What's Your Cover?

[Mobasser]

On my home lake the cover is sparse. The cover I cast to is two deep weed areas, a large rock wall, moss edges, and two wooden docks. There's also two large blowdowns, a lilly pad area about 20 by 30ft, and a small group of stumps in shallow water.                                                 For structure, I've got a creek channel which starts shallow and goes into deeper water, as well as a hump which was left when they dug this quarry lake.                Depending on the time of year, I cast to all these areas, and fish them with different baits.                                  What type of cover is most prevalent on your lake?         What deeper structure do you fish the most?

[casts_by_fly]

Prevalent and fish the most?  Aquatic vegetation.  Every lake here gets chock full of it by the end of may and short of a dieback or being sprayed they mat up by the end of June.  Its a mix of lily pads, pondweeds, and milfoil mostly.  We get some others but not mostly.  The fish relate to it depending on the underwater structure, but once the grass grows in you don't find them NOT in the grass hardly.  

[gim]

In terms of deeper structure, its established weed lines (for largemouth).  There is usually a well-established weed line here in lakes here by July.  It ranges anywhere from about 8 to 15 feet deep, depending on the depth of the lake itself and the water clarity.  My preferred method for targeting these fish in the heat of summer is a neko rig/wacky rig.  I stick a nail weight into the end of the stick bait and drop it to the edge.  The largemouth often school up in these areas, so when I catch one, I often catch more.  The trick is finding that school.  Sometimes they even hit it on the fall.

 

I fish a lot of shallow water cover too, especially for largies, but the OP asked for deeper structure, so I will refrain from getting into the shallow stuff I fish most.

[king fisher]

I mostly fish rocks.  If there is wood in the rocks even better.  One lake I fish is shallow and covered with aquatic vegetation.  I still look for rocky areas with wood, in the middle of the grass.

[galyonj]

- Grass lines

- shade lines

- literally any wood

[thediscochef]

hydrilla, hydrilla as far as the eye can see. Ray Roberts has a very healthy aquatic grass population through most of the lake shore, even some areas along the dam. It dies back a bit each year, but worse in the years where we have hard freezes that get below about 15-20 degrees for extended periods. We had that in 2021 and 2022 and it died way back. We didn't have that this year and it's noticeably more robust this year and the water is staying clearer. By mid May the cove I'm fishing right now will be a frogs-only zone. I'm about to go run a bunch of lizards through it right now

[Darth-Baiter]

annoying grass. 

 

with our recent drougts.  the water level is low.  ( I am no plant biologist). but I think this means the sunlight hits the bottom of the lake easier and the grass grows wild.  sadly, the bass LOVE this grass.  I punch probe the depths and rip stuff thru.  neither technique is my strongest.  

[Bird]

Wood.

A large percentage of the water I fish is full of lay downs, stumps and standing timber.

It's a must to wear polarized glasses and watch your prop. Lol

 

Deep structure ?

It's still wood as some of standing Oaks are in 40+ feet of water.

We do have cattails on the outer perimeters and do like to position the boat tight and cast horizontal to the bank, when I'm by myself of course.

[gim]

14 minutes ago, Darth-Baiter said:

with our recent drougts.  the water level is low.  ( I am no plant biologist). but I think this means the sunlight hits the bottom of the lake easier and the grass grows wild

Absolutely true.  Weeds grow thicker and out deeper when the water is clearer too, because sunlight can penetrate better in the water column.  Many lakes here have seen this pattern develop with a deeper weed line because of lower and clearing water.  Quite a few lakes here are "sprayed" with a herbicide in the spring to inhibit thick weed growth during peak emergent vegetation.

[Ktho]

Depending on where I fish it's mostly pond scum, rock and wood or millfoil/fanwort/hydrilla not the best on my veggie types

[Catt]

1 hour ago, Mobasser said:

What type of cover is most prevalent on your lake?

 

I fish lakes, rivers, bayous, marshes, & swamps. I run into every kind of vegetation both emergent & submergent. Trees, laydowns, stumps, brush, submerged standing timber.

 

I like fishing Hydrilla 

 

1 hour ago, Mobasser said:

 What deeper structure do you fish the most?

 

Anything 15' +/- 3' ?

[Deleted account]

My cover is the fish's cover...

[Mobasser]

One of my best spots are the deeper weeds. In summer they grow to withing one or two ft of the surface, and bass will come up and strike.                                                 Guys usually always think that pad fields will pay off, but not always true. There's got to be deep water close by or a change in depth. 

[thediscochef]

3 minutes ago, Catt said:

I like fishing Hydrilla 

same, it's a pretty forgiving grass. fish love it too

[Mobasser]

3 minutes ago, Catt said:

 

I fish lakes, rivers, bayous, marshes, & swamps. I run into every kind of vegetation both emergent & submergent. Trees, laydowns, stumps, brush, submerged standing timber.

 

I like fishing Hydrilla 

 

 

Anything 15' +/- 3' ?

