Breaking down this body of water

[GoneFishingLTN]

https://webapp.navionics.com/?lang=en#boating@14&key=wmnyFvmp{P

West Osceola Lake in Iowa

Looking at this map and knowing you are fishing in the summer.

Trying to hit ledges how do you exactly know where a ledge is?

The contour lines to me all look very close and many change only 5 feet gradually I see no huge drop offs that would create a ledge...

 

if someone could help me understand how to effectively read this so I know the next time I go to a lake how to find the ledges etc my self

 

also sorry that this may seem like I'm just trying to be lazy but bass fishing/boating is new to me this year and after many youtube videos I know what to look for but not really what it looks like.... if that makes sense 

 

for example I couldn't find one hump on that map anyways thank you for any help you can provide 

 

 

[scaleface]

Looks like one heck of a good structure lake to me  . Look at the saddle on the northwest  cove . Those are rare .  Fish it hard . 

[Bass XL]

Looking at Google Earth, it looks like there is some surface mat-like structure that appears in the summer on a few parts of the lake. I would try fishing around there. Punching a beaver and tossing a frog. 

 

https://www.google.com/maps/place/West+Lake/@41.0426984,-93.8279209,267m/data=!3m1!1e3!4m5!3m4!1s0x87ebe368696450f5:0xd80abc1877e5f626!8m2!3d41.0326626!4d-93.8102032

 

[GoneFishingLTN]

THANK YOU! This is stuff I like to learn

 

Is a ledge a steady drop like a staircase?

or is it like 10ft to 20ft? Because I'm only see the staircase type. 

[Scarborough817]

i know you asked specifically about ledges but if you want to change it up i would definitely be fishing near the casino, google earth is showing a lot of brushpiles there and there look to be some good structure changes as well.

[Catt]

First off at 4' contour lines your navionics maps is not detailed enough to draw many conclusions. See if you can find maps with 2' or even 1' contour lines, from the looks of the surrounding terrain there should be some available.

[J Francho]

23 minutes ago, Catt said:

First off at 4' contour lines your navionics maps is not detailed enough to draw many conclusions. See if you can find maps with 2' or even 1' contour lines, from the looks of the surrounding terrain there should be some available.

 

No joke! Even 1' marking lines don't show certain things.  I found a 30' long trench, about a foot deep, that appears on no maps I've ever seen.  At first, I thought the TD was ajar or something, but went back.  Dropped a ton of way points, and recorded that sucker.

[GoneFishingLTN]

51 minutes ago, Catt said:

First off at 4' contour lines your navionics maps is not detailed enough to draw many conclusions. See if you can find maps with 2' or even 1' contour lines, from the looks of the surrounding terrain there should be some available.

I have found some since. So what would be a good starting point of transtitions I've marked spots going from 6,7,8,9 etc in a staircase manner but that's not really a ledge right?

[Catt]

http://www.in-fisherman.com/bass/largemouth-bass/bass-structure-fishing/

 

http://www.in-fisherman.com/bass/ledge-fishing-secrets/

[WRB]

To start with this lake isn't a ledge type reservoir with a well defined sharp break main river channel. The lake is too shallow and may have a silted in main lake basin from the map posted. 

I would start my deeper water fishing survey on this small lake up by the dam. Just left of the dam is a bay with what appears to be a good looking bench going across it's mouth for 1 example.

Whenever fishing deep summer structure you need to determine the thermocline depth first.

Tom

[J Francho]

There's a lot deep structural interest in that 10-20' sweet spot.  The lake is just a little over a mile long.  Really, you should be able to just fish it and dissecting with time on the water.

[Dorsey520C]

A ledge is typically located offshore and is easily found by structure lines that are very close together indicating a dramatic change in depth. Typically a river channel forms a ledge, but you will also find creek ledges as well. Typically a creek ledge is not as defined since creeks do not have the dramatic depth change that a river channel will have. Although you will find well defined creek channels with ledges on Kentucky Lake and Guntersville, it is not the norm on most lakes. As others have commented there is no visible ledge on this lake. Take a look at Kentucky Lake on navionics and you will easily spot humps, ledges, and creek channels.

As someone who has never been to this lake and strictly reading a map to fish structure; I would concentrate on points since they are the most obvious mapped structure. During low light conditions bass will use a point as a natural highway. Points give bass the ability to move a short distance to shallow water to ambush shad or other bait fish. Then in the same manner move back to the 15-20 foot mark as the sun becomes high in the sky.

Now this is strictly speaking from what I can see on navionics and staying on point with your comments about structure. 

Next I would spend some time behind a graph looking for irregularities in structure and brush piles.  

If I were to fish this lake with no previous knowledge, I would start with the most obvious structure or cover. Grass, laydowns, rip rap, or standing timber covering the highest percentage targets first. If this lake has no visible structure I would then move to points. Stay back off the point in 20 + ft of water moving shallower as I fan cast. I would fish perpendicular and parallel to the point. Covering all depth zones with a crank bait, swim bait, top water, and then dragging something. Let the fish tell you where they are and what they want.