best dale hollow story?????

Buddy for Life

In 2006 I started talking via this site and the phone with a guy named Mike Willey, 3sons. He owns a landscaping company in Indiana and only fishes in the winter and loves Dale Hollow. We were going to be down at the same time one trip that winter and I picked him up on a Tuesday at Willow Grove. We went out and fished all day and had a ball. He caught fish, I caught fish and I had a 4-8 and a 4-9 on back to back cast during the day. At the end of the day when I dropped him off at Willow Grove, I asked him for his map and I would mark up some of the spots that we fished that day plus some close to the marina where he was staying for the next day was his last day and he was only fishing until noon. I had plans to fish with Steve Headrick the next day so he could not go with me and his boat is not very safe in any kind of windy wavy condition. He pulls out a map that I think was hand drawn up by the Cherokee Indians and I mark some spots for him to fish the next day. He goes out the next day and catches his first OVER fish of his lifetime. He gets a guy at the Willow Grove marina to take a picture and releases the fish. He tells me about it a few days later. 2 weeks later I am back down there with my buddy Cliff and Mike is with his son. I had purchased a map and marked up a bunch of spots for Mike to fish and was going to give it to him. We agreed to meet just inside the no wake bouys at Hendricks Creek just before dark on our first day down there. Cliff and I had fished all day long and neither of us had caught a fish. Frustrated I am as I am going into Hendricks Creek and there sits Mike and his son. We talk a bit and I give him his map that I marked up and pulls out a rod tube and hands it to me and it has G Loomis on it. He has went and bought me a 9'6" G Loomis FNF rod as a gift. I was totally in shock and did not know what to say. He said he had been out with a well known guide on the lake that is the best FNF guide on the lake and he learned more from me that one day than he did on the 3 guided trips combined. Said he caught more fish and learned more about the technique and even that very day his son had caught 2 fish off a spot that I had marked on his map. We have became very good buddy's. He has driven to the UK hospital from Seymour In to see me on surgery days, came to my house in Frankfort just to visit and see me, and even last weekend he brought his wife down and we all went out for lunch and had supper at my house. Super nice guy that knows what I have been thru, and continue to go thru in every aspect of my life.

Mike is a true friend and forget all the fish that I have caught at Dale Hollow, he has been the best catch of them all.

New Years Day Doubles 2009 and 2010

Catchemall, John Robertson, the 27th Annual Horse Creek Billy Westmoreland Memorial Smallmouth Invitational Champion, at least that is what he plaque says..........wait a minute my plaque says the same thing......does that mean that WE ARE THE CHAMPIONS MY FRIENDS, WE KEEP ON FIGHTING UNTIL THE END, WE ARE THE CHAMPIONS, WE ARE THE CHAMPIONS........you can stop singing now for I know you are all hearing Queen in your heads.


I met Catchemall for the first time New Years Day 2009 as we both left our houses around 2am and met in Burkesville around 5am. We put in at the state park new ramp and I head to my #1 honey hole. The sun came up officially around 7:15am that morning but at 7:09 that morning I landed a 5-1 Smallie on the second cast of the morning and a couple of cast later I landed a 4-15. Surely the first 5 pounder of the new year and surely the first 10lb sack of the new year.

New Years Day 2010 and I leave the house around 2am again to fish by myself. I hit my first spot, not my #1 honey hole, for I found a spot that was producing early and late very good. Literally the FIRST cast and I land a 4-4 and 2 cast later I catch one that would have went just shy of 3. 2 fish in 3 cast and I thinking it is going to be one of those days and it was NOT. Did not get another bite until landing 2 more around 1pm and 2 more a few cast before dark on the same spot that I started at. 6 fish total basically 4 on one spot and 2 on another

Best 2 hours EVER on Dale Hollow

Sunday January 3, 2010

ON3 3Y3D WILLI3, Vaun, and myself launch out of Holly Creek. The previous night on the very last few cast of the night I caught one that went about 2 and then literally the last cast I could see my bobber I caught a 5-2 on the same spot that yielded the 4 fish from Friday. We hit the same spot that Sunday morning first and Vaun catches a 5-0 for his first 5 pounder ever. We hit spot number 2 and get nothing, spot number 3 and I catch a 5-4 that hit it like a train and took the jig all the way down into her throat. I just knew that was competition bite. I swing the boat around and Vaun catches a 5-7 within a few feet of where I casted to catch mine. The spot is now known as Big Vaun for I name spots by whoever catches the biggest fish off of it. Vaun took it from me so it changed from Big Woody #who kows to Big Vaun. We go back to spot number 1 and get nothing. Then spot number 2 and I hook a nice one, get her right next to the boat and can see the jig barely in her mouth and just as I say it, out pops the jig. She was a good 5 and a half pound fish. We trolling motor over to Big Vaun and he says that he is about to catch one to put it out of reach. I swing the boat around and we fish up to the point and I make a cast within a few yards of where the other 2 were caught and the bobber went under so hard and so fast. Vaun watched the strike, I set the hook and my All Pro usually gets back to about 10 or 11 oclock but never got to midnight. This fish was large and not happy. She never jumped at all early in the struggle of man against beast. I really did not know what I had because she stayed on the bottom and was digging so hard then she made one big fast burst under the boat and I knew then it was a BIG smallmouth. I swung the boat 3 times to keep her out of the trolling motor and big motor and finally see her about 7 feet down and said this was the biggest fish I ever caught out loud. Vaun was ok until I yelled that then he got nervous. Finally the struggle was over and the BEAST was in the net. We were high fiving and screaming like little school girls. She went 23 inches long and was just fat as a pig and scaled in at 6-11. If you add in the 5-2 on the last cast of Saturday night that made a 5-2, 5-0, 5-4, 5-7 and 6-11 physically in the boat and another 5 1/2 so close just out of net range before I LDR'd her. Heck of a 6 fish stringer if I do say so myself. Greatest 2 hours EVER fishing at Dale Hollow. Vaun has a 6 year old and his son will always know that his daddy caught his first 5 pounder out of my boat and I only hope we can take his 6 yr old and my 6 yr old to Dale Hollow together to watch them become Certifyable Floatnflyable just like us.