NorthIDBasser

I was wondering if anyone had advice for what baits seem to work the best in the fall. I am mostly fishing natural lakes in the Northwest and we don't have shad in our lakes. Water temp out here is around 60 right now. Water clarity is still good 6-10ft. We have both largemouth and smallmouth. I havent spent a ton of time fishing in the fall so any pointers would help.

I have spent a fair amount of time trying to catch bass in the boise area ponds without great results. Granted, it has been mostly during winter months. I would suggest bank fishing around swan falls dam, CJ Strike, or Owyhee- all are around an hour from boise. Lots more and bigger fish in my opinion

Thank you for the info...I have never been to Banks either, even though its only about two hours away. Thanks for sharing and its a bummer no one responded with any pointers before your trip...wish I could have helped

My thoughts on "syncing" with a trolling motor would be having graphs that can communicate with a trolling motor to stay on a waypoint or contour line.

So I need to upgrade both my deck and console graphs. I currently have a Lowrance 480m in console and a Lowrance 136df on the deck. Both work fine, but are 10 yrs old and I need to upgrade. It seems like there have been so many advances made in the last 5 years to graphs, its hard to choose which graph to upgrade to. I'd like to keep my budget around $1000 for each unit with as many of the key features as possible (gps, navionics, side imaging, down imaging?). Im open to suggestions on which features are even worth having. I think it would be cool if i had a deck and console unit that could sync up too. If all of that were possible and could even sync with a trolling motor, id love to hear your thoughts and suggestions for all three. Im not a "techy" by any means but I can find my way around a computer ok. I live in north Idaho and fish mostly deep natural lakes and highland reservoirs. Thank you in advance!

Good Smallies will be on main lake points on northern half of CDA. Spooks and sammies in the morning can get u a 5lber pretty quick. Flip plastics or throw frogs for largemouth in the pads and heavy veg on the south end or the chain lakes. Good luck

My experience is colorado blades work best earlier in the year during spring when water is colder and visibility is stained or muddy bc they make more sound/vibration and you want to retreive them slowly. I have also found that adding an orange or red blade in stained water can increase the number of strikes. As the water temp warms up you can use willow blades or a combo willow/small colorado bc you will want to retreive them a bit faster. In terms of blade color, I have caught most of my spinnerbait fish with the combo of a bigger silver willow w a smaller brass colorado. In summer, small willow blades work best for burning the bait higher in water column for smallmouth. White and chartreuse skirts consistently produce...hope that helps

Thank you! I will give it a try

Just wondered if anyone could offer some advice on the best hookset for fishing a huddleston swimbait with the single exposed hook on top...I keep hearing different theories and it seems like I have lost as many fish as I have caught. Any advice appreciated...

You should definitely join if you are going to school there already. There are a few fellas from up here in CDA that recently joined the U of I Bass Team that are excellent anglers and could teach you alot. I am sure there are others in that club that could help too. I do the best on beavers, grubs, and cranks this time of year.

The water is getting good now. The U of Idaho Bass Team held a tournament there on 4/5 and there was a 6.33 and 7.77 weighed. The winning sack at a club tournament last week was over 23lbs of smallies...not bad for Idaho

Thank you for the pointers! I live way up in northern Idaho on Lake Coeur d'Alene so its gonna be a long drive down but I hope we can make it happen in the next few weeks.

Thank you for the advice!

Sorry that probably should be a different topic/post altogether....I'm new to this

A few of my close friends fished Clear Lake last April during B.A.S.S divisionals and can't stop talking about it. A few of us are thinking of making a bonsai trip down in late march. Will that still be pre-spawn typically that time of year?

The previous posts have been very helpful. I have the old lowrance 480 and I am in dire need of upgrading. I have been leaning towards the HDS-7 but I keep seeing newer models come out with all sorts of new features with pricing all over the board. Im a little hesitant to spend over a grand on a graph if it will be obsolete in a few years. Are lowrance that much better than humminbird? I know that graphs are starting to be one of the most important aspects of bass fishing. I was at a seminar a few weeks ago with an Elite series pro who said some days in practice, he won't even wet a line- he just drives around looking for fish on his graph all day long and then marks them so he can come back in the tournament. Anyway, I'm a little overwhelmed by the choices and cost. Any advice is appreciated.

I would recommend fishing the southern half of Dworshak in the spring. Launch at Freeman creek if you are coming from the north or Big Eddy if you are coming from the south (they are less than 10 water miles apart but 45mins apart to drive). Water depth can fluctuate significantly from year to year but the fishing is always pretty awesome. 4 and 5lb Smallies are pretty common in the spring and can be caught well on lipless crankbaits, shad raps, beavers and grubs(among other things). There are some toads in there. My PB is almost 7lbs in there and the state record Smallie (9.11) came out of there a few years ago. Fall is usually better on the north end of the reservoir for big fish as they follow the Kokanee spawn progression up to the mouth of the river.

I have only fished Brownlee one time and that was in mid-June of this year. I fished it for 4 days and caught between 50 and 100 fish each day. The problem is the big ones were few and far between. If you are heading north through Oregon I would suggest launching at Richland in the Powder River arm. Lots of tournaments are won in the powder river arm. Then fish your way out towards the main reservoir. Fishing is very good where the powder river meets the main lake. Tubes, drop shot and carolina-rigged lizards produced consistently, but topwater poppers and sammies caught some of the biggest ones. Nearly every point we fished produced. Brownlee had tons of fish and the locals say may is best time to find the big ones. Good luck!

If you launch at St. Maries you are going to be in for a long run to get to most areas. Rocky point is probably easiest to launch at and is right off highway 5 and only about 5 miles off the 95 out of Plummer...

Yes, Chat has mostly green fish...if you want to fish Chat you should launch at either Rocky Point or Chatcolet ramp both inside Heyburn State Park...if you want to fish around Harrison or Chain lakes, you can either launch right at Harrison on east side of the lake or you can launch on the west side at Sun-up or Spokane Point and just make a run across the lake

Lake CDA is a really cool lake because you can fish any style you like depending upon where you're at on the lake. If you want to fish for deep smallmouth, you can fish the north end that time of year and do very well off many of the main lake points. If you want to throw frogs, buzzbaits and top water- stick to the south end or the chain lakes on the cda river near harrison- which should be money. Throw anywhere around lilly pads and banks with wood and cover. As a general rule, the Smallies dominate the northern half of the lake and the Largies dominate the southern half and the chain lakes, but both can be found all over.

Does anybody know how Brownlee has been fishing lately? I have never fished there and am headed down for a few days. I've heard the Smallies are plentiful but hard to find fish over 2 lbs and the Largies are pretty scarce. Does anyone know if the Smallies are on beds down there or off already? Any suggestions or pointers appreciated.

Are you looking for brown fish or green ones?