PREVIEW: Pros Know Oxbows

The week in the Vidalia-Natchez area of Louisiana and Mississippi for the MLF Challenge Cup has been a special one. Thirty of the world best bass anglers have competed across an array of oxbow lakes where they had no previous experience, practice or information. As promised, the border towns and their adjacent fisheries have put the mystery back in Major League Fishing.

Yet, the most mysterious part of the week has yet to happen: the Championship Round. And for that, MLF saved the best for last, dragging the eight finalists an hour away from Natchez down several miles of dirt roads, deep into the Louisiana swamps to Honey Brake Lodge on Larto Lake.

Andy Montgomery was one of the first Championship Round pros to spring from the truck at Honey Brake Lodge to survey the scene.

“Oh, man, this looks like it could be a private lake,” he said about the magnificent lodge overlooking Larto. “This could be a real treat right here.”

Edwin Evers was the next pro to take in the scene and comment on it.

“MLF usually saves the best for last,” he said. “And usually when you drive down dirt roads like that, it’s going to be something special.”

Something special indeed. Honey Brake is a private lodge that provided exclusive access to Larto Lake for MLF; however, Larto itself is a public lake.

Formed by a dam/spillway at one end, Larto is some 2500 acres in size and roughly 8 miles in length.

“It’s another one of those horseshoe lakes,” Montgomery said. “Hopefully this one has some grass in it.”

For a guy who claimed to have zero experience on “horseshoe lakes” before his MLF week started, Montgomery has sure passed his crash course in oxbow fishing with flying colors, winning his Elimination Round, then checking out second in his Sudden Death Round.

“What I’ve learned is they all look the same on paper, but each one of these lakes is unique in its own way,” Montgomery divulged. “Some have been flatter, some have had more contour, some have had colored water, some have been clearer. Over the last couple of days I’ve learned that forage base is big deal. Is it shad? Is it bream? What size is the forage?”

 “Discovering these things throughout the day helps in making little tweaks to the lures,” he continued. “I’ll make color changes, trailer size changes, blade size changes, constantly tweaking until I find the right combination of size, color and profile. And once you find that right combo on the lure, it’s like a light switch comes on and suddenly you start getting a lot more bites.

“It’s a pretty neat process, really,” Montgomery added. “And that’s what MLF is supposed to be about: seeing how fishermen adapt and dial in their presentation to find exactly what the fish want. And once you hit the right presentation – bingo – it’s on.”

Ish Monroe will be fishing the Championship Round due his dominating performance on oxbows all week. He not only won his Elimination Round, he also was the first to check out in his Sudden Death Round.

“I’ve had a lot of repetition in the lures on my deck this week,” Monroe explained. “I might have three spinnerbaits, three frogs, two buzzbaits and several flipping baits. Even though they’re the same basic lures, they’re different colors or different sizes or the spinnerbaits have different kinds of blade combinations. That’s the nature of these oxbow fisheries. You have to keep experimenting with different tweaks until you find something that works. And they’ll let you know when you get something dialed in.”

“Every lake has been a little bit different this week,” Monroe continued. “I’ve had to change things up from day to day. And I’m aware of that going in today. I can’t just glue what worked on Bruin in my hand and force it here. This water is probably a little different color. The trees maybe a little deeper. The docks maybe shallower. There might be vegetation. I don’t know. I might start with the same style bait that worked in the other lakes, but you can bet I’ll be changing the characteristics of that bait until I get a response from the fish.”

Jacob Wheeler followed Monroe’s comments with a similar take on oxbows.

“We’ve been fishing these things all week,” Wheeler said. “Every day it’s the same: they give us a paper map with a curved line on it that looks just like the map from the day before. They all look the same until you get out there, ride around and see that each one has it’s own personality in terms of water color, water clarity, cover and forage. And all those variables impact the profile, color and action of the lures you’re throwing. On one lake a black and chartreuse maybe the deal but on the next lake they won’t touch it and it’s black and blue that trips their trigger.

“We as anglers don’t necessarily look at the water and know exactly what color or size to throw. We have to experiment with some educated guesses until the fish start reacting.

“As an example, those fish on Bruin wouldn’t bite my buzzbait. So I changed the color of the trailer and they started to nip it a little more. Then I changed the blade color and then they starting crushing it. These shallow-water fisheries like this are all about reading the fish’s reaction to your lures and then tweaking the lure increase that reaction.”

Kevin VanDam also agreed with such assessments of oxbows, adding an interesting tidbit.

“What’s really amazing about these oxbow fish is how one little change – maybe in lure color, maybe in lure size, maybe even in line size – can mean the difference in fish just nipping or following the bait to fish completely inhaling the bait. And when you dial in exactly how they want that bait, the train can leave the station pretty quickly.”