A nice little father and son trip got off to an early start because our clients wanted to try their hand at a little largemouth bass fishing first thing in the morning and then try their luck at some Butterflies in the mid-morning and afternoon. As it turned out the largemouths had a real bad case of lockjaw. Not even a bump...tough day we know our clients must of been wondering if this was what was to come when they began fishing for Peacocks. I don't know why I used the word fishing the correct word is catching when talking about Peacocks. After about two hours of fruitless largemouth fishing it was time to switch gears and begin catching, the catching was slow in the northern canals and only got better the further south we got. By the time the day was over our clients had caught 35 Butterfly Peacock Bass up to three pounds with a average weight of two and a half pounds. Not a great day in our books, but in our clients eyes it was a wonderful trip.

As pomised here is the three generation catching trip. The fishermen where Gilbert, Gene, and Matthew, we got on the water at 9:30 with a nice partly cloudy sky and the tempeature in the low 80's. We pulled away from the ramp and made a short run to our first spot of the day. The canal narrows then opens backup with a nice grassbed in about five feet of water. As we came off plane to enter the narrows we saw that another boat was working the spot already, but we decided to try our luck any way. No sooner than the trolling motor hit the water I spotted three peacock bass cruising the area, I quickly threw a Bomber Long A out in front of the peacock and ripped it back to the boat with the peacock's charging behind the bait. Sam baits Matthew's pole up and tells him to throw the bait in front of where the fish are heading. The bait hits the water and slowly sinks in front of the fish, the shiner is frantic as one of the peacocks zeros in on him and snatches the shiner, Matthew sets the hook and the battle begins, first the peacock tries to bulldog into the grassbed, then turns out into deeper water, making the drag sing as Matthew tries to turn him, as the fish feels the line pulling back he heads topside and shakes his head a few times and does a couple of tailwalking dances, finally Matthew bring him under control and boats his first peacock bass a scappy two pounder. Gene fires up the trolling motor and follows the outside edge of the grassbed and continues to throw his Long A while Gilbert and Matthew stick with trolling shiners. Gene fires the bait near a boat dock with a grass mat in front, twitch ... twitch ... boom goes the bait as a peacock slams the bait then goes tailwalking, and into the boat. Matthew lands 2 more peacocks near another dock with a grass mat, so we circle around to try the area some more when Gilbert finally connects into his first peacock bass. We follow the grassbed and ease under a bridge and spot peacocks to the left and more peacocks to the right, Matthew kept trying to be the first to get his bait in front of the fish and they decide to move to deeper water. We continue down the canal until we come to a side canal and enter it, Matthew quickly finds 2 more and Gilbert adds another. We follow the canal to it end and turn back and as we reach the mouth we see a school of peacocks moving into the canal .... what to do .... what to do .... We decide to give them a little time to get into a feeding mood, so we head to an area with a couple points and another bridge. As we moved into the area we see plenty of peacock bass that are over three pounds and a few snook in the ten to fifteen pound range are cruising the area, but there where no takers. The peacocks turned their nose up at the live bait and would only chase my Long A. On to the next cut, Matthew has two more decide that his bait looked good enough to eat and Gilbert also puts another in the boat. I can only find two largemouth bass and miss another nice peacock on my Long A. We decide to good back to the school we had seen earlier to see if we could catch a couple more before the skies cut loose on us. Sam slowly motors into the cut as I scan the waters for signs of the school, it seems that the school had broken up or moved out, but plenty of the peacocks had stayed in the grass bed. As usual Matthew jumps around the boat trying to get his shiner in front of every peacock in the water. We finally get him to settle down and Mr. Peacock slams into his bait and the fun begins again. Sam works with Gilbert on a pair that is cruising a rock (could it be ... spawning fish in August), Gilbert hooks the male twice and neither time was he able to get the fish to the boat, finally the peacocks move off. The rain starts to move in so we decide to go back to the first bridge and see if we can get the peacock we saw earlier to bite. We get under the bridge and fine that there are a few peacocks still there and Gilbert and Matthew each put another into the boat and we finally get Sam to put a pole in the water and he quickly catches two peacocks. So end the Gunderson's Three Generation Peacock Bass Catching Trip final totals:

• Matthew -- Nine Peacock Bass
• Gilbert -- Four Peacock Bass
• Gene -- Two Largemouth, & One Peacock Bass
• Sam -- Two Peacock Bass

These reports are provided by Sam's Peacock Bass Guide Service.

Sam's Peacock Bass Guide Service is no longer in business but there are some nice pictures still on his old site.