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Fishing Stories from Ned Kehde |
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Submitted by Ned Kehde - Mar. 27, 2001 Warmer weather brings out anglers and fish at Coffey County Lake On the first day of spring in eastern Kansas, many thermometers broached 60 degrees and the wind didn't stir, allowing the glassy surfaces of the lakes and ponds to brilliantly reflect the ultramarine sky and absorb the sun's potent rays. It was the first balmy day of 2001. And the tree frogs greeted the warmth with choruses of glee, and fishermen became jubilant, too. Even though it was a weekday, many anglers, who had been beleaguered by the longest winter in recent memory, found the warmth to be so seductive that they took the workday off and went fishing. Thus when Cameron Roth of Berryton joined Kevin Davis of Lawrence at Coffey County Lake at 2:00 p.m., the lake was teeming with fishermen. Davis is a veteran bass angler with an extraordinary talent for catching shallow-water bass, and Roth is 26 years old and a newcomer to the sport. But despite Roth's youth and inexperience, he possesses a natural talent for catching bass, says Davis. Until a year ago, Roth categorized himself as a nonchalant angler who primarily plied farm ponds, the waterways immediately below dams, and, as a youngster growing up in Burlington, he illicitly fished Coffey County Lake's southwestern shoreline at night long before it was open the public. Then out of the blue, he became afflicted with an acute case of bass fishing fever. The depth of Roth's passion is witnessed by the fact that he practices pitching a 3/8-ounce bass jig into a cup during his lunch and work breaks at the Lawrence Paper Company. To placate his new piscatorial yearnings and to learn the tactics of the other bass fishermen, Roth joined Sunflower Bassmasters and Lawrence Fishing and Outdoor Club. In addition, he began fishing the amateur divisions of the bass tournaments staged by Central Pro-Am, Heartland Tournament Association, and Wal-Mart Bass Fishing League, and Roth quickly mastered a variety of methods that the savviest bass fishermen from around the Midwest employ. And during his afternoon afloat with Davis at Coffey, Roth exhibited some of his prowess for catching smallmouth bass by probing the lake's many rocky shores and jetties with a 5/16-ounce, greenish-brown Eakin's Pro Model Jig, a brightly colored Smithwick Rogue, a crawfish-colored Storm Wiggle Wart and a 3/8-ounce, white spinnerbait with two gold blades. Roth worked water as cool as 49 degrees and as warm as 60. At several shallow spots the water was stained with about a foot of visibility, but the water at deeper areas was clear with more than four feet of visibility. Along the deep rocks and in the clear water, Roth employed the Eakin's jig, which caught the fancy of a score of smallmouth. In the stained waters around the shallow rocks and where the water temperature exceeded 55 degrees, Roth enticed the smallmouth to engulf the white spinnerbait that he retrieved at a moderate pace. And Davis used a Rogue at all the areas and caught smallmouth aplenty. As sunset approached and the shadows grew long, the bass began to shun Roth's jig and spinnerbait. So he picked a casting rod that sported a gaudily painted Rogue, and he and Davis finished the day by twitching their Rogues along a rocky jetty in 12 to 15 feet of water. And by the time they had made their last casts, 56 fish had been lifted over the gunnels of Davis' boat. |
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