What Lure Would You Throw?

[Missourifishin]

The conservation area I go to often has a big lake that is heavily pressured. But it also has a lot of smaller lakes and ponds that you have to walk back in the woods to find. And I've heard rumors that there are some hogs back there.

I've found one that seems promising, that rarely gets fished. It is a strip probably over half a mile long, and 100-150 feet wide. The problem is that the banks are mostly sheer cliffs. There is really only one spot on the bank I can get to, to fish. And it is right next to a beaver dam. I haven't figured out how deep it is yet, but it seems to drop off quickly. Visibility is 3-4'. Another problem with it though, is very thick weeds near the bank. I cast out past them, but always end up pulling in a lure covered with vegetation as I drag it through the last 20 feet or so close to the shore. I threw crankbaits, spinnerbaits and crappie jigs for about 2 hours last night. The fish are pretty aggressive, possibly due to low pressure, and I ended up catching large bluegill and some crappie on crankbaits, and also several bass including one hard fighting little 2-3 pounder. I didn't catch anything on the spinnerbaits.

I believe there are probably some really nice bass in there, and I'm just trying to figure out how to catch them. Soft plastics aren't really big confidence baits for me. But I'm thinking of lobbing some texas rigged with a 1/8th ounce weight, or some wacky weightless senkos out past the weeds hoping the fall slowly into the deeper area. Most of the fish I caught on cranks bit as soon as I started cranking it down. So I'm thinking maybe my chances of having them hit a soft plastic on the fall are pretty good.

 

Wow. Sorry for writing a small book about it. It came out longer than I expected.

Anyway, thoughts?

 

[Mccallister25]

Def. throw a senko in there. Also the t-rig and a jig probably wouldn't be a bad idea. Maybe a hollow body frog also.

[WdyCrankbait]

creature bait maybe like a Brush hog or something?  My 1-1/2 cents.

 

Good luck!!

[iceintheveins]

Senkos, flukes, and a 6" curl tail worm. Try poppers and buzzbaits in the low light conditions too.

[Missourifishin]

Great ideas guys. Thanks.

[RB 77]

It sounds like you might be rewrded for following your own idea of some soft plastics. A T-rig and a Stik Bait might work quite nicely.

[einscodek]

Pitch a few Sk rodents in there here and there.. topwater frogs.

Drop shot the weed edges if you can reach them from the bank.

[Suspendingjerk]

Good advice so far. Only thing I'll say is maybe throw something a little heavier than a 1/8. You mentioned a lot of vegetation and something heavier will get your bait through all that mess.

[Missourifishin]

Good advice so far. Only thing I'll say is maybe throw something a little heavier than a 1/8. You mentioned a lot of vegetation and something heavier will get your bait through all that mess.

 

I hadn't thought of that. The areas I'm going to try to cast to are out past the weeds. But there very well could be heavy vegetation a little bit deeper out there too. I guess I'll have to figure that out when I start throwing these bottom contact presentations.

[RipSomeLips]

I would work a fluke for sure. Especially since you mentioned they were hitting your crankbaits as you started cranking down, I love that you can work a fluke just about anyway that is needed, and you can mimic a baitfish very well. It also would glide pretty decent thru your vegetation issues if you texas rig it weightless and weedless then it's money in the bank.

[Fishes in trees]

Big lake, heavily pressured, walk in pits & ponds that aren't so heavily pressured.  Your location says Columbia, MO.  You're probably talking about the Finger Lakes/Rocky Fork conservation area, right?   Early to mid-80's, I fished that area quite a bit.  You've got a few options.

 

Option A - research & network - there is someone who can give you permission to get a boat on those secluded waters.  I found that person in the 80's, you can also with diligent and creative research.

 

Option B - Tote in a boat.  I had a belly boat, that was good for mid May through early September.   A kayak is an option.  If you've got a buddy a canoe is an option.  I had a professor pal who had an 18' flat bed trailer and he towed an ATV and a 16' jon boat (on a little trailer)  He would just back the ATV & boat trailer off the flat bed trailer and off he'd go, down the different paths that run all through that property.   When you came across a chain or gate across a path, he'd just reach into his pocket, pull out a key and say "Lock the chain/gate behind us after we pass through."   Back in the day, the U of MO and the Conservation Department often had a mutual back scratching relation ship.  I presume this is still the case.

