Even after seven high school tournament wins an an angler of the year award on the high school trail, Skip Howell says his best day on the water was a simple afternoon spent with his dad at Lake Monroe.
“He and I went after school one day this past January, and I caught a 9-pounder right before we were about to leave,” Howell said with a smile.
Many of his favorite times are focused around his dad, who helped get him started after bass several years ago, though that wasn’t the original mission.
“On one of my very first fishing trips of any kind, my dad and I went to the old river in Amory and were crappie fishing,” Howell said. “I started throwing a bass rig and caught one pretty quickly, and I decided right then I liked bass fishing a lot better than crappie fishing.”
He took to the sport well and quickly learned its craft.
“I started fishing competitively in the seventh grade,” he said. He finished fourth in the first tournament he fished. From that moment forward, his competitive light has been burning brightly.
The big leagues of tournament bass fishing can take a long time to reach but, for an angler who loves each step of the journey, it’s a ladder worth trying to climb. Today Howell fishes high school tournaments, club tournaments and any event large enough to lay claim to the name. He also fishes in the Phoenix Bass Fishing League, which is a division of Major League Fishing, one of the top organizations in the sport. In the Phoenix league tournaments, Howell is fishing against anglers of every age and degree of experience. Tournaments in this league are set all across the South and Midwest, but they’re on Tennessee River lakes frequently. In between, Howell fishes every local event he can. This weekend he’s competing in a winter trail club tournament on Pickwick Lake
“I like competing and I always want to win,” Howell said, “but a big part of what draws me to it is how good it feels to figure something out in a small amount of time.”
One thing Howell has long since figured out is his personal preference for following bass through the winter. The cold weather and cold water surrounding the changing of the calendar trip his excitement like no other time of year. That’s when he says his favorite tackle pattern is in its prime as well: the Damiki rig jighead.
A Damiki rig is designed for vertical jigging, especially during cold water conditions. The pattern offers a shad-imitating jig head that’s typically paired with a 4- to 6-inch jerk bait in a color appropriate to the water clarity conditions. The Damiki rig is set apart by its balance.
It’s meant to allow the user’s presentation to remain perfectly horizontal. It’s at its most effective when it’s paired with forward-facing sonar and used for finessing lethargic bass.
“I like fishing in December because, by that time, they’ve fed up for the winter,” Howell said. “They can be lethargic and hard to catch but, when you do catch one, they’re generally bigger.”
Howell favors the Diawa Exceler spinning reel and 8-pound line for working the Damiki rig.
His personal best bass weighed in at 9.42 pounds.
The 16-year-old sophomore is a student at Tupelo High School and is sponsored by Frog Level Tackle in Booneville.
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Quality, in-depth journalism is essential to a healthy community. The Dispatch brings you the most complete reporting and insightful commentary in the Golden Triangle, but we need your help to continue our efforts. In the past week, our reporters have posted 40 articles to cdispatch.com. Please consider subscribing to our website for only $2.30 per week to help support local journalism and our community.
