Pickwick spotlight shines on co-angler winner
By Greg McCain

Co-anglers are at the mercy of their boaters in fishing tournaments. Boaters occasionally concentrate their efforts on catching bass to such an extent that their back-of-the-boat anglers are left to make random casts to fish-less waters.

Bill Spencer, co-angler winner of the Alabama B.A.S.S. Nation (ABN) tournament on Pickwick Lake Saturday (June 1), said he considers himself lucky to have a boating partner like Randall Carter. Spencer and Carter, both from Maplesville, have paired up in most of the ABN tournaments over the last few years, and two co-angler wins are the result for Spencer, who also took top honors at Lake Eufaula last year.

Spencer had an exceptional day from the back deck Saturday on Pickwick, boating two bass over five pounds and a third just over four. His three-fish limit weighed 14.14, among the best totals weighed by an ABN co-angler over the last 10 years.

Logan Parks, the first-year B.A.S.S. Elite Series pro and former Auburn University angler, repeated his Pickwick win from the State Championship last fall, easily claiming the boater division. His total of 22.71 was almost six pounds better than Noah Godwin (Pro Line Bassmasters), who had 17.00. Joe Lay (Lake Tuscaloosa Bassmasters), who controls the boater Angler of the Year standings, finished third with 16.38.

Much of the buzz during the weigh-in was about Spencer’s mega bag, however.

“It feels awesome,” he said. “I would have never expected it. All the credit goes to Randall. Randall. He puts in a ton of time to put us on fish. I’m thankful for him doing that. I’m also thankful to my girlfriend. It doesn’t matter if I have a bad tournament or a good tournament. She’s there 100 percent.”

Spencer and Carter (both of Wiregrass Bassmasters), who also teamed to win the total boat weight category in the tournament with almost 30 combined pounds, endured the early morning rain to land most of their fish in the opening hours of the tournament.

“During the rain storm, we caught pretty much everything that we caught,” Spencer said. “Once the rain ended and the cold front started blowing through, it slowed down drastically. We would get a bite maybe every 45 minutes to an hour. Before the last one I weighed in, I probably went an hour and a half without a bite.”

Spencer said he and Carter caught some good fish on Carter’s custom-made shaky heads early, and “I swapped over to a Carolina rig and caught everything that I weighed in, plus culled four or five times.” They fished only “a short run” downstream from the launch area at McFarland Park in Florence.

He used a Big Bite Baits Fighting Frog on the Carolina rig, opting to change from his normal four-inch bait to the three-inch version during the tournament. He said the bass seemed to eat the smaller frog better, which made hooksets easier.

Spencer said another advantage of fishing with Carter surfaced during the course of the day. Carter, whose Fish Life Fish Care Products (http://www.fishlifefishcareproducts.com) are an ABN sponsor, put his own products to use in order to keep their fish healthy.

“By 8:40, we had two limits in the livewell, two big limits,” Spencer said. “He had two fish, and I had one that were sort of sitting sideways. No doubt without his fin clips and livewell treatment we would have lost fish. We did not have to worry about losing any.”

On the boater side, Parks took advantage of his knowledge of Pickwick, targeting a gizzard-shad spawn early and then working deep-water ledges later in the day. Parks has visited the Tennessee River fishery repeatedly during his high school and college careers and calls Pickwick his “favorite lake.”

His five-fish limit included the Academy Sports + Outdoors Big Fish, a 5.47 largemouth.

“It all came together,” said Parks, who has criss-crossed the country early this year with the Elite Series. “It wasn’t totally unexpected. I really like to fish out here. It’s my favorite lake.”

Even so, Parks said his practice was tough, but he keyed in on a shallow area where the gizzard shad were still spawning.

“I did find one spot early in the morning where I saw some fish blowing up on bait,” Parks said. “I figured out there was something of a gizzard spawn up shallow. We started there and caught a few throwing a (bladed jig), a Berkley Slobberknocker.

“It was a good way to get started. I had 15 or 16 lbs. when I left there and then started running ledges. I pulled up on the right one about 2 o’clock.”

Parks said caught ledge fish on “a little bit of everything,” but a key was his use of a prototype Berkley swimbait. The Berkley CullShad is available in a rigged model, but the prototype is an unrigged version that anglers can rig to fit their needs.

“I caught some key fish on that and some others on typical ledge stuff,” Parks said.

Parks, who said he will try to fish the ABN state championship on Lay Lake in the fall, said his Elite schedule allowed him to fish the Pickwick tournament.

