Columnist Paula DelGiudice: Bass fishing grabs spotlight

Paula DelGiudice

Thursday, March 22, 2001 | 9:53 a.m.

Paula DelGiudice's outdoors column appears weekly. Reach her at desertdenizens@ aol.com

Fishing is in the news this week. Not only was there a huge striped bass taken near Cottonwood last Thursday, but the BASSMASTER Western Invitational was held at Lake Mead.

The stars were aligned right for a pair of Southern Nevada anglers in the past week. The angler who came out on top in the Western Invitational was Jack Gadlage of Logandale, who outfished the rest of the entries by more than five pounds to take first place honors. When all the fish had been weighed, Gadlage's total for 15 fish was 43 pounds 12 ounces. His win earns him 250 points in tournament standings and $35,000.

Also finishing in the money from Nevada was Ken Mercurio of Sparks with 19 pounds 5 ounces, earning $750. Timothy Klinger of Boulder City earned $660 while another successful tournament angler from Boulder City, Byron Velvick, finished out of the money but in the top 70 anglers.

Right behind him came Henderson angler Dennis Kolender and Las Vegas angler Frank MecCariello.

Gadlage won the tourney by fishing steep banks that bottomed out in 15 to 20 feet of water with a five-inch smoke-colored Zipper worm fished on green 20-pound P-line.

According to a tournament spokesman, "After leading the first round with a solid 15-2 limit, Gadlage had to relinquish the lead on day two to Mark Tyler of Concord, Calif. Sensing that his fish in the Overton Arm were failing, Gadlage made a gutsy decision to move to Bonelli Bay in the Virgin Basin, a place he had fished a year earlier and offered very similar terrain."

Gadlage said, "Even though I knew this water, there was certainly no guarantee of what it would produce. I simply made a calculated decision and it paid off."

While the bass anglers were looking to add big largemouths to their live wells, striper fishermen were in shock after hearing of the huge striper taken near Cottonwood on Thursday. Alan Cole, famed creator of the A.C. Plug, caught a 63-pound striped bass above Cottonwood last Thursday at about 1 p.m.

It has been a slow couple of months on the river, according to Cole. He had gone many trips without catching a single striper. The weather had started to warm, though, by the time the monster striper snatched his 12-inch lure and made its way into the record books.

"She came up and thumped it," said Cole. "Then she went down. When she came back she grabbed it. I fought it for about 15 minutes before landing it. As I got it close to the boat, I still didn't think it was that big. I was really fooled by the size."

Cole was fishing a familiar pattern: drifting and casting into some pockets when the big fish hit. He was using 30-pound test fished off a Shimano Calcutta lure.

After he landed it he headed back to Cottonwood to find an official scale. He bottomed out two scales that only went to 50 pounds before finding a propane scale on which to weigh the fish. He was in luck.

"This river is a world class fishery," said Cole. "Who knows how big the next fish will be? Maybe there's an 80-pounder in there waiting to be caught."

Cole's big fish will be among the leaders in the A.C. Plug "Over 40" club. It joins 78 other fish caught on A.C. Plugs that weighed over 40 pounds. In addition, it will join the 13 entries that weigh over 50 pounds and the three entries over 60 pounds.

The A.C. Plug is legendary on Colorado River waters (and elsewhere in the country). The plug, created and designed by Cole, has been catching big striped bass on the Colorado for many years. Recently, Cole sold the rights to produce the plug to Luhr Jensen, though local anglers are in luck: In his agreement with Luhr Jensen, Cole will be able to produce and sell a limited number of handmade plugs at several outlets that service Lake Mead and Mohave fisheries (including Willow Beach, Searchlight, Cottonwood and Boater's World).