The two-day Possum Kingdom Catmasters (PKC) Tournament attracted 129 teams from as far away as California and Montana. Catfish anglers were competing for the first-place prize of $25,000 and custom sculptured wooden catfish trophies created by Savage Saint.
The October 20, 21, 2018 event was in its second year of operation and is already making plans for 2019 to be bigger and better.
The tournament also offered a Calcutta for both stripers and gar for an additional chance at some prize money. No gar was weighed, but the striper pot was won. The organizers also raffled off tons of sponsor prizes to keep things moving along and fun.
The tournament was plagued with cold and wet weather on the days prior to the tournament. Prefishing competitors endured as they struggled to make a game plan.
“It rained so much I thought the ark would rise again,” joked Eddie White who traveled 2,694.2 miles round trip from Montana to fish the Tournament with his wife Ann and Ken Miller. “I thought I would start hearing animals at any time.”
“Sunday was 75 and sunny,” reported White. “Upon arrival, the weather turned nasty quick. There were winds that we thought would knock our camper over. Then the rain poured for five straight days. Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday saw daytime highs in the 40s. On Thursday we had a couple hours with a break in the storm, but not in the clouds.”
“Thursday and Friday were just a bit warmer,” continued White. “The rain stopped Friday night just after the rules meeting started. Saturday morning the fog was super thick and delayed takeoff before turning into a beautiful day with wind and a high of 70 degrees. Sunday was colder in the morning with little fog, bluebird skies, and high pressure.”
A blown engine on Saturday put another damper on White and his team, but they were able to borrow a boat and finish the tournament. Prefishing demonstrated that they could catch 10 pounds and over fish consistently in the river so that was their overall strategy. They only got to fish about three hours on Saturday and they stayed in the lake to prevent any damage to their borrowed boat from floating debris in the river. On Sunday they brought in a limit of 5 fish.
One hundred twenty-eight other boats have their own tales to tell about the Second Annual Possum Kingdom Catmasters Tournament. By all indications, it was a popular event with most angles saying they would be back next year, including the winners, boat number 46 from Oklahoma.
First Place
Chris and Kyli Baldwin (Chris Baldwin Guide Service) weighed in 145.88 pounds to take top honors. Chris said they set a strategy and stuck with it. They found good fish while pre-fishing and followed them as they moved. Their success was based on finding the pattern.
“We got on the lake Wednesday morning,” reported Chris. We were struggling big time to get quality bait. After driving 25 miles around the lake I sucked up my pride and made a phone call to my friend, Cody Waldrop. He put us on some 5- to 7-inch shad.”
With bait in the livewell Team Baldwin began to pattern the fish. They were pulling planner boards and the first adjustment they made was to slow down.
“I noticed we were going about .8 mph,” revealed Chris. “Thinking that was too fast to keep my drift sticks on the bottom we slowed down to about .3 or .4 mph. BAM we hooked up with a nice fish. This was on Wednesday.”
On Thursday Chris and Kyli fished upriver and caught one fish in three hours. They headed back out to the lake where they hooked up in the same hole they had fished on Wednesday and added it to the list for tournament day.
On Friday they fished north of where they caught fish on Thursday. Nothing. That suggested to Chris that they should try going south.
“We ended up going five miles south and caught some more smaller blues,” recalled Chris. “So, we went on the hunt again. We continued to move south about five more miles downriver and caught an 18 pounder. We added that spot to our list.”
Their experimentation had indicated that the fish were in transition and moving south. With that pattern discovered they started their Saturday where they caught the 18-pound blue. They quickly had four quality fish in the boat that helped them take the lead on day one.
“Sunday morning, we head right back to our spot,” said Chris. “We realized that the group of fish we were following had been in transition downriver for the last five days. We made the call to move two more miles downriver and they were there!
“We spot-locked all tournament long,” concluded Chris. “And followed these fish 20 miles down the lake from Wednesday to Sunday. We never caught a giant but we were fortunate to come out on top with the quality fish we had.”
Second Place and More
Josh Smith and Brandon Kennedy started day one with a little adversity. But they weren’t about to let a prop issue detour them from their game plan. They stuck with it and it paid off. The team from Kansas ended up winning Second Place ($12,000 – 115 pounds), Overall Big Fish ($1,160 – 46.41 pounds), and Second Day Big Fish ($2,320 – 46.41 pounds).
Team Smith/Kennedy arrived on Tuesday before the tournament to prefish and develop a strategy. They targeted the same type of structure that they fish in Kansas.
“We ended up catching some bigger fish toward the upper end of the lake on the flats,” offered Kennedy. “We were dragging baits behind Parks Planer Boards. Ninety percent of our fish came off the boards. Our terminal tackle was a 36-inch leader, a 2-ounce pencil sinker, a float, and an 8/0 circle hook. We baited up with cut shad.”
“We fish a number of tournaments all over the country,” added Smith. “And Possum Kingdom Catmasters put on a great one. Everything moved well during check-in, launch, and weigh-in. There is no denying that the payout is the best in the county! Hopefully, more tournaments follow suit.”
The Remaining Top Ten
3rd place – Randy & Tanya Bane – 103.23 pounds.
4th place – Brad Shoemate & Travis Robertson – 100.65 pounds.
5th place – Rene Zamora, Brenda Alcaraz & Rosendo Alcaraz – 71.23 pounds.
6th place – TJ Ranft, Ronnie Ranft & Diane Ranft – 69.91 pounds.
7th place – Michael Davis & Jesse Neufield – 67.07 pounds.
8th place – Smoky Brown – 61.95 pounds.
9th place – Spud Barton, Eric Richter & Kerry Dugan – 61.03 pounds.
10th place – Daniel Armstrong & Mickey Petree – 60.57 pounds.
Striper pot – $1120 to TJ Ranft / Ronnie Ranft / Diane Ranft
The Heroes Outdoor Therapy (HOT) Veteran’s Award went to John Mangum from Team number 6. John caught a 27.83 pounder and earned a check for $1,885. The tournament participants, spectators, and staff also collect $1,142.66 in cash to donate back to HOT in support of their veterans’ activities.
Final Thoughts
There were 129 boats in the tournament and a total of $61,785 was distributed to the anglers. The two days of catfishing on Possum Kingdom Lake produced 1,780.68 pounds of catfish on day one and 975.45 pounds on day two. That’s 2,756.13 pounds for the two days.
In summarizing the event, tournament director, Bryan St. Ama thanked the Chamber of Commerce as one of their biggest donors and supporters.
“We have a lot of local support from businesses and fans of the event,” St. Ama said. “As for this year’s tournament, we feel it was a success overall. We learned a few things moving forward to improve next year’s event. We are already planning to make it bigger and better. It is our goal to raise the bar each year with bigger payouts and hopefully gain more support from the industry.”
To keep up to date with plans for next year’s tournament check their website at www.Possumkingdomcatmasters.com and like them on Facebook.
