Pre-fishing for NCCATTS tourny

Hit Tillery with high hopes Friday night. Just wanted to see if they were still in the area...They were. Can't wait for tourny Saturday night. This flatty was all scarred up, the ones I been catching have been healed up but not this guy.


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Nice fish.
Looks like you are on them.

Yes sir, they are headed down the lake. We didn't catch but 5 fish all night. Alot of the bait is suspended in deep water down the lake and the blues have followed suit. They were not around my hole like they have been, and when I went down river I found out why lol. Tried suspending baits over the channel in the morning with no takers, we did find a lot of standing timber. Some of the trees were 40 ft tall in 60 fow.
 

oldest school

Old Mossy Horns
Just tell me you "saved them" and didnt get greedy before the tourney.

Or maybe that doesnt matter on cats but on stupid little fish like bass it's not a great idea to lean on them before the money is in play.

Good Luck and keep us posted. i love to see big fish pics.
 
We didn't stay in that spot long and we rolled, just wanted to test the waters. They will have all week to replenish. I can say out of the big fish, we have not caught the same fish twice, not this year at least. I've got a few tricks up my sleeve for back up lol. I CPR all fish over 10 lbs, and 99 percent of the small ones too. I may keep three eaters a year.
 

oldest school

Old Mossy Horns
We didn't stay in that spot long and we rolled, just wanted to test the waters. They will have all week to replenish. I can say out of the big fish, we have not caught the same fish twice, not this year at least. I've got a few tricks up my sleeve for back up lol. I CPR all fish over 10 lbs, and 99 percent of the small ones too. I may keep three eaters a year.
smart choices it seems to me.
on not catching the same one twice, they get educated or move alot?
 
smart choices it seems to me.
on not catching the same one twice, they get educated or move alot?

I think they move around alot myself, they move with the seasons. They been coming off the spawn so they about done up river, you can always catch fish up there but most fish follow that bait back down in late summer.
 

oldest school

Old Mossy Horns
Got it. Just asking cause i dont know.
Do the bigger ones show signs of being caught? have to relate it to other species; so asking do they show hook marks like trout or green trout?
in your opinion is there enough pressure on them to see the effect of releasing them?
 
I've caught fish with other people rigs in there mouth before. I've caught the same fish twice a few times that I know of, fish had certain scars or marks that made them stand out. I see some fish that you can tell have been caught but it's few and far between so they must heal pretty fast. There is lots and lots of pressure on them, more so in small lakes like Tillery and Badin where they are just under 5000 acres, people over harvesting a small lake like that can really hurt the lake. Places like Buggs Island and Gaston are much bigger and can stand to have more fish removed imo, CPR works and I hope more people learn about it and do there part at least with these trophy cats. Takes a long time to grow a 50 lber and all the fish don't have the genetics to even get that big. The big ones are the better spawners and lay more eggs too.
 

catfishrus

Twelve Pointer
Stick to them flatheads and you will have a more consistant bite over blues on tourney day. Blues don't like boat traffic and them summer time Saturday night tourneys generally don't produce the big blues....too much boat traffic. Granted anything is possible...just speaking from my experience. Mr. flathead don't mind the boat traffic thus why highrock set the record back when it was a 5 fish limit for 166 lbs. Tillery could break that record today but everything is 2-3 fish limits today. I fished the first NCCATS tourney ever on Tillery...I was looking for a 125 lbs 5 fish to win it(the lake was very capable of producing that)...we placed second with 5 fish for 24.55 lbs and missed big fish by 1/2 pound with a 9.5 lbers...so you never know about them blues. We finished second in the mastercatters event once to a 3 fish stringer of blues that went 119.8 lbs on Tillery. I seen two channel cats win at badin on a blue bird sunny day once too..out of 25 teams.

Omar Edwards put the drive in me to tourney fish years ago at badin….we didn't know nothing but Omar and his two partners weighed in 129 lbs of flatheads for a 5 fish limit in my first ever tourney. That set a fire in me and I started the mastercatters series several years later 2007, so we could compete through the winter months. I fished enough to see Omars record broke with another 5 fish stringer of 4 flatheads and one blue from badin one night that weighed in around 143lbs. I really enjoyed it until I hurt my back...things went down hill from there. I miss the tourneys at times but its not worth the back pain anymore.

Good luck to you!
 
Stick to them flatheads and you will have a more consistant bite over blues on tourney day. Blues don't like boat traffic and them summer time Saturday night tourneys generally don't produce the big blues....too much boat traffic. Granted anything is possible...just speaking from my experience. Mr. flathead don't mind the boat traffic thus why highrock set the record back when it was a 5 fish limit for 166 lbs. Tillery could break that record today but everything is 2-3 fish limits today. I fished the first NCCATS tourney ever on Tillery...I was looking for a 125 lbs 5 fish to win it(the lake was very capable of producing that)...we placed second with 5 fish for 24.55 lbs and missed big fish by 1/2 pound with a 9.5 lbers...so you never know about them blues. We finished second in the mastercatters event once to a 3 fish stringer of blues that went 119.8 lbs on Tillery. I seen two channel cats win at badin on a blue bird sunny day once too..out of 25 teams.

Omar Edwards put the drive in me to tourney fish years ago at badin….we didn't know nothing but Omar and his two partners weighed in 129 lbs of flatheads for a 5 fish limit in my first ever tourney. That set a fire in me and I started the mastercatters series several years later 2007, so we could compete through the winter months. I fished enough to see Omars record broke with another 5 fish stringer of 4 flatheads and one blue from badin one night that weighed in around 143lbs. I really enjoyed it until I hurt my back...things went down hill from there. I miss the tourneys at times but its not worth the back pain anymore.

Good luck to you!



I learned along time ago that targeting blues is really tough in the summer, they follow the bait and the bait is spread out through the lake. A blue will and can be anywhere this time of year imo. Ive saw 40 lbs win and 15 lbs get third place in cold front conditions but I've only been fishing tournaments for a couple years so my experience is limited. I'll be targeting Flathead from May till Sept then I'll strart chasing some blues but will still fish for flatties up till they quit biting which is sometimes in mid December for me. There are alot of guys who can catch blues all summer but for me they are a by catch when I'm after flatties. I've not yet learned that trick yet. To me Flathead is the top predator and they just more fun to target and they fight so much harder than a blue does. Plus I love catching perch so gathering my live bait is just as much fun as fishing. I'm excited for Saturday, we got a good game plan so we will see how it pans out. There will be alot of really good fisherman there, It will probably take 75 plus lbs to win with two fish.
 

Mr.Gadget

Old Mossy Horns
I think they move around alot myself, they move with the seasons. They been coming off the spawn so they about done up river, you can always catch fish up there but most fish follow that bait back down in late summer.
So how did it go?
Land any big ones and what did it take to win?
 
Yep, it was 74.5 for the win. 2nd place had big fish with 41.2 lb wopper. I came in 7th out of 30 boats with a 27 and 25 lb flats. There were a lot of quality fish caught Saturday night. Three fish over 40 weighed in and lots over 30lbs. Next one is in three weeks on Highrock.
 
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