HENDERSON — Many successful bass fishermen tune in to the sights and sounds on the water to put the puzzle together to trigger bites.

Jean Trahan of Lafayette did just that and, despite a recent influx of $100 worth of new fishing tackle in his boat, relied on an old, beat-up, homemade topwater to coax three good bites Wednesday evening at Henderson Lake.

“I got lucky,” he said after winning the Wednesday Night Hawg Fights Bass Tournament Series tournament with a 26-boat field with three bass weighing 8.25 pounds worth $630. He fished alone.

Right on his heels in second place was the father-and-son team of Chester Begnaud and Paul Begnaud, Henderson Lake regulars whose limit weighed 7.76 pounds for $378.

Also solving Henderson Lake’s bass were David Guillory and Chris Guillory. Their three bass weighed 7.34 pounds worth $252.

Carroll Delahoussaye and Danny Bulliard enjoyed a bassin’ payday, too. Delahoussaye’s 4.09-pound bass was one of two they weighed and it was worth $140 in the circuit’s sixth tournament of 2022.

Trahan scouted the lake June 5 and didn’t get a bite. However, he did see and hear bass busting the water while dining in the area he was fishing in the north flats.

“I saw bass exploding all around me. I couldn’t get them to bite,” he said about his trip from 6-a.m.-Noon that Sunday. “I said, ‘You know what, they’ve got fish here. I’ll just come back here (for the Hawg Fight) if nothing else.’

“When I got back in there, I had nine rods on deck. I was going to throw everything,” he said about his plans after the 5:30 p.m. start. “At 6:30, I didn’t have a fish. I thought, ‘What am I going to do? What’s Plan B?’ ”

A keeper bass answered then and there. After the fish hit his topwater, he put it in the boat.

He stayed in that area about 25 more minutes, then cranked up, got on step and ran a short distance to a second spot in the area.

“I caught my second one on the same bait. I didn’t put it down after I caught the second one,” he said, noting it is a prototype for an artificial lure he’s making.

Trahan, who owns Southern Technologies of America Inc., a telecommunications company, had no takers for a while but he did hear a good-sized bass smash the surface about 100 yards away.

He marked the spot in his mind, went there but couldn’t get it to bite.

He returned to his starting spot, fished and waited, then went back and got that sizeable bass to bite to fill out his limit.

“It was just meant to be,” he said.

Trahan had no idea he would win.

He eyeballed the three bass he caught and estimated them each between 2 and 2 ¼ pounds.

He underestimated. But he’ll take it.

“It felt good to win. It’s about time. I think it’s been two years, three years since I’ve won one. Chris and I have had some second-place finishes but never a first place” in several years, he said, referring to New Iberia bass angler Chris Vedrines, his usual tournament partner who is on vacation traveling across the country with his wife in their RV.

The next WN Hawg Fights BTS is scheduled to be held June 22 in the Atchafalaya Basin out of Bayou Benoit Boat Landing.