Black Lake
Aug 28/29th , 2004

This was a greatly anticipated event. Many anglers were concerned because of the 15” length limit on this lake. Plus the anxiety of catching a 15” fish and trying to qualify for the Nationals. During practice many of the anglers couldn’t put a legal fish in the boat…everyone was complaining about catching 14, 14 ½ or 14 7/8” fish. Some of the anglers approached me asking if maybe we should move the tournament to a different location. However, the tournament was held on the scheduled lake!

Most of the practice days were held on sunny, bluebird days, with water temperatures in the high 60’s. The weatherman was forecasting a change in weather conditions for the tournament days and we know how we can trust our weathermen. Tournament day Saturday morning was overcast and very humid and muggy. There wasn’t a star to be seen. At sendoff time we had a slight breeze from the southeast which put a slight chop on the water. We had 19 anglers qualify to fish our two-day event, however, because of previous commitments we had a total of 14 anglers, with nine of us trying to qualify for the Nationals.
At sendoff time there was an indication that a few anglers were going to go to a very specific location, so it was going to be a race to see who could get there first. Just so happens that that location produced the first and second place winners in last seasons’ event. The top 5 finishers after the first day of competition were:

Mark Mothersell 15.29 lbs
Jim Missel 11.35 lbs
Carl Nasello 8.06 lbs
Don Tripoli 7.56 lbs
Keith Allen 7.29 lbs

Many of the anglers were complaining of a very tough bite. There was only one limit brought to the scale and that was Mark Mothersell. However, there was another angler who also had a limit, but had the misfortune of two fish jumping out of his weigh bag while he was climbing out of his boat. Both fish landed on the dock and he was able to (catch again) only one of them while the other one escaped back to the water. We were very sorry to hear about that Jim Missel.

Day 2 competition started and the weatherman was calling for scattered thunderstorms. It was very cloudy all morning long with the sun poking through occasionally for short periods of time. Around 12:30 the clouds dissipated and became a bluebird day. There were some reports from the anglers that the topwater bite was on fire first thing in the morning. One angler reported catching well over 20 fish in the first hour.

Final results:
Mark Mothersell 24.89 lbs
Jim Missel 24.85 lbs
Scott Firkins 17.22 lbs
Don Tripoli 16.43 lbs
Dave Beitler 15.62 lbs
Congratulations Guys Job Well Done!!!

Big Fish Day 1 Mark Mothersell 6.08 lbs
Big Fish Day 2 Joe Swader 5.02 lbs

2004 ANGLER OF THE YEAR results for District 4
First Place Jim Missel
Second Place Don Tripoli
Third Place Joe Swader

This concludes our 2004 Season. Nine of us are planning to attend the 2004 Nationals on Lake Wheeler in Alabama.

The 2005 Season for District 4 starts with one of our early birds on Conesus Lake on Sept. 4th to be followed by Chaumont Bay on Sept. 18th. Then we will be off to the Nationals!

Thanks to all our anglers who have made this season so enjoyable and exciting! Looking forward to next season…..
Joe, Don and Marlene