muzgash15

I fished there a couple seasons ago. If I remember correctly the bank is generally wet and steep so it's difficult to fish at times. There are a lot of snags also. The water is really high right now, you may not even be able to get in there. If you can use something weedless and you might hook into some decent smallies though. Let me know how it works out for you.

In my inflatable boat and my kayak I've always used a milk jug with the top cut off above the handle so there's about a four to six inch opening. It only takes a few rocks or handfuls of sand/gravel. Just tie a rope to the handle and you're good. I've never tried it but Unabasser's idea with the nylon bag may be even better unless all you have is sand.

I've been kayaking for a few years now. Mostly in rivers and some in lakes, only recently I purchased a kayak that has a large enough cockpit to fish from. I can say from experience that unless a scratch or gouge causes your boat to take on water it's not doing any harm and in fact is completely normal. Take a look at any kayak that's ever been down a lazy river, it's full of scratches and gouges from going through shallow water with a rocky bottom. They don't effect the performance of the boat at all. You shouldn't worry about them.

Hi everyone, I just discovered this site recently and I must says it's the best bass fishing site on the web. I have a question that some of you may be able to answer. At my local lake there's a shallow flat that doesn't have access to deep water anywhere nearby, isn't near a channel or old road bed, doesn't have any substantial cover and has a muddy bottom. It extends out from shore about 70 yards and never gets more than about six to ten feet deep. I don't understand why but it's loaded with bass. They jump out of the water all over the place during spring and summer, especially at dawn and dusk. They are obviously feeding, why else would they be jumping out of the water if they're not? But they are difficult to catch, I thought at first I may be scaring them by casting a shadow, or making noise in such shallow water. I don't think this is the case though, I see them jump within ten feet of me sometimes and have hooked them even closer than that. The frequency of their jumps doesn't seem to decrease while I'm there either. I can watch from pretty far away and get a feel for their activity, then walk over and not really notice a decrease. I usually either wade out there or fish from my kayak. I throw rat-l-traps, worms, and rooster tails at them and don't catch nearly as many as I think I should. The water is usually pretty stained so I'm sticking to either chartreuse, chrome, or black in most cases. My main question is why are there fish in this area? The only real cover is the occasional piece of driftwood that gets caught in the mud. What lures are recommended for catching them in this situation? I've searched all over the forum for answers to these questions and haven't really found any.