 

Option C -  As I recall, most of those waters were actually better bluegill & various sun fish fisheries than they were bass fisheries.   Get a bunch of your buds together, 7' light action spinning rods, corks & split shots and go to town.   Don't stop until everyone has their limits.  You can actually chum them up and summon a monster school of bluegill and catch all you can carry.   I used crushed dry cat food, throw enough into the water that it makes an obvious cloud and then fish crickets on floats near the bottom of the cloud, where the water you've chummed meeds the clearer water.

 

If you are determined to bass fish, fishing from the bank is a challenge, and there are better and easier places to bank fish than the finger lakes/Rocky Fork strip pits.  Many of those pits are very deep.  How deep?  I remember 40 feet or more being common, but that was 30+years ago.  They might have filled in a little bit then.  Basically, on each one of those pits, there is a shelf.  That is where they got the bull dozers in and out of the pits.  Many pits have 2 or 3 of them as the veins of coal they were following didn't always run in a straight line.  That is your shallows.  That's it.  Some time during the day there will be action on those shallow shelves.  The vast majority of the area of the pits, the banks drop nearly vertically, down to the bottom.  The pits are ringed with vegetation though.  This is key.  Fish will be suspended, relating to that vertical wall of weeds in some way.  They are a challenge to access from the bank.  Paralleling the weed wall with some kind of crank, like a shad rap works.  I think that drifting a wacky rig senko slowly down the fact of the weed wall works better.

 

Back in the days when I fished those waters regularly, I was a meat fisherman.  I seldom had issues   with catching enough fish for supper there.

 

Hope this helps                                      

[The Fisher]

First choice would be plastics on a T-rig: U-Tail worm, baby brush hog, Zoom Speed Craw.

Next a Wacky Rigged Senko.

Then a fluke.

Next 1/2 OZ Siebert Big O brush jig to punch through veggies.

If there is some clear water without veggies, try a Roostertail.

Unfortunately, I find fishing a bank tends to be a search project until you know what they like. Once you do then you can carry less stuff. I fish a couple of ponds where the fish will not hit anything that moves but throw in a plastic and they think the banquet table was set for them.

Once you catch a few on plastics you'll get very confident, very fast....wacky rig watch the line, always keep constant tension, no slack, and when it moves or you feel 2-3 ticks, side sweep slowly to set the hook. T-Rig or jig 1-2 taps, reel slowly then jerk up. 

 

[Missourifishin]

Thanks guys.

 

 

Big lake, heavily pressured, walk in pits & ponds that aren't so heavily pressured.  Your location says Columbia, MO.  You're probably talking about the Finger Lakes/Rocky Fork conservation area, right?  

Fishes in trees, that's correct. And you hit the nail on the head with everything you said.

If I was fishing for food I would have already caught dinner every time I've fished the pits back in the woods. I was only fishing for bass, but I caught a lot of big, fat, aggressive bluegill too, mostly on small cranks. And a few crappie too. I've also caught plenty of bass back there, but not any very big ones. I have caught quite a few bass between 2-4 pounds on the big lake. But I have heard from people who I consider reliable that there are good bass in someof those other pits. So that's what I'm after. I'm definitely going to try letting a senko drift down just past the wall of weeds. I've thought about dragging a kayak back there, but I'd have to buy or borrow one first. Do you have any suggestions of other places to bass fish from the bank in Boone county? I've been living here less than a year, so I'm still figuring it out.

[Theangler1]

I would definetly try to invest in an inflatable boat. I actually just picked up an intex challenger k2. They have decent boats for a great price. For 100$ you can atleast get out on the water. You can also get a sea eagle boat that you can stand in. I also fish a strip mine that is very early fished and can only be fished from one shore and found out when on my friends sea eagle we pick up the giants on the other side of the lake.

[F14A-B]

Well you know there is LMB in it.... You can be certain there's at least a small wolf pack in there..

Up-size you're soft plastics... Use stealth at the water.. Also be careful at steep banks & at beaver huts... There in there.. Big girls are harder to catch. But you need to give up the cranks and such.... Go big!

[bassin is addicting]

all the above are good ideas...

 

i would also try a 10" worm...that might land you some bigger fish..