Top 5 Patterns from Toho Day 1

Slow-fishing key to capitalizing on the Toho spawn

Lake Kissimmee produced the bulk of the top-10 catches on the first day of competition, but not all of them. Still, it seems that anglers believe the time lost to traveling through the lock from Toho to eventually get to Kissimmee is worth the gamble.

Here’s a look at how the second- through fifth-place pros caught their fish on day one.

Click here to read more about tournament leader JT Kenney’s day-one performance.

2nd Place – Stacey King – 28 pounds, 1 ounce

After months of undergoing surgery, radiation and chemotherapy to remove cancerous lymph nodes in his neck, Stacey King has proved that he’s back in a big way.

King sacked 28 pounds, 1 ounce today to take the runner-up spot at the Walmart FLW Tour event on Lake Toho presented by Mercury.

“Man, it feels great just to be back fishing again,” says King, who was declared cancer-free in December. “This catch today is a real blessing. I’m not quite 100 percent yet; I’m maybe about 80 percent, but I’m glad to be out here.”

If King can catch 28 pounds at 80 percent, the field might be in trouble if he gets to hitting on all cylinders by the end of the week.

King drew boat No. 21 for his takeoff position this morning, and he made a beeline for the lock and headed straight to Kissimmee. The fish were biting when he got there.

“I’m fishing a traditional spawning area down there,” he says. “It’s got the right mix of flats and lily pads. Within the area are three or four little key spots that are producing the fish – the sweet spots are maybe the size of a tractor trailer. I’m pretty sure they’re bedding and moving in and out of there to spawn.”

King’s limit consisted of a trio bass in the 7- to 8-pound class. He’s using soft plastics to fish the bedding area.

3rd Place – Jason Reyes – 21 pounds, 15 ounces

Behind Kenney and King the weights fall off by some 6 pounds to Jason Reyes in third place. Reyes opted to stay in Toho and avoid the time-consuming process of passing through the lock.

“I fished both lakes in practice, and I really didn’t do any better in one than the other,” Reyes says. “So I just decided to stick it out in Toho and not have to deal with locking.”

Reyes’ limit was anchored by a 9-pound, 10-ounce bass that held the Bridgford Big Bass honors almost until the very end, when Shane LeHew nicked him by a single ounce with a 9-11 brute that earned the award.

Reyes noted the presence of fry in his areas, indicating that some spawning has already happened in Toho.

“I was fishing bedding areas,” he says. “In some of the shallower areas I could actually see beds, and there were definitely some fry in the area as well, but I was fishing a bedding pattern, picking everything apart so slowly – every little piece of grass, pad stem and cattail. It’s such a meticulous way to fish. I’ll spend 45 minutes covering 100 yards. It’s what you have to do to get a bite here.”

4th Place – Charlie Ingram – 21 pounds, 7 ounces

Veteran pro Charlie Ingram made the run to Kissimmee pay off today and now holds down the fourth-place spot.

Ingram also drew an early boat number and wasted no time getting right to his best water in Kissimmee. The early bite was on, and Ingram sacked a 7- and 8-pounder.

“It’s like they bite right when I get there, then there is a dead period, then it picks up again in the afternoon,” Ingram says. “It’s typical spawning behavior. The water temperature is right, the moon is right, and they’re moving in and out of these places in bunches. It takes patience to just fish slow like that, waiting for another wad of them to move in.”

5th Place – Lionel Botha – 20 pounds, 10 ounces

Lionel Botha also opted for a boat ride south to Kissimmee to catch the fish that put him in fifth place on day one.

Though Botha lives in Florida, he spends far more time on Okeechobee than Toho, and he says the two lakes are very different.

“These lakes [on the Kissimmee Chain] have a lot more lily pads,” Botha says. “Okeechobee has plenty of pads, too, but for its size, the Kissimmee Chain of Lakes has more pads and the bass use those pads to spawn a lot more here. Okeechobee has large areas of hard bottom for the fish to spawn on, so they don’t need to use the pads as much. Here, they lay their eggs on the stems and roots. So in a way it’s nice because you have something more specific to throw to instead of just fishing big areas.”