By Stan Fagerstrom

This sort of thing just doesn’t happen---but it did!

Pull up a stool because I’m about to share the story of how a soft-spoken gentleman from West Virginia had a week of bass fishing that very likely is the best ever recorded anytime and anywhere.

The angler I’m writing about is Les Melton, of Charleston.  The place is Mexico’s fabled El Salto Lake.  Odds are if you follow bass fishing as close as the rest of us plug-pitching nuts, you probably already know a bit about both.  El Salto, of course, is thought by most to be the best bass lake that’s ever existed.  Melton, the vice president of the Charleston Medical Center, is a recognized bass fishing expert.  He’s been at it all his life.

If you’ve read material I’ve already provided for the Anglers Inn web site you may recall stories I’ve written before about Melton’s angling success.  The last time I did a column about him, I thought probably his fish-catching experience I was detailing at the time might never be topped.  I was wrong.  I guess it’s fair to say that when it’s El Salto bass fishing you’re talking about---darn near anything is possible!

But not even veteran guides at Anglers Inn, and they’re among the best anywhere, were prepared for what Melton did on that beautiful Mexican Lake the last week in May.  Statistics are usually on the boring side.  I guarantee the statistics that follow won’t bore experienced bass fishermen.  What follows, my friends, are the carefully recorded records of what the West Virginia big bass specialist accomplished in seven days on his last visit to El Salto Lake:

            Total number of bass caught……………………………….. 607

            Number of fish of 10-pounds or more………………………27

            Number of fish of 8-pounds or more………………………..60        

            Estimated number of fish of 7-pounds or more……………..100

Total weight of 10 largest fish for seven days………………134.1-pounds

            Total weight of 5 largest fish for seven days……………… .71.5-pounds

            Total weight of 10 largest fish for one day………………….118-pounds

            Total weight of five largest fish for one day………………...66.8-pounds

Countless anglers spend a lifetime fishing bass and never do manage to boat a 10-pounder.  But Les Melton nailed 27 of them at El Salto in just six days.  Here’s a run down of the size of those 27 slab sided brutes that topped 10-pounds: 15; 15; 14.07; 14; 13.08; 13.04; 12.12; 12.12; 11.14; 11.08; 11.08; 11.02; 11; 10.10; 10.08; 10.08; 10.08; 10.08; 10.06; 10.06; 10.05; 10.04; 10.02; 10.02; 10; 10 and 10.

Before some skeptic questions these weights, let me point out that every one of the fish listed above was weighed on Boga Grip scales.  Melton is as meticulous in his record keeping as he is in his actual fishing. He doesn’t trust digital scales.  I don’t either.  I have my own Boga Grips scales and they don’t, as my digitals sometimes do, tell me one thing today and something else 15 minutes later.

When I last talked to Les a couple of years ago he’d already caught some 70 bass of 10-pounds or more, most of them at El Salto Lake.  At that time his best day ever on El Salto had come in 1999 when his 10 largest bass weighed 104.4-pounds.  But great as he knows El Salto is Melton never expected to reach what has to be the very pinnacle of bass fishing success this last time around.

“I couldn’t believe it was happening,” he says.  “I must have felt like players do when they win the Super Bowl.  It was the epitome of what bass fishermen hope to do.”

So just how did all of this come about?  Were there secret lures, scents, techniques or anything else not readily available to the rest of us?  Not really.  I know what I’m talking about because I’ve spent a good bit of time discussing those things with this likeable West Virginia gentleman.

The key, as Melton will tell you, was finding where those big El Salto monsters were holding.  This last time it wasn’t off the shoreline and it wasn’t around the countless submerged trees, though both of those spots often hold an abundance of smaller bass at the productive Mexican lake.

“The first two days we fished the north end of the lake,” Melton says.  “We did get a substantial number of fish, but most of them ran from 5 to 6-pounds.  On the third day we began fishing deeper water in the south end of the lake.”

Melton fished by himself on his last El Salto adventure.  His guide was Javier, one of the most experienced of the knowledgeable Anglers Inn guide crew.  Melton will tell you both of those things, playing a lone hand and not having to share the best spots, plus being able to draw on Javier’s expertise at finding fish, figured in his fantastic success.

And Javier did put him on big fish in the south end of El Salto.  The bass still weren’t up against the shore, off points or congregated in the submerged trees.  “We found them on the large flats,” Melton says, “there was no obvious cover on the surface.  The fish were grouped over ditches and old creek beds in 15 to 25-feet of water.  Once we found them it was ‘Katie bar the door’.”

The lure he used most has long been one of the most productive at El Salto.  Melton says 90 per cent of his big fish came on a 10-inch Berkely Power Worm.  These worms were black with a blue tail.  He rigged them Texas Style on a 5/0 wide gap Gamakatsu hook.  He used a ½-ounce slip sinker on 30-pound test Magnathin monofilament.  The remainder of his big fish came on a 5-inch Storm Swim Shad swimbait in a golden mullet color or on a citrus colored Fat Free Shad crankbait.

Another primary key to Melton success, and it’s something that surfaces every time I interview an especially successful worm angler, is the technique he uses with it.  Again there’s no big secret.  He just fishes the darn thing s-l-o-w.  “I cast,” he says, “then just let the worm fall straight down to the bottom.  If nothing happens I wiggle my rod tip a little, then reel in a few inches and repeat the process.  I spend at least a minute with each retrieve.  I expect such a slow retrieve might drive some fishermen crazy, but it works for me.  Worms don’t swim fast..  I’ve tried different speeds.  The slow one works best.”

Have opportunity to visit with Melton and he’ll tell you how important it is to always watch your line while fishing a worm.  “Those big fish,” he says, “were in 15 to 25-feet of water.  I had to really concentrate on what my line was doing to tell when a fish picked up.  When one did I set the hook hard---twice.”

Something else he does is retie his hook after every fish is caught.  He also changes his hook at least four or five times a day.

This last trip to El Salto was the 23^rd time Les Melton has visited Anglers Inn to fish at El Salto Lake.  Despite the excellent success he has had in the past, his results in May were the best ever.  “I don’t want to exaggerate,” he says, “but 7-pound fish actually got to looking a bit small.”

If anyone has a right to predict what the future holds for big bass fishing at Lake El Salto it’s this West Virginia expert.  The man now has 112 bass of 10-pounds or more to his credit.  I asked him how he felt about the lake’s future.  “El Salto is a well managed lake,” he says, “they’ve done a marvelous job with it.  Catch and release is working.  I don’t think the lake has peaked.  I think the time will come when it’s fairly common to catch 15 to 16-pound fish there.”

Finally, Melton is just as enthusiastic about the job Billy Chapman Jr. has done with Angler’s Inn as he is fishing in the lake that this beautiful lodge overlooks.  “I can’t imagine how there could be a better place for a bass fisherman,” he says.  “That goes for the staff as well as the facility.  I’m proud to call them my friends.”

I’ve a strong hunch Chapman and the members of his capable crew are equally proud of Les Melton. 

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