Knee Deep Lake Hopatcong King of the Lake Results

Once again, a lot of smallmouth bass caught in the most recent Knee Deep Club derby, King of the Lake, the largest at three pounds, four ounces, and a number of them near three pounds. Jack Dziduck emerged as the contest winner for the fourth consecutive year, so it may be interesting to hear if he can pull this off next year as well. At any rate, I find four consecutive wins astonishing.

The largest hybrid striper weighed seven pounds, 11 ounces; a four-pound, eight-ounce walleye got weighed in, and three crappies well over a pound weighed as much as one-pound, 10-ounces. Laurie Murphy from Dow's Boat Rentals also reports that some nice perch and bullheads made it to the scales.

Where have the largemouth bass been? I remember this lake from way back in my teens, when I constantly read The New Jersey Fisherman and viewed the water from afar, through the lens of the weekly fishing report, living in Mercer County. This lake with its intricate coves and weedy shorelines seemed like the largemouth lair of dreams, and there seems no doubt they predominated in considerable numbers over smallmouths. A member of Mercer County Bassmasters at the time, I heard some stories, and though I got to ice fish the lake once at age 17, I was ready for it when I began fishing summers and fall with my son in 2007. At first, we caught largemouths, some of them 3 1/2 pounds, and then we discovered smallmouths, plenty close to three and better, and since then, no more nice largemouths.

I'm looking forward to October, when we go for hybrids and walleye, but I had just been thinking, before I began this post, that I would like to spend a little time in mid-October casting a spinnerbait, hoping to hook some largemouths.