Catt, out of all the baits I have, the simple t rig plastic worm has been the most productive cast to all these areas. I try other things- buzzbaits, poppers, lipless, but the t rig is the best all around. I usually start with a smaller worm and increase in size as summer comes in. It's very hard to beat day in and day out.

[Darth-Baiter]

I should probably start learning some aquatic plants stuff.

 

I think I know what Hydrilla is from my aquarium days.  but some of the others....????

[Mobasser]

A #3 or 4  Mepps spinner can be excellent where weeds grow close to the surface. If I can keep it just above the weeds, bass will hit it. 

[DaubsNU1]

Flooded timber, lots of moss, some weed beds, and rip-rap.

 

[Pat Brown]

In North Carolina, I have a few bodies of water I rotate and each one presents differently throughout the year and each one fishes a little differently.  Really helps hammer home the age old wisdom that what works one place won't work another place on any given day.

 

I fish a smaller pond with a nice flat hard bottom with very little cover or structure.  There is a dam and some inflows and a couple docks and a steeper bank with more wood cover/laydowns/submerged brush.  It's about 4 ft deep max and most of it is 1-3 ft deep.  I have caught my largest bass out of this pond and people swear it holds no fish.  It is very difficult to get fish at this pond but I have discovered through a lot of work that there are tons of small medium large and giant bass in this seemingly innocuous featureless small public pond.  On this pond it seems like the bite windows are very narrow and obvious if you fish a lot and identify them and the forage is very abundant and specific and failing to at least match the activity level of the forage will result in very few bites.

 

I fish a small lake that has tannic water and is loaded with dense patches of hydrilla with lots of good hard rock edges and lots of cool wood cover along the banks.  This pond has lots of good 20-30 foot channel swing /bluff banks and has a nice rip rap wall near the dam as well as some bridges and road beds.  It's a blast to fish in the spring time.  On this lake I like to target those deep grass-rock transitions and the shallow complex cover spots where rock and wood and grass and openings all happen around shallow and deep water.  I also like targeting Lily pads in the spring and early summer time when they become more prominent.  Skipping jigs and swim baits under heavy overhanging shady leafy outcroppings can be VERY productive in the summer when it's HOT and SUNNY.

 

I fish a larger lake that is more on the stained to muddy side with the deepest parts averaging around 15 ft deep.  It's flatter with a nice reddish stain from the mud and run off.  No vegetation but loads of submerged brush and laydowns along the banks.  Lots of cool underwater humps and shoals and some cool hidden creek channels.  There are some nice rocky points littered with under water stumps and some nice bluff walls loaded with deep brush and fallen trees.  This lake fishes the best of my 3 main bodies of water 365 days a year and I catch my best size and numbers on average.  I primarily fish jigs around wood on this lake.

 

 

[WIGuide]

Cover....you name it we've got it. We have pretty much every aquatic vegetation known to man, stumps, laydowns, docks, boathouse tracks, fish cribs, brush piles, the list goes on. The most prevalent would be vegetation around here. Every lake around my area has at least some of and most have copious amounts.

As for structure, it varies greatly by lake. We have a mix of natural and man made lakes. They can vary from big bowls of featureless bottoms to flat shallow lakes with small creek channels running through them, to relatively deeper lakes with a plethora of humps, points, holes, etc. The Mississippi has a mix of sand drops, wing dams, and closing dams. 

 

What I fish the most really depends on where I'm at and what the fish are holding on. 

[Darth-Baiter]

one of my most magical days of fishing.  gin clear water.  (it isn't now).

 

I could see stumps underwater.  maybe 15 feet deep.  I would see a stump, back pedal my kayak away and send in a worm.  even tho the stump was visible, the bass was not.  but it was almost 100%.  I could count down the worm sink and BAM!  so much fun.  

 

I have never seen the water like that ever again.  some stumps were on the bank high and dry.  they were like movie prop stumps.  big stump, caves underneath formed from the splayed out roots.  it was crazy.  now I just cast blind.  way less luck.  

[DaubsNU1]

17 minutes ago, Darth-Baiter said:

one of my most magical days of fishing.  gin clear water.  (it isn't now).

 

I could see stumps underwater.  maybe 15 feet deep.  I would see a stump, back pedal my kayak away and send in a worm.  even tho the stump was visible, the bass was not.  but it was almost 100%.  I could count down the worm sink and BAM!  so much fun.  

 

I have never seen the water like that ever again.  some stumps were on the bank high and dry.  they were like movie prop stumps.  big stump, caves underneath formed from the splayed out roots.  it was crazy.  now I just cast blind.  way less luck.  

 

Fished with a buddy up in Washington back in the 1990's...water was "gin-clear," we could see the bottom at 20 ft. Crazy!  We didn't catch a darn thing.

 

Water around her has 10-12" visibility. I am amazed fish can find lures in this stuff...

 

 

 

[tander]

Riprap

Docks

Lily Pads

[TnRiver46]

I just so happened to snap a pic under my

dock sunday. Rocks stumps and logs 

[the reel ess]

Four docks, two of which are falling down, laydowns, some brushpiles and lilies.