Hello, anglers.
Winds have been a huge factor on area lakes the past few days and weather reports don’t show much relief until late this week.
Even so there were several tournaments last weekend, including the FLW college event on Toledo Bend.
As we have been writing about for the
past couple of years, the growth of organized bass fishing on the
college level has
been impressive to say the least. According to FLW reports, the
LSU team of Richard Murdock and Beau Hadskey won the FLW College
Fishing Southern Conference tournament on Saturday with five bass
weighing 20 pounds, 13 ounces. The victory earned the club
$2,000 and advanced the team to the FLW College Fishing Southern
Conference Invitational tournament.
“Last weekend my partner and I had some
really good pre-fishing action going,” said Hadskey, a petroleum
engineering major.
“We were fishing up north and catching them pretty good. But today
there were waves out there that were 4-feet tall. We chose
to stay down on the south end of the lake where it was calmer and
ended up doing all of our fishing between Mill Creek and
Six Mile.”
Hadskey said they caught all of their fish in 6 feet of water or less while swimming a jig and using a lipless crankbait.
McNeese State’s team of Ty Griffin and Andrew Gary had a top-five finish while finishing in fourth place with 14 pounds, 8
ounces ($500), while another LSU team of Brett Matherne and Logan Mount finished fifth with 12 pounds, 13 ounces ($500).
The lake level has fallen slightly and stands at 169.08 feet at midweek with one generator running 24 hours.
Water surface temperatures have been almost unchanged for about a week from 54-58 degrees with north Toledo stained, midlake
slightly stained to clear and south Toledo clear to very clear.
BASS: Bunches
of bass are in shallow water 8 feet or less. Rat-L-Traps and
spinnerbaits have been two effective baits with specific
Trap colors being Toledo Gold, Cherry Bomb and Rayburn Red in
low-light conditions and chrome-and-black and chrome-and-blue
on bright days.
The best spinnerbaits in clear water
with grass have been Stanley’s double willowleaf blades with one of the
blades gold-and-copper
plus shad colored skirts with white-and-chartreuse.
Depending on how active the bass are on a given day, the retrieve or presentation can be from very fast to a slow yo-yo with
frequent pauses.
There are also occasions when bass will
not hit moving lures. Those times call for something slow in order to
leave baits
in the strike zone as long as possible. A weightless presentation
with Gulp! Sinking Minnow, Kandi Stik or Senko can be very
productive during such situations and these can all be rigged
several ways, including Texas weightless, Wacky or split shot.
All three can be super productive depending on the nature and
characteristics of the cover (grass or brush) and how the fish
are relating to that cover. Most of the time it takes a little
experimentation to establish a pattern.
Another pattern where we are being successful is the outside edge of the grass line on the southern end of the lake. Pirates
Cove (Toro), Six Mile/Sandy, Mill and Clear Creek. Housen and Hurricane creeks as well as Indian and Buck creeks all have
excellent submerged grass. So do areas around Texas and Louisiana Islands so there is no shortage of grass down south.
As a matter of fact, I have some areas
that I avoid that have too much grass and have been more successful in
those areas
with scattered grass where you can get your light-weighted bait
down to the fish. Later in the year these thick grassy areas
will be good cover to fish, but currently I look for scattered
grass.
Remember what we talked about last week
concerning the four areas bass are using — the shoreline, inside grass
line, outside
grass line and on top of the main grass line? Much of the success
of this spring’s fishing on the southern end of the lake
will be determined on how anglers approach those four areas and
making adjustments while going from one to the other as conditions
change.
There still are bass in deep water with
Stanley Bugeye football jig and Carolina rigs catching fish in 18-30
feet on main
lake points and ridges. We also continue to catch bass on
drop-shot using Berkley Havoc Bottom Hopper Jr. in shady watermelon
candy and green pumpkin. We continue to have a jigging spoon tied
on and some days it remains productive but we are not using
it as much as past weeks.
CRAPPIE AND YELLOW BASS: Crappie are moving to shallow water and anglers are catching up creeks and under bridges both day time as well as after dark
with crappie lights and lanterns using live shiners.
Those who have docks with medium to deep water are also catching them. Yellows are getting ready to spawn and can be found
on edge of creeks and the river using spoons and tailspinners such as Norman’s Knock Off and Little George (Mann’s).
Joe Joslin
is a syndicated outdoor columnist, tournament angler and pro guide on
Toledo Bend and Sam Rayburn. His column appears Thursdays.
Contact him at 463-3848 or joejoslinoutdoors@yahoo.com or visit www.joejoslinoutdoors.com