December 6, 2019

From your State Presidents Desk

Hello to all Nebraska TBF members. Well another season has successfully passed and we are gearing up for the 2020 season with another solid tournament schedule with some modifications.

First, I would like to announce that the tournament schedule and all the necessary information has been posted to our state website.

Secondly, You will find that we are going to go to a 3 qualifying tournament venue for 2020. Since the qualifier locations are scattered it was decided that you can fish all three if you desire but it is not necessary since  only your best 2 finishes will count towards the placement to the 2020 National Semi-final Tournament (NSF) that we will be hosting for 2020. Please refer to the tournament page for full details.

Concerning the 2020 NSF and since we are the hosting state we will be going to Lake McConaughy in September of next year. Many of you may be scratching your heads about the choice of Big Mac. This place has turned into a solid fishery for both largemouth and smallmouth the last few years. It has the potential to produce some good stringers but that means that you will need to figure it out to do it.

Since the holidays are coming up fast I would like to extend “best wishes” to you from your state officers. Be safe this winter and see you in the spring.

Happy Holidays!!!

December 6, 2019

This is a late report to all of the Nebraska federation members for the 2019 NSF hosted by the South Dakota Federation. This tournament was held at Big Stone Lake on September 14 & 15, 2019.

In a nutshell this lake produces fish in both numbers and size. Fishing for the Nebraska Federation and qualifying for the 2020 TBF National Finals at Grand Lake is Zane Ridpath and Rick Schwerzler. Zane will be fishing in the boaters division and Rick will be fishing in the co-angler division at the nationals next spring. Both finished in 3^rd place in their divisions. Zane finished with 39-02 and Rick had 28-10.

Congratulations to Zane and Rick on their great finishes and good luck at Nationals.

Nebraska TBF Semi-finals Qualifier #3 was held June 15^th at Lake McConaughy in western Nebraska. As with any Midwest lake in the middle of June the fishing is sporadic and tough at times but finding the fish is always the name of the game.

With smallmouth being the dominant bass in the lake system it was going to be challenging with changing water levels, post spawn smallmouth coupled with having heavy tournament pressure for 3 weeks prior.

Our top angler was Zane Ridpath (from the Omaha metro area). Zane managed to figure out where they moved by bringing in a winning weight of 14.04 narrowing out local angler Cameron Armstrong with 13.80. The thing to note is that Zane’s limit was all smallmouth and Cameron’s was all largemouth.

The winner of the non-boater division was Brent Jeppson. Brent brought in 3 smallmouth for 6.77 lbs.

Congratulations to our top 2 boaters (Zane and Cameron)  along with our 2 non-boaters (Brent and Kaito Ajiro) for qualifying for the 2019 District 8 Semifinal to be held at Big Stone in South Dakota/Minnesota.

Our next stop will be at Mozingo Lake in Missouri. We will be assisting Aksarben Bass in hosting the annual Travis Ferguson Memorial Tournament which is a fund raiser to combat Cystic Fibrosis on August 17^th. Then on August 18^th TBF Nebraska will be holding our annual TBF Open Team Tournament.

With the first qualifier over the anglers again went out on Okoboji for the second qualifier for another set of Semi-final spots. This day was like the “Tale of Two Days” in the tournament world. With clear skies and less than 5 mph winds greeted the anglers who unleased they skills on what was fishing for spawning smallmouth to fishing for spawn and post-spawn largemouth.

What was a “hit or miss” proposition yesterday turned into batting practice for many with several limits caught per fisherman. With the ability to sight fish a good number of smallmouth over 4 lbs. were weighed in.

Once again with his local knowledge and a desire to put an exclamation point to the previous days  statement, Jerry Pape again set a pace that was too much for anyone else to match. With a winning 5 fish bag of 21.67 lbs.. Jerry stated that he had right at 21 lbs. within 90 minutes after blast-off. On the non-boaters side Jeremy Jensen won with 15.31 lbs.

Congrats to Jerry and Jeremy.

The following tournament results are as follows for Qualifier #2.

Top Finishers:

Boaters Division                                                                           Semi-final Qualifiers

Jerry Pape                          21.67                                Mark Sexton                      B

Mark Sexton                      19.11                                  Mark Borchers                  B

Mike McKnight                 18.80                       Jerry Avis                B                           

Mark Borchers                  18.65                                                                                              

Jerry Avis                            18.41                           Jeremy Jensen                  NB

                                                                                              Billy Ray              NB

Non-Boaters Division                                                 Giles Monif                        NB

Jeremy Jensen                  15.31                                  

Jacob Her                           11.99                                  

Billy Ray                              10.13                                  

BB Mark Borchers                  4.80

Ranger Cup Mark Borchers