You can bet that Hubert Daville’s next trip to the tackle shop will find the Rayne fisherman picking up a handful of bags of Mooch Minnows.
“This was the first time I’ve ever fished one,” Daville said March 13 after boating a 13.57-pound Toledo Bend monster on a Mooch Minnow, rigged on a jighead. “I was just throwing it out and working it back like a jerkbait.”
Fishing by himself on the lower end of Toledo Bend in 59-degree water, Daville, 64, had found a favorite little hydrilla bed and decided to stay a while.
“It was just a little patch, maybe 20 yards,” he said. “I fished it about 2 weeks ago and caught good fish. I went to the spot and put my Power Poles down so I could fish slowly. You could feel the grass. If you pulled it through the grass, you had a pretty good chance of getting a fish. I stayed on that spot all day.
“The wind had been pretty strong all week; this was the only day when it wasn’t blowing real hard, so I went out.”
At 1:25, Daville made a cast, felt some resistance and thought he’d gotten his Mooch Minnow stuck in the grass in about 6 feet of water. But then his line began to move, so he set the hook.
The fish of a lifetime
Fishing an Ozark Trail baitcasting rod and reel spooled with 16-pound Stren, Daville said the fish pulled hard but never came near the surface.
“I couldn’t do much with it; I thought it was a striper,” he said. “I probably horsed it too much, but I didn’t think it was a bass because it never jumped.
“When I got her turned and coming to the boat, that’s when I first saw it was a bass, and that’s when I realized how big it was. I knew it was over 10.”
Daville led the fish to the boat and swiftly netted it and brought it aboard. Knowing he had a sure-fire qualifier for the Toledo Bend Lunker Bass Program, he called Fins & Feathers Resort and let them know he was on his way. Once there, a tape measure showed the fish at 26 inches long and 21 inches at girth, and the scales registered 13.57 pounds – his personal best by far.
“It was about as big around as it was long,” he said. “She was fresh; she hadn’t been fanning or anything. She was beautiful – the fish of a lifetime.”
