Yesterday I drove to Port Gibson to fish with Ben in a Lake that has been managed for large bass for years. Ben is my children’s age and was truly thoughtful to ask an old guy to come fishing. The lake is in the loess hills west of Port Gibson, a straight up, straight down environment. As we drove back to the lake the road ran down the ridges and you could look almost straight down on either side. It was perfectly beautiful country. The lake is about 30 acres and deep with numerous coves. We started out fishing with a DT-6 and caught a fish in the first five minutes. The lake has Florida bass in it and they are healthy . Part of our job was to remove small fish, since the lake is intensively managed. As we were signing up there was a tally on a board of how many pounds had been taken out. As we worked around the lake you could see that the above the water topography translated into an almost straight down drop below the water. We fished with the DT-6’s mostly, although Ben caught some on a worm and I caught a few on a DT-10. I made a cast on a point in the shadows and got a sharp lick but no hookup. On the second cast a bite resulted in a powerful fish that took off for the middle of the lake. It made another run then turned and ran for the boat which it decided to dive under. I was trying to keep my rod from hitting the side of the boat and barely succeeding when the hooks pulled out of the fish’s mouth. We never got a glimpse of the fish but as strong of a fish as I have ever had on. Disappointment, but that’s just fishing. Maybe there’s another one around. We kept fishing and the bite was steady all afternoon. We quit at dark with 26 bass in the cooler and 4 more released the largest of which weighed 4 1/2. This one was a good representative of the afternoon.

Ben spent the night and returned this morning for two hours and caught 17, 4 of which were in the 5 pound range. Caught a few on a spook but most on a crank bait. I had a great time. What a wonderful place!