Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: TUESDAY, April 2, 1991                   TAG: 9104020038
SECTION: SPORTS                    PAGE: B5   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: Bill Cochran
DATELINE:                                 LENGTH: Medium

VINTON ANGLERS FIND FORTUNES BLOWING WITH THE WIND

Hix and Joe Young, both from Vinton, teamed up to win Saturday's Roanoke Valley BassMasters Spring Partners Tournament on Smith Mountain Lake with a 32-pound catch.

Two weeks earlier, Hix fished with Dennis Morgan of Hardy, the pair catching 19 pounds, 5 ounces, good for third place in a tournament sponsored by the Smith Mountain Ruritan Club.

The day before the Roanoke Valley tournament, the sky turned black and it rained buckets, ending just about the time competitors trailered their boats to the lake in the predawn darkness. Then came the wind, as it invariably does behind a spring rain, the kind of wind that lashes the lake's surface with angry whitecaps, causing it to rise and fall, ebb and flow like a miniature ocean. Typical tournament weather.

So what do you do?

Stay at home, many would-be tournament fishermen decided. Only 58 two-man teams showed, about half what some years have brought.

The week before, while practicing in the wind, Hix and Young had found a 100-yard stretch of bank on the Roanoke River side of the lake where bass were plump for picking. They pointed the bow of their bass boat in that direction again Saturday, picking up three bass on the way, reaching the bank about 10:30 a.m.

"When we left about 3:30 p.m., we had nine fish," Young said. "We stopped at one place on the way back [to the Foxsport Marina weigh-in] and caught a bass that weighed 6-8."

Hix said, "I think what was happening, we were catching them coming up out of a channel. One would pop up ever so often, and we happened to be there."

The wind was a factor, Hix said. Blowing against the bank, it had concentrated baitfish, and the baitfish were attracting bass. The wind also likely was piling up the kind of warmer water that bass respond to, and it was masking the approach of the two anglers.

Like most fishermen, Hix used to let the wind sap his enthusiasm the same as it can sap the energy from a trolling motor battery, but this year has been different.

"I learned to use it to my advantage this year," Hix said.

His technique is a bit unorthodox.

"Pretend like you are a small fish and do what a small fish would do in the wind," he said. "The small fish has to get out of it. He can't stay in it. He is looking for cover, too."

The bank Hix and Young fished had cover on it in the form of rocks and brush. For five hours, they pelted the shoreline with spinnerbaits and jigs.

"We were catching them anywhere from 6 inches to 10 feet deep," Young said. "If they came up to feed, we would catch them."

When the bass got tired of looking at one lure, the anglers would switch to another type or color. The most productive jig was black. The spinnerbaits that worked well were chartreuse, chartreuse and blue, and solid white.

Richard Cook and Danny Angles finished second with 29 pounds, 6 ounces. Third were Mike Surber and Kenny Sayder with 25 pounds, 4 ounces.

The big bass of the tournament, 7 pounds, was landed by Dennis Morgan, Hix's partner two weeks earlier.

The wind also was a major factor during the recent Red Man Piedmont Division qualifier on Lake Gaston. Chris Daniels of Clayton, N.C., outfished a field of 290 anglers by casting a 7-inch, pumpkin seed-colored plastic worm to windy points. He caught five bass that weighed a total of 13 pounds, 11 ounces.

The fishing was so tough that Edward Clayton of Blacksburg finished eighth with a single bass. Of course, Clayton's bass wasn't exactly ordinary. It weighed 9 pounds, 4 ounces, the biggest of the tournament.