2024 St. Johns B.A.S.S. Elite

The St. Johns River lies within an hour of my home in north-central Florida, but the only time I fish there is when B.A.S.S. schedules an Elite Series event. So, by no means am I an expert on that waterway.

Because B.A.S.S. postponed a day of competition at the preceding Harris Chain event, our practice period on the St. Johns was shortened to just two days. And with hundreds of miles of water to sort through, it made choice of direction and time management critical considerations. Even worse, the St. Johns River is a tidal basin, so factoring in water levels and movement made the task of finding reliable places to fish even more difficult. 

With all of this to consider, I decided to focus on the areas I know best.

Practice Begins

On day 1 of scouting, I started in Rodman Reservoir — a 10,000-acre impoundment fed by the Ocklawaha River, which connects to the St. Johns River via the Cross Florida Barge Canal.

Minutes after idling into the main pool, I noticed schools of fish busting on the surface. They were 200 yards away, and closer to the feeding frenzy was Brandon Palaniuk. As I worked my way in that direction, I noticed him boating several fish, back to back.

Not wanting to crowd in, I waited until he left, then moved to the center of the schooling area, where I scored almost immediately. The schoolers consisted of black bass mixed with stripers, both running between three to six pounds. Amazingly, no other anglers in the area seemed to notice the activity. Realizing its potential, I punched the numbers on my Garmin GPS and quickly moved to another section of the pool.

As the day progressed, I found fish relating to shoreline eelgrass and lily pads. They weren’t big, but definitely respectable. Toward the end of the day, I punched matted vegetation up the Ocklawaha. It looked so promising. It reminded me of days long passed when I wrestled big fish from beneath the green canopies. 

Unfortunately, this was not one of those days, and I never got a bite.

On day 2, I launched on the St. Johns at Palatka City Docks — our official headquarters for the event. From there, I ran to a major canal system upriver. 

That yielded nothing, so I moved to a nearby creek. By this time, the tide was rolling in. And in one 50-yard stretch of lily pads, I got a number of quality bites by swimming a 1/2-ounce green pumpkin jig with a matching YamaCraw trailer. 

Not wanting to be seen on the “juice”, I pulled the trolling motor and went looking for other similar spots.

By early afternoon, I ended up in Dunn’s Creek — the tributary that connects Crescent Lake with the St. Johns River. 

In each bend of the creek, I got a bite or two from 1- to 2-pound fish — nothing bigger. I filed that away and moved back to the St. Johns, then south to Georgetown. By this time, the tide was falling and the canals were super shallow. I entered two of them anyway and got a couple of bites in each, but they were small fish.

From there, I raced back upriver to test several stretches of lily pads. That’s when I found what I felt would serve as a good backup to the schoolers in Rodman — a stretch not far from the locks, right on the river channel.

Somewhat dissatisfied with practice, it was time to prep the boat and all my tackle for the competition ahead.

Tournament Time

Prior to the event, the tournament director secured a locking schedule for Rodman Reservoir. The first lock entering the pool would close at 8 p.m. sharp, so that gave me about a half hour to test the lily pads on the river beforehand.

When my boat number was called, I exited Palatka City Docks and headed straight to my best stretch of lily pads. 

Within minutes, I boated my first keeper. It weighed less than a pound, however. As the clock ticked away, I kept expecting a better bite. But it never came. Apparently, the tide phase was wrong for that part of the river.

As I entered the lock, I counted 33 other competitor boats along with some weekenders. The Buckman Lock was designed to accommodate large barges, so 40 or so bass boats is nothing. Once secured and the doors closed, I realized the height difference of 30-plus feet between Rodman’s water level and that of the river. Seeing that, I knew our locking time would take every bit of a half hour or more. And that made me second guess the schoolers. 

Would they still be actively feeding with the sun that high?

I tied up alongside rookie Kyle Patrick and veteran master Rick Clunn. Rick had a cameraman along to document his 500^th B.A.S.S. event. As the lock filled, we engaged in casual conversation and that seemed to help pass the time.

Thirty-five minutes later, the lock opened and we exited in a frenzied boat race — Rick and I toward the back of the pack. When I reached the schoolie hole, Brandon Palaniuk was making his first casts. And about the time I dropped my trolling motor, he had hooked up. 

Watching as he played the fish, I realized he had tied into a striper. On the opposite side of his boat, other groups of fish were chasing bait on the surface. Getting a cast to them in time, however, was nearly impossible. They were up just briefly, then gone — never breaking in the same place twice. 

Minutes later, Brandon hooked another striper. Then another. It was becoming obvious there were no black bass mixed in. 

Thirty minutes later, the action died altogether and neither Brandon nor I had caught a single bass. It was deflating. We both had visions of quick, healthy limits, but it wasn’t meant to be. As Brandon idled through the standing timber to another area, I trolled to the nearest shoreline to try my luck there.

The minutes turned to hours and I still had only one small keeper. Finally, around 1 p.m., I ran into a school of fish holding on some downed timber. In minutes, I put a 3½ and two 2-pounders in the livewell … all falling for a topwater prop bait.

Eventually, it was time to lock back into the St. Johns. Once through, I returned to the lily pad stretch where my day began. And by the time I had to leave for check-in, I boated three more fish — including a 3-pounder.

Back at the scales, I registered a weight of 11 pounds, 14 ounces. By the time the scales closed, I was sitting two pounds outside the cut. To make it to the weekend, I would need a big bite.

One Last Chance

With the take-off order reversed on day 2, I knew my time in Rodman would be limited. Considering that and the quick action I saw the previous afternoon on the river, I deliberated on whether to go to Rodman at all. But because the morning tide was so low and wouldn’t rise until midday, I decided on Rodman.

When I got to the schoolie hole, Brandon was nowhere in sight. Neither were the fish. It was like the Dead Sea. I tried the adjacent shoreline where I had a few bites in practice, but it was dead too.

Pondering my next move, I decided to head upstream to a shallow pad field where I had done well in the past. 

There, I targeted individual pad clumps using a prop bait and a lightly weighted Senko. Thirty minutes in, I caught a solid 2-pounder. An hour later, I caught a 3½-pounder. A bit later, I added a bare keeper. But as the fish got smaller, my confidence waned. No longer feeling good about my chances there, I moved to an area by the dam, to a stretch of eelgrass. That’s when I got the bite I needed.

Noticing an isolated patch of deeper grass, I launched the prop bait, let the splash rings settle, then twitched it one time. A second later, it disappeared into a vacuum of white water. When I set the hook, a large fish came to the surface, thrashing back and forth. And after a couple of strong pulls, I brought her boatside and over the gunnel. She weighed nearly six pounds, and I knew then I was within reach of the cut.

As the clock wound down, I boated a couple more fish. Then it was time to lock back through to the river. 

Once through, I retraced my steps from the previous afternoon, hoping for a repeat performance. Unfortunately, it never happened. When I reached the scales, I registered a weight of nearly 13 pounds — two pounds shy of the cut.

Disappointed, I trailered my boat back to the house and met up with travel partner Cliff Prince. We shared our stories of defeat into the evening, then called it a night. The next morning we appeared on B.A.S.S. LIVE Mix, sharing our failed strategies.

Next is Lake Murray in South Carolina. Stay tuned…