In the shortened FLW Tour season, Brent has won two of the five tournaments with persistence and experience.

The first win of the season was the opener on Table Rock. Ehrler won it with a an RC 3.5 DD, Pointer 100DD and a swimming grub. That victory came on the heels of his FLW Series Western Division win on Lake Shasta in his home state of California.

Just a couple of months later, Brent took home another FLW Tour win. Last weekend on Lake Ouachita in Arkansas, he pieced together a topwater and Senko pattern to catch 58 pounds, 1 ounce, in four days and win by more than a pound.

"It was pretty fun and interesting how everything developed,” he said. “Before we got there the water was up more than five feet, but our first practice day they started dropping it about four inches a day. It was a post-spawn deal and the fish were in the bank bushes due to the high water instead of running offshore."

"With the water dropping they stayed up but pulled to the edge of the bushes and were roaming. There were some individuals, some doubles and some wolf packs. They weren’t really holding on anything. Instead of running spot to spot it was better to run a pattern looking for the fish moving around.”

The bass were keying on bluegill, which were spawning. Brent threw a Gunfish 115 in Pearl Ayu and Ghost Minnow, and a Brian’s Bee’s Prop Bee topwater with prop blades front and rear. He also threw a Senko to the cruisers, and made long casts with all the baits.

Brent ran the topwater Gunfish and Prop Bee early in shady areas in the back of pockets, and then worked the Senko on main lake and secondary points through the day. The topwaters proved to be the big-fish baits each morning, catching 6-pounders on Day 1 and Day 3, while the Senko rounded out the limit each day.

“The second day, I didn’t have a bite until 10 a.m. and caught my second keeper at 1 p.m.,” Brent said. “I had exhausted my areas and was trying to figure out what to do, so I slid into the back of a pocket to look around. I could see the bass cruising the banks and caught one about 1:15, and had a limit by 3:30. I also found some bluegill beds and other bass swimming around. So that gave me an area to start on Day 3.”

That was when Brent busted an 18-11 bag and vaulted into the final day Top 5.  He alternated between the Gunfish on exposed main lake areas or when there was low light or a breeze, and the Prop Bee for calm conditions in the back of pockets. He had 30 bites on the third day and was looking for fish for the final day.

But overnight, the water level dropped and the fish that were cruising the edge of the bushes left. Ehrler said they left the sides and backs of the pockets for deeper water toward the mouth and main lake, but he didn’t figure out exactly where they were until late on the final day. He then culled two small fish for two that each weighed 2 ½ pounds, boosting his weight.

Joe had the same gameplan of throwing topwaters and it worked on the first day, with a nice 11-13 bag to start the tournament.
Then it unraveled on Day 2.

Joe believes the bluegills were trying to re-establish beds after the water rose the week before the tournament began. When it started slowly dropping, they stayed and the bass that had been around the bushes moved out.

“If you were in the right area you just hammered them,” he said. “My backup plan was a worm in deep grass. The first day I did well on the topwater plan, but the second day I pulled the plug pretty quickly after not getting any bites early. I went to my deep grass with the worm and scratched out a little weight. The third day was pretty much the same.”

Joe threw a Sammy 115 in Aurora Brown with a feathered rear treble hook.