“I love coming here,” he said. “I’ll take advantage of any opportunity that I get to come here and fish, especially at this time of year when the bass are offshore. I love fishing the Tennessee River in the summer.”

For Goodwin, second in the boater AOY standings in his initial year of competing with the ABN, the day was one of firsts. He enjoyed his first-ever trip to Pickwick, where he caught his first smallmouth bass. Normally found fishing on the Coosa River, Godwin caught a 3.70 smallmouth among his limit.

“We started on a shallow place about mid-lake where we thought we could catch a few keepers,” Godwin said. “The wind had sort of messed it up.”

“We moved to a flat with isolated cover. We would get about one bite an hour. Luckily I caught a 3.70 and a four-pounder and a few more keepers. We didn’t catch many fish. I made a small cull on my last cast.”

Godwin added that he caught “all of them on a dropshot. Some of them you could see, but most of the time, we were just casting to cover.”

Prather, the second-place boater, fished his second ABN tournament, sharing the boat with his son, John Tyler Prather. He had three fish that weighed 11.68, including a key big fish late in the day.

“We caught them right off the bat this morning on a spinnerbait,” Bill Prather said. “Both of us had our limit by 7 o’clock this morning.

“I probably had about 9 lbs. I culled on up later on in the morning and didn’t catch another keeper until about 30 minutes before we came in. That’s when I caught my big fish, a big cull.”

The big fish, which weighed over five pounds, bit a Texas-rigged worm.

Finishing behind Parks, Godwin, and Lay among boaters were Walter Orr (Shotgun Sports Supply, 15.99); Caleb Swaim (Belgreen Bass Club, 15.90); John Tyler Prather (Carbon Hill Bass Club, 15.43); Terry Ezzell (Belgreen Bass Club, 15.30); Jeff Gilliam (West Alabama Bass Fishermen, 15.24); Carter (Wiregrass Bassmasters, 15.12); and David Thornton (Belgreen Bass Club, 14.83).

Following Spencer and Prather in the co-angler standings were Chad Macks (LA Po Boys, 10.73); Tyler Weeks (Belgreen Bass Club, 10.49); Mason Laurin (Troy University, 10.00); Shannon Oliver (Belgreen Bass Club, 9.40); Sam Jackson (West Alabama Bass Fishermen, 8.71); Ryan Turner (Wiregrass Bassmasters, 7.87); Dale Westmoreland (New Line Bass Club, 7.83); and Gary Borden (Wiregrass Bassmasters, 7.58). With his solid finish, Westmoreland also maintained his co-angler of the year lead. Macks is second.

In the total boat weight category, the Prathers followed Carter and Spencer. Other qualifiers for the team portion of the state tournament were Ezzell and Anthony McKee; Randy Sparks and Oliver; David Thornton and James Thornton; Ferlin Weeks and Tyler Weeks, and Jarret Brown  and Chris Brown.

Other winners Saturday included Mark Edmonds, who won the Academy gift card drawing, and Sam Jackson, who earned the Airport Marine Fishin’ 4 a Cure (F4AC) bonus. His partner, Jeff Gilliam, was the second-highest finisher among F4AC participants. ABN competitors pay $25 per tournament or $100 for the year to participate in F4AC with the money going to support Children’s of Birmingham. Through the years, ABN members have contributed about $340,000 to help fight childhood diseases at the hospital.

President Eddie Plemons thanks all the sponsors who support the ABN schedule. In addition to Academy, Airport Marine, and Fish Life Fish Care Products, they include Impulse Lithium batteries, AmFirst BassCash, Office Partners, Halo Rods, Radicull Culling Devices, Davis Bait Co., George Paint and Body, BassCats Boats, Nitro Boats, Triton Boats, Mercury, Motor Guide, Lowrance, NetBait, Shell, Hammer Rods, Shelby County, Strike Zone Lures, Charlie’s BBQ, the Rod Glove, T-H Marine, Power-Pole, and Alabama Hosting.

The Pickwick tournament wraps up the regular-season qualifying events for the ABN. The State Championship will be held Oct. 25-26 on Lay Lake out of the Beeswax ramp.

Photo link: https://flic.kr/s/aHBqjBt6TT

Greg McCain is a freelance writer from Russellville, AL, and a member of the Belgreen Bass Club. In addition to producing content for this website, his credits include articles in Georgia Outdoor News, the ACC Crappie Stix blog, the Cornfield Fishing Gear website, CrappieNOW online magazine, and Great Days Outdoors.