Dodge PFA Throwing Lunker Bass

Dave Partridge, of Albany, is a senior biologist with DNR Fisheries who had never seen Dodge County Public Fishing Area until February, 2003. He was impressed and decided to come back the next weekend.

The results of Dave’s fishing over two days, February 8 and 9, included largemouths weighing (in pounds-ounces) 11-14, 10-1, 8-14 and 6-11.

Dave said he found the bass by fishing a Texas-rigged Zoom magnum lizard in watermelon red on creek-channel ledges. With water temperatures in the low 50s, the bass were hanging on ledges where the bottom dropped from 10-12 feet to 16 feet or deeper. All of the bass were released alive except the 11-lb., 14-oz. bass, which Dave is having mounted.

Dave went back again on February 15, and he didn’t catch any monsters, but his biggest five bass weighed 27-lbs., 9-ozs. They were still on the ledges.

Dodge PFA is known for big bass; it produced a 15-lb., 8-oz. monster last year and a 14-pounder in 1999. 

For more on fishing Dodge County PFA, see this feature article from 2014.