Tag: Billington Sea

With Three Minutes to Spare…

Nine down, one to go!

This morning, twenty-four brave souls launched into the cold, wind, and rain on Billington Sea. It wasn’t pleasant out there today, especially those first few hours before the rain let up and the clouds broke, but we powered through it.

I started my day in the back “pond,” looking for rock piles and a big rocky flat. It’s been a few years since I fished Billington, so they weren’t quite where I remembered them being. I managed to catch two as I puttered around looking for them. Finally, I saw a swan stand up and flap its wings, which pointed out the flat. I caught my third and fourth fish there, then my fifth came close by on a point.

At this point I had 60 inches and was sitting in third place, with John Ferreira in first, and Mike Morcone in second. At 1 PM, when I turned off the standings, we were still the top three, in that order.

But as usual, by the end of the tournament, things changed…

Mike Morcone couldn’t find any upgrades, so his limit of 13-inchers wasn’t enough to keep him in second place, but it was enough for fifth place and a little scratch.

Making a late-day run, Bruno Casagrande twitched his crankbait (seriously, I thought he was throwing a jerkbait or a blade bait) and enticed a few bass to hoist him up into fourth place! Whatever works, right?

Spending most of the day drop-shotting in what we call “Don’s Spot,” John Ferreira looked poised to win his second event of the year, as his 71.50 was well ahead of the rest of us for a good part of the day…

But I crushed those dreams when I caught two upgrades by trolling a white chatterbait, bumping me up to 72.25 and first place! Hell yeah! Wait…what?

Just as I was quasi-celebrating my victory (“quasi” because I suck at math), I bumped into Ryan Pierce, who had just caught his fifth bass, a 15.75. That fish, caught at 2:57 PM, with three minutes to spare, launched Ryan from seventh place right into the winner’s circle with a resounding 76.50!

Congrats to everyone, but especially Ryan, who notched his first MAKB win! And he did it from an old sit-in! Great job, buddy. Very happy for you!

The lunkers for this event went to Gerard Elias, who nabbed a 19.75 largie fairly early. Honorable mention goes to Sean Dwyer, who had a 19.50 that was just a sliver away from 19.75.

Joseph Daddeo landed the day’s pickerel lunker, with a state-pin-size beast that took up the entire 26-inches on the Ketch board, and then some.

Good stuff, fellas!

No one caught a smallmouth, so I will refund everyone.

Take a gander at the final results over on TourneyX.

I appreciate everyone coming out, especially in that kind of weather. Full field! Awesome.

And a shout out to those who joined us for the first time—Steve Hedges, Mike Morcone, Doug Wiebers, Josh Carvalho, and Blake Navarrette. Sorry for not properly introducing myself; it’s a bit hectic in the morning and we haven’t done any post-event results or anything like that in person this year, so the end of the day isn’t like it usually is, with everyone hanging out, talking smack and whatnot.

Hopefully we can get back to that next season. I definitely miss it.

Anyway, our final event of the regular season is next Saturday at Snipatuit Pond in Rochester. Registration for it will go live tomorrow night at 7 PM on TourneyX. Set your alarms!


The Season Opens with Strong Wind and Big Waves

Our first tournament of 2017 is in the books.

The day started off fairly nice. A little chilly, a little windy, but comfortable. Then it just got worse and worse, and I’m pretty sure there were two-foot waves at the end of the day. Crazy.

Anyway, we had 15 anglers. The bite was fairly tough, but fish were caught.

Taking third place and lunker: Donald Davis. His five went 57.25 inches, and his biggest was 19.25.

Ken Wood took second place with 60.50 inches. His biggest fish of the day was a fat 15-inch crappie. Haha.

And taking first place: Bruce Levy. His best five went an even 67 inches.

You can check out the full results here

Congrats, fellas!

And thanks for coming out, everyone. Robert, we hope you’re doing all right.

Next tournament is Glen Charlie Pond on May 6. Hope to see you there!


The Season Kicks Off on Saturday, April 15!

Our first tournament of the year is coming up on Saturday, April 15 at Billington Sea in Plymouth. If you would like to participate, REGISTER HERE at TourneyX.

Use the code in the description to bypass the entry fee requirement. We will be taking payment at the ramp. Hope to see you there!


Wet, Breezy, and Cold, But the Bass Were Biting

What a dreary day!

Eight of us made the trek out to Billington Sea to fish the second MAKB tournament of the year. It was foggy/misty, breezy, and cold. Water temps were in the mid-50s for the most part. Not the best of conditions, and definitely not as good as it was looking just a day or two ago. But there were a decent number of fish caught.

We decided against doing a separate lunker pool for smallies, since rarely more than one or two are caught in a tournament, if any. Bummer for Donald “Dropshot” Davis since he caught a fat 16.25-inch smallmouth, probably the biggest I’ve seen come out of that place. He had two more fish, all caught on a dropshot, for a total of 48.75 inches.

That was good for third place. He also took home the lunker prize with a 17.25-inch largemouth. Nice!

At launch, Ken Wood made his way directly across the lake. He was going to try to find my way into Trask Pond, if at all possible, but then realized he’d forgotten the remote for his Power Pole. A little blessing in disguise, because on the way back he tossed a white spinnerbait into a laydown and nailed his first and biggest bass of the day. He managed a few more throughout the day and ended up with a total of 49.25 inches, taking second place.

(Four of us also chipped in five beans apiece for a pickerel lunker pool, and Ken was lucky/unlucky enough to land a 3lb 6oz aquatic snot rocket to increase his bean count by fifteen.)

Edward Neely came all the way from Springfield with borrowed gear, after some lowlife turd stole his rods. This didn’t stop him from hauling in four solid bass for 52 inches and the win!

So a big congrats to Ed! Use that trophy wisely…you know, for, like, bludgeoning to death fishing-pole thieves or something. Haha!

And thanks for traveling so far, man. I appreciate it!

Congrats to Don as well. And a respectful nod to Chris Diranian and Mike Elrick, both of whom had three fish each for 39 inches and 33.75 inches, respectively.

Our next tournament is in three weeks at Oldham Pond in Pembroke. Hope to see a good turnout! Great little pond.