Success, as motivation speakers seminars insist, is granted to those who will do what others won’t, can’t or didn’t.
Corneilus Harris has advanced to a separate place in the highly populated realm of bass fishing, partly because the Zanesville resident was shrewd enough to heed his stepfather, and partly because he does what most people don’t or won’t.
When the 41-year-old Harris was in his teens, his stepdad, Lonnie Hampton, “first introduced me to the AEP ReCreation Land,” he said. “He told me about catching big fish during the colder months. Yeah, he caught some nice bass.”
Not nice enough, though, to convince a 15-year-old to make a habit of shivering over a bass. Bitten by a bug nonetheless, by the mid-1990s and grown in age, Harris found himself fishing those familiar lakes later into the season than most and occasionally being rewarded by uncommonly large largemouths.
The discovery of a fishy cache cannot be dismissed under any circumstances by an avid angler, particularly one with above-average curiosity and a built-in need to get outdoors even during the least friendly months.
“I started out using plastic or rubber worms, and I caught a fair share of decent bass,” Harris said. “I spent a lot of time, mostly trial-and-error, trying to find out what works.”
The common wisdom would suggest, “Not much.” The largemouth essentially is a warm-water sunfish that in places such as Florida, Mexico and Japan can grow to 20-plus pounds. The Ohio record, which has stood since May 1976, is 13.13 pounds, a 251/16-inch largemouth taken from a farm pond.
Largemouths remain somewhat stunted in northern reaches, where the growing season is relatively short. Cold-blooded, warm-water species typically are forced to do little more than tread water during the frigid months while waiting for the spring warm-up and an increase in metabolism.
During his many forays over a course of late autumns, mid-winters and early springs whenever ice was absent and casting possible, Harris discovered that he would seldom hook a small or medium-size bass. However, the right lure, presented properly and retrieved slowly, sometimes connected with a big fish that didn’t have to work especially hard or fast to mouth it.
“It’s what I would call an opportunistic bite,” Harris said.
The response from an opportunistic fisherman was to work on perfecting technique, observing conditions that most readily coax fish into taking bait, and figuring out which was best.
Having discovered, Harris isn’t shy about sharing.
“My bread and butter bait is the 4-inch Salt Series tubes by Venom Lures,” he said. “My favorite tube is the Black Blue-G,” which comprises a black body flecked blue and silver.
The rod choice is a 7-foot medium-heavy model whether he’s using a baitcaster or a spinning reel. The tube is Texas-rigged on 12-pound test Trilene XL line that stays limber enough in the cold to be useful on the ultraslow, stop-and-drag, twitching retrieves that require a lot of patience to master.
Harris, though, figures that quality supersedes quantity at a time of year when most people mistakenly figure bass won’t take a bait. In early November, Harris landed an 8-pound, 8-ounce largemouth, his biggest ever. A month later, he netted a pair, both topping 5 pounds.
Big fish often get their picture taken before being returned to the pond.
Despite their cold-water lethargy, big bass “do fight,” Harris said. “They don’t jump out of the water, but they will rise and boil the surface. Most of the time, they head down.”
Ideal fishing weather typically includes a 10 to 15 mph wind that creates a ripple on the water surface that hides fisherman from fish in the clear ponds. Afternoons on which the sun moves in and out of the clouds are optimal. And fish tend to be more active after the sun has warmed the water — late morning until sunset.
Harris is not reticent about sharing lore, but he’s a little more close-mouthed regarding location. The lakes he mines rest on AEP ReCreation Land in Guernsey and Noble counties, but he’ll get no more specific than to confide he has found lakes that most people haven’t.
“Ninety percent of the ponds I fish, you have to hike to,” Harris said. “I have put a tremendous amount of time searching out the lakes that hold the bigger fish.”