I wanted to fish a lake that I frequent quite a bit and had a little surprise upon arriving at the landing. They had lowered the lake around 6 feet for repairs to the dam and this made it impossible to launch a bass boat there. Pulled out and headed south to another lake in search of finding the smallmouth and largemouth that swim there.
One thing about fishing this time of year is that arriving at the landing, there is usually only a couple of trailers compared to the summer months. Lakes especially during the week are void of any activity and this is allowing you to go to any location to fish that you want.
This particular lake after a long idle ride from the landing to the lake, decisions are always tough in where to start. Water temps were anywhere from 60 to a little under 64 and the clarity is definitely getting clearer as the waters cool. With the wind picking up and blowing into the left side of the lake, I figured that I would concentrate on the windy side to see if the fish are searching for baitfish.
Areas of concentration were going to be deep shorelines as well as long deep points and working these with crankbaits. This time of year I am looking for active feeding fish and crankbaits allow me to cover a lot of water looking for actively biting fish. Starting on a point and then working down a deep shoreline wasn’t producing anything until I hit a little shallower water and a 15 inch largemouth nailed the deep diving crankbait.
Continued to do this same thing on similar shorelines with no success and moved into an arm that comes off of the main lake. The front side is somewhat deep but as you go further back into this arm it gets shallower to the 5 foot depth. Switched over to a rattle trap style bait and fan casted and caught another 13 inch largemouth bass.
Moved back out into the main lake and back to the deep shorelines and points and hit one area that was a little shallower and caught a very small smallmouth. Since seeing that the fish that were caught were coming from shallower water worked a small shallow finger with a wacky rigged BearPaw Hippie Stick to no avail.
Moved around the main lake to similar areas and just couldn’t coax anything into biting and decided to call it a day. Only three fish were caught with 2 on the deep diving crank and one on the rattle trap. Days like this are going to be far and few in between and the fall bite really hasn’t kicked in yet but shouldn’t be long.
Most water temps are still hanging in the low to mid 60’s and for fall fishing that is still a little warm. Once we get the waters to the low to mid 50’s this is when the fish really start putting on the feed bag especially once we get through the fall turnover. Any fast moving bait will catch these fish and take a look at their stomachs when you do as they are going to be very fat as well. Take advantage of these fall days while you have the lakes all to yourself, the fish will also be all yours.
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