Wendell Ramsey - A San Angelo Original

I feel like I caught my first REAL big fish! If you are a fan of the blog, you would recognize the name “Wendell Ramsey” as a name that constantly resurfaces as one of the best, if not the best, local bass fisherman. Wendell Ramsey was nice enough to meet me for an interview for the blog on a windy Wednesday when truthfully, he could have been fishing. I had exchanged emails when I first approached him about a piranha I caught in the Concho over by Country Club Estates in the summer. I give you that Mandy Scott over at TP&W set me straight by identifying it as a Pacu, but Wendell was extremely nice an approachable when I emailed him pictures asking him if he knew what it was. Since then, we have had a chance to exchange a few emails while trying not to be too much a pain to him, Wendell has been extremely kind and willing to offer advice to a struggling fisherman. Just recently, I had the chance to meet Wendell face to face as he agreed to be a guest presenter at the Paul Ann (Baptist Church) Bass Club where we all learned a lot!

I was taken aback at how nice and humble of a man Wendell is. If anybody has any right to be proud of something, it would be this guy regarding his knowledge of the craft we enjoy. I consider myself extremely fortunate to have had this opportunity to interview this man.

WTJB: Hello fellow fish jerks. This is Jay Leeper with West Texas Jerk Baits. I have the honor today … I feel like I caught my first big bass …. Wendell Ramsey here at the interview site to be interviewed and to pick his brain a bit. Wendell, would you like to say Hello?

WR: Hello audience! I’m glad to be here! I want to thank Jay for having me and I want to tell everybody right off the bat that I offered to take Jay fishing tomorrow and he declined so (groaning in the background) remember that. He declined to go fishing tomorrow.

WTJB: You know, I’m still thinking about that. I’m thinking while you’re saying that, “Gnaaa!!!” I have a meeting tomorrow, but it’s loosing importance quick!

(laughing)

WTJB: Wendell, for the audience, would you tell us your name, hometown and a little about yourself?

WR: I’m Wendell Ramsey. I am a Senior. I have a son that is a Junior. I was born in Alice, Texas. I lived in Freer, Texas until I was about 6 years old where I moved to San Angelo and have been there for the rest of my life. I graduated from Water Valley High School. Small school, great people, it was a lot of fun. I’ve been around this area every since.

WTJB: Currently, are you a member of any bass clubs?

WR: I am. I’m a member of the Angelo Bass Federation and the Concho Bass Club. At this time, I believe that’s all. However, I believe I have been a member of all the bass clubs at some point in time.

WTJB: If I understand, you also have a perfunctory title?

WR: I am the President of the Angelo Bass Federation for the last three years.

WTJB: Talk about responsibility.

WR: Yeah!

WTJB: As you know, part of our focus is to talk about local fishing; especially for acknowledged experts like yourself. I know that you are uncomfortable wearing that mantle.

WR: I am. That’s a little thick for me.

WTJB: I dunno. If you take a look at the past interviews when I ask who are the top 3 fishermen your name keeps coming up first! Whether you like it or not …

WR: Great… That’s nice. Can I say that I’ll probably never catch another fish again!

(Laughing)

WTJB: Can you tell me what is your favorite local lake and why?

WR: You know, I really have a lot of favorite local lakes. I don’t have a preference to any. If I had to fish a lake within the West Texas Area, it would be Lake Brownwood. It’s certainly not one of the best local fisheries in west Texas as far as catching quality fish, but it’s a fun lake for me. I do catch a lot of fish on that lake but I do love fishing Lake Brownwood. Honestly, I grew up fishing Nasworthy so Nasworthy would be a close second. A lot of people would frown on that, but Nasworthy really is a good fishery.

WTJB: (to the audience) We had the privilege of having Wendell come out and be the guest speaker of the Paul Ann Bass Club. Although it seems redundant as he talked about these things at the bass club, I loved the answers. (to Wendell) Your favorite techniques?

WR: Well, by far, it’s no secret that I love to flip and pitch soft creature baits. I like staying around heavy cover jerking fish out of there on a short line. I grew up fishing out of a kayak dabbling so I was always around that kind of cover. A big heavy action rod with heavy line fishing heavy cover is by far what I like to do.

WTJB: Your 3 favorite lurers?

