I got out yesterday; first time in about a week. I chose a place that I fish quite regularly and I know it as well or better than any place I fish here. It’s a mid-sized lake that’s deep (90ft) and has very clear water. The state stocks it with trout and it’s designated as a Trout Lake. What this means to me is, the lakes very abundant smallmouth & largemouth bass population goes by and large unfished for. This however, does not mean the bass are suicidal and strike everything that one throws. It’s quite the opposite. The 15-20 ft of visibility (and sometimes more) really gives the bass a heads up on an anglers approach. The bass are catchable but if an angler does not take steps to put the odds in his favor, it can be pretty tough sledding. After the first of July, many of the bass spend the day suspended and very hard to catch, which prompts me to hunt them almost exclusively at night.
The past few days this area has experienced some heavy rains accompanied by very high winds. This usually gives the waters here a little color but it’s not much and it doesn’t usually last more than a day or two. So when I showed up at the ramp yesterday, the sun was beaming, the skies were blue, winds were calm, but the water Had Color. Like 1 foot of visibility color. I was very surprised. I was expecting a drop-shot or Senko bite on 6lb line and spinning gear, but this no-vis warm water was a game changer.
I started out fishing with what I rigged up (and expected) the night before I left, But the drop-shot and stick baits were going untouched. After a little scouting around, the hummingbird was showing that there were fish suspended down at 10 – 12 ft off the points and around submerged wood.
Bringing only a limited bait and tackle selection on this trip, the only crank baits I had was a box of square bills. The first bait I tied on (the one casting rig I brought) was a 6th Sense Crush Flat 75X. It’s a square bill crank that’s rated for 2-5 feet but my experience with the bait shows that it runs down to like 7-8 ft on a long cast. The bait had worked well here in the spring slow crawled through shore line cover, so I thought I might be able to buzz it along right over their heads and hopefully they’d come up and whack it.
It took a few casts to figure out the speed they wanted but as soon as I started burning the bait, it was on. The bluegill pattern plug would be doing all the damage and before the day was over, the paint was chewed off the bait.
Many of the bass looked like 2 pound clones; fat and healthy. Their heads almost looked too small for their body size which is not something I see in green bass up here. Near the end of the afternoon my bait got slammed by a very respectable smallie. It's funny how you know right away "This is a good one". It was the only brown bass I got all day among 30 plus largemouth (which is an oddity up here for sure). Turned out to be the big fish for the day. Warm Sunshine & Several hours of the best numbers type day I’ve ever had on this lake, Good Times right there.
A few final thoughts ~ I didn’t know how these fish would react to the colored water when the majority of the time the lake is crystal clear. Lesson here – a Bass is a Bass.
Every strike that comes on a high speed crank is awesome, even from 2 lb bass.
6th Sense Baits catch bass, at least for me.
A-Jay
