By Marty Dixon/Staff Correspondent
It’s been a few weeks since we’ve last talked, so let’s get right to it.
The fishing season is in full swing with the changing weather, and the large green ladies are moving shallow to build their house and lay their eggs. The water is warming, and the dogwood trees are blooming, so the fish have started moving shallow and eating up the petals.
This past weekend was the Gadsden Super Tournament sponsored by the City of Gadsden Parks and Recreation Department. As usual, the city put on a fine showing. Julie at Coosa Landing always does a good job, while Jen at Parks and Rec handled everything without any hitches. The turnout was pretty good, with roughly 80 teams participating.
Kris Colley and Adam Bain smoked the field with 22 pounds. Second place went to Bradley Jones and Broox Goza with 20 pounds. Local angler Kade Kitchens weighed in a seven-plus pounder for the Big Fish of the Day. Robert Mayo managed to snag a $1,500 tagged fish. Fourteen teams weighed in at least 14 pounds on the day.
Brother Butch and I managed a seventh-place finish with 16.16 pounds. We fished the blind squirrel pattern and managed to find a few acorns on the day. We caught a big fish early on, followed by a couple of squealers by 10:30. We made a snap decision to fish a shallow area near where we were. That turned into a good choice, because it turned out much like the Bruce Lee movie “Fists of Fury.” Except for us, it was “Fishes of Fury,” in that we enjoyed a 15-minute flurry of putting fish in the boat. We managed 10.5 pounds in that short period of time. It was one of the best 15 minutes of fishing I have had with my brother. We were both catching and getting the net for each other. For us, is was a shallow water bite flipping and topwater for the day. After looking at most of the fish that came across the scale, it certainly appeared to be a mostly shallow bite.
Also, right now there are some good stringers out there. The three-fish limit tournament this past Tuesday afternoon took a massive 13 pounds by Kade Kitchens to win. This weekend, the Coosa River Team Trail Tournament is on the water out of Coosa Landing this Saturday with over 100 boats competing. I fully expect to see some heavy stringers during the day. Our fishing club is also fishing on Saturday, so add another 25 boats to that mix.
I’d like to mention that it was good to see some old friends and friendly fishing adversaries this past Saturday. I finally got the chance to meet Jim New, a fellow fisherman on the river. We’ve chatted online a few times and I finally got to put a face to the messages and words of encouragement he has passed on to me. We caught up some and are look forward to sitting down and talk fishing sometime soon. It was also great to see Jamey Loyd and Vern in that new Aymas boat.
I hope this article finds everyone well. God Bless and tight lines to all (there are plenty of tight lines; I just hope that the fish are slightly smaller than ours at weight-in)!
Marty Dixon is a 1982 Sardis High School graduate and retired high school educator and coach. He was head coach of the Gadsden State women’s basketball team from 2015 to 2019. He and his wife Texann live in Gadsden. He can be contacted at fishn4funin02@yahoo.com and the Neely Henry Bass Fishing page on Facebook.