Ran into the legend himself, Bruce Carpenter and his daughter at the 107 ramp at MTL Friday morning. Had a nice chat and he gave me a few tips and some advice, based on his last week of fishing the lake every day. It matched the reports I had but as usual, he had some additional thoughts. What a nice guy ol' Bruce is...

I proceeded to catch nothing for the first hour. I didn't panic as Bruce noted that the last two days his first hour was terrible and that is usually his best. After moving to different areas, I settled on the place I intended to go all along. Much to my surprise, there were no other boats there. Caught 8 keepers, in the next few hours, all over 12". Then #9 hit and I thought I had my 3rd drum of the morning, until I saw it roll and about chit a meat ax. It was a crappie and a biggun'! I managed to net it and get it in the boat. No small task with a 10' pole, 6 lb test and by myself. End result was a 17", 3 lb 10 oz. black crappie. I caught 3 more before the clouds and pleasure boaters made me think better of staying on the lake much longer. Ended up with 12 keepers, all over 12" and one of them was a hog for the ages!

I'll try to post a pic or two later today. Not sure if I'll pull that off or not. It has been a while...