Brad Crum and I headed to Vandalia Lake to fish the Vandalia Sportfishing and Conservation tournament. I got onto some quality fish in practice and the game plan was to fish deep for 4 to 6 quality bites with mainly a 3/4 oz Pig Sticker Football Jig. I told Brad we were going to be fishing deep even in the morning and we were not going to go looking for an early morning shallow bite to start the day. We blasted off and headed down the lake to my first stop a long point that fell off into about 20 feet of water on the end. We made about 20 or so casts and I finally hooked up with a fish about 2 and a half pounds on a 3/4oz Pig Sticker Scrawler Jig in Black and Blue. The fish jump out of the water and the jig shot out his mouth. I didn’t feel all that bad because with the fish I had been on I thought I would be culling that fish anyways. We zipped on down to my 2nd spot just a deep brush filled sea wall and I was able to whack a 3 and a half pounder on the jig. I just pulled the jig through the brush and he started swimming off with it.

Without another bite we headed on down the lake and came to a large submerged stump field that I had found in practice and Brad was able to catch a short off the spot on a sweet beaver. With no takers we zipped up to another deep brush filled spot that I had caught a fish off of in practice and I was able to jack a 4lber on the big football and get him in the boat. Feeling a little relieved at this point to have about 7 pounds in the boat with two fish we made the move down lake to another deep spot I had found in practice and Brad was able to connect with a 2 and a half pounder on the big football jig and get him in the boat. We’d worked our jigs for a while on the spot when my bait just felt mushy and I set the hook into a great fish that ended up going 5.31lbs to end our 4 fish day for a total weight of 14.72lbs and 2nd place. We never could get the 5th fish in the boat and it wouldn’t have mattered anyways because first place was monstrous 5 fish sack that went 23lbs! The funny thing is that big bass of the tournament wasn’t even included in that. There were three fish over 6lbs weighed in and two including mine over 5.  The top three places all reported catching their fish deep on a jig. This year has been a tough one. 2nd place is nice but I just want to be able to put the cap on one of these tournaments and win! Looks like I’ll have to wait till next time.

If you’re going to fish a big jig you need the right tackle. I was using a 7 foot medium heavy AiRRUS Co-Matrix Rod which is just a whoopin' stick. The rod is super strong and gives you the edge in moving fish out of deep piles and getting them in the boat.  I fished my jigs on 25lb Gamma High Performance Co-Polymer Line. The line has tremendous strength and cast-ability which are two things I look for in a line for my deep jig fishing. If you haven’t given Gamma a try you need to! This is a great line!

The skirt on my jig was a living image black and blue skirt that I had created with the Naked Bait Company Skirt Expander. The Jigs I was throwing had around 100 strands in them to create that big fish catching profile. For my trailer I used a big old school Zoom Salty Chunk. For some reason a lot of anglers have gone away from this trailer but there is no better style of trailer to give your bait that bigger profile. I think a lot of fish are starting to see too many of the crazy leg trailers out there and that type of trailer gives the jig a slow more subtle action. I’m always trying to study other anglers and what they throw and I try to throw something a little different that the fish haven’t seen.