Boyd Duckett stood at the water’s edge of Great Pond, studying minnows roaming the shallows while a warm, cloudy morning dawned over day three of the Elimination Round of the Major League Fishing 2019 Summit Cup.
“I don’t remember this lake,” Duckett said, looking into the water. “I don’t think I fished it the last time we were here. But I like the looks of it. It’s not a fast dropping lake right off the bank; it looks shallow and flat here at the ramp. I see lots of shallow vegetation and pads back there, so it’s probably got some largemouth. And it’s got all kinds of life in it. Even right here at the boat ramp I see minnows, bream and little perch cruising around; it looks pretty healthy to me.”
“I get these Maine lakes confused with the Cup we fished in Grand Rapids (Minnesota),” he added. “All these lakes kind of run together in my head because they’re all so good.”
Duckett admitted that the activity he was watching in the shallows looked inviting to explore the largemouth card right out of the gate on day three, but he knew better in MLF Cups in this part of the country.
“One thing I’ve learned in these deals up here is to use your ride through period to do your graphing for smallmouth,” he revealed. “Graphing around once lines in has already started is too costly. Every minute you don’t have a lure in the water up here, you’re getting behind and it happens fast. If I want to scout largemouth water, I can do that while I’m fishing and keeping a lure wet. But you can’t exactly graph around on the big motor and fish at the same time, so using the ride through time when no one can make a cast to graph is critical.”
Up in the parking lot, other anglers fishing the final day of the Elimination Round were prepping their tackle while trying to recall if they had fished Great Pond in MLF’s previous visit to Maine.
Gary Klein remembers Great Pond well, although he never made a cast in it.
“The last time we were here I got eliminated in the first round in another lake, so I never fished this one,” Klein recalled. “But I came back here later in the week to do a photo shoot – it was an aerial shoot of us running our boats on the water. I never made a cast here, but you know, as fishermen we are always fishing with our heads, and I remember the way this lake broke off on the graph on some of these offshore shoals – that’s the kind of thing that sticks in my mind.”
Klein then identified some clear-cut goals he had for his second go around in Maine.
“I want to cover more water at a quicker pace and not be satisfied with a few bites and the status quo,” he said. “These are northern fish: if you get a bait in front of them with the right presentation, they’re going to bite; they’re going to let you know where they live. So there is no use in waiting on a bite in these kinds of fisheries – you’ve got to go them – and if they’re not there, then keep moving.”
“Also, I’ve never won an Elimination day in Major League Fishing and I want to change that,” he added. “I know six guys advance and move ahead, but I want to do more than that – I want to win a day. To do that, you can’t have any voids or lulls in your day, especially in this part of the country. I’ve got to be catching them all day long – there is no room for a one-hour void in the day where I’m not getting bit. I’ve got to pick up the pace and avoid the lulls to get this done.”