WR: Three favorite lurers right now? My favorite one right now is a Rage Tail Space Monkey. It’s put out by Strike King. It’s kind of new on the market. I was fortunate enough to know Steve Parks in Dallas who invented the baits and patented them and now markets them through Strike King. He sent me some really before they even came out on the market. (These are) Fantastic baits. The actions of the baits he has are phenomenal. And then, I’m staying with Creature Baits in that I like Zoom Speed Crawls. A very effective way to catch a lot of fish. You’ll catch little fish and big fish. I’ve been using them a long time. Probably my next favorite bait is the 10” Power Worm rigged with a ¼ oz. weight with a big 5/0 hook. I’ve caught fish everywhere on that particular bait from Amstead to Toledo Bend. It’s a fantastic way to catch a lot of big fish.

WTJB: Alright! Here’s a question that ought to peak people’s interest when it comes to picking your brain. Is there any advice you could give for local fishermen; especially for those slightly below average???

WR: Jay’s raising his hand!

WTJB: I am!

WR: That’s not true!
Yeah, I preach this a lot to a lot of people. There are 2 really important things to remember. “One” is time on the water. I know that people have busy jobs and families, but the best teacher is time on the water. So, you know, if you need to involve your family to get time on the water, so be it. There are different levels, but time on the water is one of the most important things. The other thing is to learn your craft to the best of your ability. Learn the basics. Learn how to cast accurately. Learn how to flip and pitch accurately. Keep your baits in the strike zone as long as possible. As long as you’re around fish and your making quality casts to the fish at all times, you really cannot go wrong. I see a lot of people who just don’t do that. They cast randomly around cover and not really in the cover. They tend to stay away from it because they are afraid to get hung up when in fact they should probably be a lot closer to that stuff. So, accurate casting which includes the angle you cast or pitch or flip or anything you do you want to keep that bait in the strike zone. That really falls back to time on the water. The more you do those kinds of things, the better you’re going to be at it. The fish will come. If you can do those things accurately and well, the fish will come.
(Jay laughing) How’s that?

WTJB: (Still laughing) I’m not sure how well I buy that last part.

(more laughing)

WTJB: OK, what is your opinion on the condition of the local fishing? We’re talking from Ivie to Spence on down to Twin Buttes.

WR: Well, you’re painting a broad picture there because we have lakes that are actually kind of hurting right now even though the fishing conditions might not say so right now. The fishing is very well like Lake Spence. The fishing is very well, but as you know I recently talked to TP&W and there is a high level of Golden Algae and it is at toxic levels. I’ve seen some of the fish and they are starting to show the effects of it even though there are not any fish kills or such at the moment. They are showing some sign of that. Ivie, on a scale of one through ten is probably a seven or an eight right now. Ivie is a real good lake. It has been since the hydrilla has taken over in the last two to three years. It’s really made it a phenomenal fishery. There are a lot of big fish in there right now and you can catch all sizes of fish in there. I believe it’s because of the grass that’s grown in the lake. I would have to rank this as one of the greater lakes near the San Angelo area. Twin Buttes is dropping right now. Typically, it holds its own this time of year. The springs run and the lake levels off, but now it’s dropping. That’s not a good sign in the winter time when it’s dropping. The fish I have been catching out there are healthy and full of eggs. They are ready to spawn. Hopefully, we’ll have a real good spawn and we’ll get some rain. Nasworthy is Nasworthy. It’s pretty much stays level. It’ll drop a few inches here and rise a few inches there which is good, generally, for spawning anytime you have that.

WTJB: That’ll work. OK, this is one I have been dying to ask you.

WR: Uh-oh!

WTJB: (snicker) Your favorite true fishing story?

WR: TRUE fishing story?!?! I’ve got a great one for you. I hope we have time for this one, but I’ll try to cut it down for you. Brady Lake, back in the mid to late 90s, me and a friend and fishing partner of mine, Ronnie Wallace, were in a Honey Hole team tourney at Brady Lake. Early in the morning, we started fishing. I caught a couple of 14” bass in the morning right off the bat. Right after that, Ronnie caught one that was almost 10 lbs. It was a big beautiful bass that swallowed a crank bait. We were excited. We hadn’t been fishing but maybe 30 minutes that morning of the tournament. We got him into the live well. Then things were in a kind of a lull so we decided to move to another area. When we decided to move, I mentioned to Ronnie that we had those 3 fish in the same live well and, “Let’s move the big one over to the other side and we’ll leave the 2 little ones by themselves so that they will be easier to cull.” He agreed.

As we were idling out he looks in the back and asks, “How many fish do we have?”

I said, “Three.”

He said, “We only got 2.”

I said, “What!?!?!?”

He replied, “We only have 2 fish in the live well.”

I was like, “You have to be kidding me!”

He said, “You have got to come here. You are not going to believe this!”

