Fishing Tips From Zell Roland

Spring 1995
By Debbie Zeiner

There's an old saying that goes, "If a fisherman's lips are moving, he's lying." That may or may not be true about a lot of anglers, but if you ever see bass pro Zell Rowland's lips moving, you'd better listen.

Rowland was the first speaker in the Wichita State University's Department of Continuing Education course, "Bass Fishing Strategies" on Thursday, February 2, and held the audience of 70-80 fishing nuts spellbound for nearly three hours.

I must confess, when I first picked up Rowland at the airport the afternoon before his class I wondered what the evening course would be like.

Don't get me wrong. I met a confident, decent and outspoken angler with an outstanding reputation, but a very tired and seemingly shy fellow. Not someone I expected to hold us all in the palm of his hand for hours that evening.

Boy, can first impressions be wrong! Rowland was as much of a machine in the classroom as he is on the water. Apparently he loves talking about his love of topwater fishing nearly as much as he loves practicing his particular art form.

Rowland's recurrent message was practice, practice, practice. He suggests fishing exclusively with one particular bait at a time, on all sizes of line, until you learn exactly how that bait reacts to each line size, then move on to another lure and learn it. He said every bait has a particular purpose, use and reaction, and most anglers don't spend the time learning all they can about their arsenals of tackle.

Of particular interest to local tournament anglers was Rowland's story about who scares him at tournaments. "If I see a guy walking to my boat with seven or eight rods under his arm, and tackle boxes and bags in his other arm, I know I've got him whipped. Because he obviously doesn't have the confidence he needs to follow his own plan. I can whip him all day by changing lures and watching him scramble through his tackle to try and find something similar to what I'm throwing, which will never happen."

"But the guy that shows up at my boat with just a few rods and a paper bag of lures scares me to death. Because he knows just what he's doing and just what he needs that day!"

Rowland described topwater fishing as rather like an artist painting a picture. With 9 to 12 inches of slack line, he likened the sweeps and strokes of an angler to move bait on the water to the strokes an artist makes on canvas.

Some of the topwater artist's tips were:

- Don't pay too much attention to colors of lures that don't match a shad or a frog.

- Hook points should be perfectly round, so that fish can't throw your hooks as easy.

- Paint your treble hooks black or brown. Fish aren't stupid. They've never seen a frog or shad with shiny, silver legs!

- Remove your buzzbait skirts to make them easier to cast in the wind.

- Insert a bit of plastic worm in topwater baits such as The Rat to make them more bouyant.

- Tie feather trailers on all of your topwater baits.

Of course, Rowland spent time explaining the differences between three or four generations of Pop R and other topwater baits, and his secrets of sanding and tuning them.

Rowland spends over 250 days a year on the road, and last year he spent over $75,000.00 in travel expenses. He said if his sponsors know he's home during the months of January or February, they call him out on the road again. It's a very tough schedule for him and his loved ones, and some days he thinks about what it might be like to be a guide again. For now, however, those of us who were fortunate were able to spend some time with this interesting, articulate angler.

NOTE: The four part course, "Bass Fishing Strategies" which was offered by Wichita State University Continuing Ed Department featured Zell Rowland, Kevin VanDam, David Fritts and Rich Tauber. "Bass Fishing Strategies" has been inducted into the National Freshwater Fishing Hall of Fame.

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