2023 WVKA Jackson County Open – Presented by Mountaineer RV and Outdoor Center

The West Virginia Kayak Anglers held their second tournament of the 2023 season on May 6^th, 2023. The eligible waters for the tournament were Elk Fork Lake, O’Brien Lake, Woodrum Lake, and Mill Creek in Jackson County. With spring in full swing, bass in all stages of the spawn and an ideal weather forecast, this one was an absolute slugfest!

Continuing his hot streak with another commanding victory is Buddy Vance with a whopping 89.75” bag anchored by a 21.50” largemouth. Though he prefers O’Brien, Vance opted to fish Elk Fork due to the conditions and how he wanted to fish. Vance shared that he started the day with a spinnerbait and caught a few but ultimately, he leaned on flipping a Strike King Rage Bug to produce his fish. “I caught my first big fish that was 21.50”and after that I never put it back down,” said Vance who also shared the key to his flipping bite. “Slowing down and making multiple casts close to cover was key.”  Vance has now won both of WVKA’s tournaments so far this season and is red hot.

Michael Ridenour of Fairmont, WV was able to secure second place with an 80.50” bag, wining the big fish tie breaker over third place. Ridenour’s first comment was that the water at Elk Fork Lake was even dirtier than usual. Ridenour started the day off strong with a 19.75” largemouth that he caught on a buzzbait only 8 minutes into the day.

Ridenour caught another fish on a chatterbait before he noticed, “the bite seemed to fire up around 1:30 as it usually does at Elk Fork” and proceeded to catch 4 more keepers which was enough for a second-place finish.

In third place was Mark Edwards with 80.50”.

Mark shared that he was “unable to get a reaction bite early so switched up to throwing a wacky rigged senko.” Mark’s comments about the key to fishing in the springtime is covering water to find bass as they are scattered out going through various phases of the spawn. O’Brien Lake was where Mark decided to fish this tournament.

Rounding out the paid finishers in fourth place was Dennis Treadway who put together a 77.75” bag on O’Brien Lake.

Dennis recalled a very exciting start to his day when he “noticed a lot of activity up shallow and decided to throw a topwater bait,” Dennis said. “On the second cast, my day changed fast. Before long, after throwing this topwater bait at divots in the bank, I was able to start putting a bag together.” 

Eventually the topwater bite mostly died off for Dennis but he was able to catch a 13.25” close to the end of the day that was a small cull enough to move him from 5^th place and into fourth place and in the money!

Notable finisher and your winner of the big bass award was Greg Kupfner with not just one, but two giant 21.75” largemouth. Greg started his day throwing a Z-man hard leg frog.

He remembers “getting a blowup on the second cast and then the third cast brought a 21.75,” Greg said. “About an hour later I got another huge blowup and I couldn’t believe it was another 21.75!” Against all odds, Greg also caught an 18” fish in the morning and then caught another 18” hours later in the day to give him a HUGE 94.50” total. It turned out that the two 18” fish were actually the same fish!  Unfortunately, it is against the rules to use the same fish twice for a tournament, even if it was caught twice and hours apart. This brought Greg’s total down to 76.50” which was good enough for 5^th place, just out of the money. Still a very impressive finish for just four fish.The next kayak bass fishing tournaments in WV are:

-May 20^th,2023 at Upper Mud Lake with SWVKA (Southern West Virginia Kayak Angler)