Needless to say, that big fish that Ronnie caught had ate one of the 14” bass in the live well. So here we are in a major fishing tournament (with) a lot of money on the line and we were all excited, but we didn’t know what to do. The rules say that you can only weigh 5 fish. One of our fish ate one of our fish, does that still count? We had quite a dilemma Anyways, to make a long story short, We managed to get the 14” bass out of the almost 10-pound bass and releasing the big fish safely after the tournament. Needless to say, we managed to cull all of the little fish and we won the tournament and we had the big bass. We told them what happened and we did pass the polygraph.

WTJB: How did you get the fish out?

WR: Slowly, but surely, we managed to work the fish out of its gut. It was in head first, but it took a while. We got it out. Is that a story or what??

WTJB: (laughing) Oh my God!

WR: It’s a true story. We were lost because we could not believe it had happened.

(Wendell shared another story that will be available on the podcast.)

WTJB: Catch and release?

WR: I believe in Catch and Release to a point. We need to look at how we are managing them. I know that there are a lot of people catching them and releasing the; none of them are going home to the frying pan. People need to take some home. I look at Ivie that has an 18” minimum. That came up because people believed that there were not enough bass in the lake. Of course the lake was low at the time and I believe it hurt the quality of the fish for a short time. With the grass back, the fish are coming back healthier. I do believe that lakes that do not allow fish to be taken out are being hurt in the long run. I do not know if this means that we need to drop the size from 14” to 12” in order to take a few home and fillet them, but it won’t hurt.

WTJB: Gotcha. Personal hero?

WR: Personal Hero? I do have a personal hero. His name is Bob Vance. He’s a good friend of mine’s dad who passed away several years ago. He was a good man who I respected during my upbringing. He was good. I’ll leave it at that.

WTJB: OK. My next question is one that I am very curious as to how you are going to answer. In your opinion, who would you consider to be the 3 best local fishermen?

WR: Three best local …. That’s hard to answer because I certainly respect a lot of fishermen in this town. I’ve always said, even in my writings in the local newspaper that I have done that I certainly respect a lot of the fishermen in west Texas and San Angelo.

WTJB: You can respectfully pass to answer that question because of your position that you are in.

WR: I will answer because there are at least 3 that I certainly respect. Believe me, I know for a fact that there are a lot of fishermen in this town that are just as good a fisherman as I. Some of them do not fish nearly as much as I do. I know what quality fishermen they are. First of all I would like to talk about Ronnie Wallace. He’s one of my long time team fishing partners since probably about ’94 or ’95 we have been fishing the team fishing circuits together. An excellent fisherman; very good and very knowledgeable. He can find fish on literally any lake. Number 2 is Gary Carr. He’s a local banker here in town. Quality fisherman dedicated when it comes to practicing for a tournament. He’s very serious. He’s one of those who pays a lot of attention to a lot of the details that a lot of people overlook. He can find fish quickly and he’s very thorough. I’ve watched him and fished against him in many a tournament. He’s a very good fisherman. And then there’s Charles Becker. He’s certainly a quality fisherman as well. He’s been around, like me for a very long time fishing out of Kayaks and migrating to bigger boats. He’s caught fish, literally, probably all over the world. Locally, when you go to weigh in, he’s always got fish. There’s 3. I can give you 30 if you want.

(Laughing)

WTJB: That’s all the questions I have. Is there anything you want to talk about like fishing club meeting times or something like that?

WR: Well, if anybody is interested in the Bass Federation, it’s no secret that you can go to the website www.texas-bass.com There’s many, many clubs in west Texas as well as through out the state. I know I’ve talked about it before, but if you are interested in competing in the Bassmasters amateur level, this is the way to go. This is an opportunity, a very hard opportunity; especially in Texas. Texas has more fishermen trying to get in at this level than any other state. If you can get through Texas, then you have got a pretty good chance. Great group of guys. Not a whole lot of meetings as we usually have out meetings at the tournaments. You can go to the website and click on the west region and it will give you all the information that you will need. Of course, you can email me or call me.

We wrapped up the interview and I feel like I let the big fish go. I didn’t want the interview to end as I knew an opportunity to learn so much more was getting away from me. In the end, I was glad as I knew that I stood a pretty good chance of catching back up and with a little luck would have another opportunity to learn from one of the best.

In all honesty, if you get a chance to visit with Wendell, you need to take advantage of it. This San Angelo Original truly is very approachable and willing to let you pick his brain.

In my quest to break the 5 lb. mark, I know that much of the information Wendell has shared is relevant and applicable. I only hope that I can apply it correctly.

Again, my sincerest thanks to Wendell for taking time from his busy schedule to meet and talk with me. I consider myself truly honored have a chance to visit with him over one of my favorite subjects.