LAKEPORT, Calif.: The 2025 WON Bass Clear Lake Open was one for the record books in many ways, with some impressive limits brought to the scales by the 176-boat field. Leading the charge and setting the new record was noted Clear Lake guide John Pearl with an incredible 102.81 pounds over three days of fishing.
His daily tallies included daily weights of 34.44, 31.87, and 35.50 pounds, respectively, as he took home $17,000 cash and a new Ranger/Mercury boat package. While he did utilize a 13-inch glide bait early in the event, the 5-inch Deps Sakamata Shad in either biwako wakasagi or electric shad accounted for nearly every bass included in his record-setting total.
Pearl, who fishes Clear Lake as much as anyone, said the fishing has been incredible recently on the lake, and things set up perfectly for him to utilize a jighead and minnow during the event.
“It’s been phenomenal fishing for the last year, and if you would have asked me before the event, I would have said it would be won on a swimbait, but the warming weather had the bigger fish coming to the bank,” said Pearl. “The smaller males were up shallow, but there was a wave of the big females moving up towards the docks. Most were sitting out over 30 feet of water and might be down 5 or 10 feet below the surface staging and warming up their eggs.”
Pearl looked for areas near key spawning areas and kept his boat in 20 or more feet of water. While forward-facing sonar was key overall, windy conditions sometimes changed his approach. When using the technology, a speedy retrieve was essential.
“I fish my Sakamata much faster than some guys do; it’s almost like a ‘power finesse’ where I’m trying to get them to react,” he said. “If they follow it too long, you are just educating them, so I’ll often reel it back in and make another cast past the fish. All of my bass were those ‘floaters’ I could see sitting under the surface over deep water, but when it was windy and hard to use forward-facing sonar, I would cast under docks and in front of them where the fish should be positioned.”
Of all of the minnows on the market, Pearl chooses the Sakamata Shad because of the confidence he’s gained in it on his home waters.
“We catch them like crazy on it all winter long, where in the past we would only throw swimbaits and not catch nearly the numbers of fish in the winter,” he said. “The wings on the side of the bait give it a nice wobble that gets the fish to bite, and they come in some excellent colors. I was using biwako wakasagi in low-light conditions in the morning, and when it was a little brighter, the electric shad was good in the afternoons because it looked more natural.”
