Part 1

“I didn’t throw back in there, Stan,” my partner said as he pointed toward an opening in the submerged trees along the shoreline.

I nodded in appreciation and a couple of heartbeats later my spinnerbait splashed down in the area he had indicated.  I took maybe a half dozen turns of my reel handles when my rod tip jerked down.  “There he is!” I hollered.

He was there all right and for the next few moments he went wherever he wanted.  Our Mexican guide stood ready with the landing net as I finally managed to get that slab sided brute close to the boat.

For a heartbeat the fish rolled near the surface.  “Grande!” the guide grunted.  My gut tied itself into a clinch knot as the fish ran under the boat, then came back out almost close enough to net.

Then just as fast as it had hit, the fish was gone.  I hadn’t broken anything.  As far as I could tell I hadn’t done anything wrong.  The fish just came unpinned.  I lifted my Stan’s Spin spinnerbait out of the water and held it up so I could examine it closely.  As I anticipated, it had a few battle scars but was still fishable.

I enjoy tinkering with my lures and sometimes it pays off.  This Mack's Lure spinnerbait catches fish just the way it comes out of the box, but now and then I've made minor changes that have paid off big time.

I didn’t, however, continue to throw it.  Instead I slid it back into a compartment of my traveling tackle box.  I had later plans for that lure.  I dug another one just like it out of another compartment, clipped into the snap I had on my 30-pound test line and went back to fishing.

It was 7 p.m. and the shadows had lengthened on Mexico’s Lake El Salto.  My pal Mike Pedersen was in the bow seat of the Anglers Inn bass boat.  Whenever he’s fishing up front Mike always leaves spots for me to be the first to throw into.  I do the same for him when I fish from the bow.

“There’s another opening about like the one where you hooked that big one,” Mike said.  I cast my new Stan’s Spin into the spot he indicated.  The strike didn’t come quite as quickly this time around, but it was an even more savage hit when it came.

“There he is!” I hollered again.  I suppose I should have been saying there “she” is.  When largemouth get to be the size of the one that had just grabbed my spinnerbait they are invariably females. 

I've taken bass larger than than the beauty I'm holding here on a Stan's Spin spinnerbait.

I glanced at the guide as the fish cleared the submerged timber where it had been holding and flashed near the surface.  “Otro grande,” (another big one) he said softly as he leaned over the side of the boat with the net.  A couple of heartbeats later he had it in the net and I started breathing again.

And a big one it was.  When we got it on the Boga Grip scales I always carry to El Salto it weighed 10-pounds, 4-ounces.  After a couple of quick pictures and a couple of “high fives” with both Mike and our guide that lunker was eased back into Mexico’s best bass lake.

I again inspected my lure.  Like the Stan’s Spin that had hooked the first trophy bass that came unpinned, this one also had some battle scars.  The top arm of the lure was bent a bit, but like the first it was still fishable.

I didn’t, however, continue to throw it.  I slid it back into the same compartment where I’d stored the first one.  Both of those spinnerbaits are hanging from a bulletin board that’s right up there in front of my computer as I write this column.

Get around a river where smallmouth are holding in and around fast water and a Mack's Lure spinnerbait with its easy-turning Mylar blade is a great lure to use. This is one of a bunch I took out of Oregon's Umpqua River.

There’s a reason for that.  Whenever I catch a really good bass, and I’ve nailed a bunch of them on the Stan’s Spin, I set aside the lures they smack.  Those lures are memory makers and that’s reason enough to keep the lure that gets them, but it’s not the whole story.

Every now and then I make changes in some of the lures I throw.  I had done that with the two Stan Spin’s I’ve been telling you about.  They are changes you can make in your own spinnerbaits if you choose to do so.

I’ll get into the details of what those changes were in my next column.  Watch for it beginning Jan. 1

-To Be Continued-