One beautiful sunny and mild morning this week I thought “what a perfect day to practice my swing and hit a few balls at my favorite golf course.” When I arrived at the course, I was very disappointed to find that the course picked this day to work on tees and greens and so the front nine was closed to duffers like me. But instead of heading home, the fisherman in me saw a perfect opportunity to cast for some fish that may have never seen a lure before. Luckily I always have a fishing pole and a few lures in the trunk of my car. I asked the folks at the clubhouse if it would be OK to fish on the ponds while the course was closed. It was my lucky day.

Using a small beetle spin with a white twister tail, I caught five bass from the first pond near the tee of the third hole. The bass ranged from 12 inches to a very fat three pound largemouth.

The second pond I hit was a small three acre lake between the fourth and seventh holes. Being late winter, there was no brush growing along the shore line but with fairly clear water I was able to notice a few brush piles under the water’s surface in three feet of water. Boom, boom, boom! I hooked four bass in four casts and managed to land three. All of the fish weighed more than two pounds. I continued to walk around the lake picking up two more small bass. Back at the brush pile I pulled in three more bass with the biggest being four pounds.

On the next cast I hooked a tree. It was a nice size tree but not what I was looking for. Unfortunately, the tree seemed to eat my lure and I spent the next 20 minutes using an array of broken tree branches to retrieve my favorite lure.

I guess I made too much noise retrieving the bait because I didn’t catch another fish from that brush pile. I continued my hike along the ponds and picked up five more small bass, none of which were over 12 inches but still fun to reel in. By this time it was 11a.m. and the course was getting ready to open for the afternoon. I managed to catch two more bass from the first pond near the tee of number three. All of the fish I caught were released to fight another day.

Twenty one bass were caught on the front nine. Now if I could only shoot that well when golfing. What a great day!

Sorry no pictures, I normally don’t take a camera to the golf course and if you have ever seen me play you would know why.