Its about that time again... HOT Winter action on TN Reservoirs If youre one of those anglers that put the boat away at the first sight of freezing temps to sit in front of the fire place during the cold winter months until spring, you may want to reconsider. When the surface water temps drop below 50 on Kentucky Lake and Lake Barkley it’s time to hit the lake with blade baits. The majority of the shad in the lakes are going to migrate back out to the first few underwater points and outside creek channel swings in the bays from the shallows. Get yourself a good map and locate these underwater points and creek channel ledges that have steep drop offs near the mouths of bays and you will find bass. Not all of these spots will have bass on them. You need to study your graph and look for the baitfish. If plenty of baitfish are present you can bet bass will be nearby. On the other hand if the graph is void of any baitfish and there are no fish eating birds in the area then you might as well move to the next spot. In the rest of this article I will breakdown how to go about being successful in the winter months. Location: I look for larger bays initially because I believe they hold a larger number of bass. Then I try to locate underwater points on ledges near the mouths that can be from 1’ deep on top to 10’ deep on top but the one thing in common is they must drop rapidly to at least 15’ to over 20’. I find these spots by either using a paper map, computer program or my GPS. Most of the time I use my GPS. I highly recommend you invest in a good GPS unit with a map card of the lake you are fishing. Some of today’s map cards are in high definition which has a contour line for every one foot drop in elevation. They make finding these under water treasures unbelievably easy. If you don’t have the GPS you can always use a good detailed paper map to line up on a spot referencing land marks and your depth finder. What to look for: Once you have picked out some of these spots you need to look for signs of baitfish in the area. One good sign is birds that feed on baitfish being in the area. If you have those birds on the water near your location or flying overhead and diving it’s a sure bet the baitfish are there. Study your depth finder as you idle around the area for baitfish. If there is any, it’s a good bet you can catch bass there. Play close attention to your depth finder the entire time you are fishing. If you see a clutter of bait fish with fish arches below or in them drop your bait straight down and you can usually pick up a fish. When I fish these underwater drop offs and creek channel ledges I almost never go down a straight featureless drop off. I go straight to the high percentage areas. Points on the drop off, small fingers on the drop off and cuts on the drop off. In my opinion 9 times out of 10 the majority of the feeding fish will be on those irregular features. What to use: When I say blade bait I’m talking about one type of bait. The silver buddy style of bait. It’s a flat piece of aluminum or steel with some lead on the belly that weighs it down and makes it vibrate hard when you pull it up off the bottom. Make sure you have a good plug knocker and a few of the baits because the treble hooks will snag and the plug knocker won’t always get them back but most of the time will. I prefer the 1/2oz model for most of my blade baiting. I have one simple rule when it comes to color selection. If it’s sunny throw the silver, if it’s cloudy throw the gold. That’s it. Now if it’s muddy or heavily stained and cold water below 50 degrees, stay home or find water with better than 2’ visibility. No I’m not sponsored but I use a bait made by “realbaits” it has realistic eyes, a holographic sticker for more flash and o rings on the hooks. I think it’s a much better bait at a better price than some others. Presentation: Boat positioning plays a major role in your success or failure. When I get to the spot I plan to fish and have idled over it a few times to determine if it’s worth my while I will back off and drop the trolling motor. I believe most of the fish will be right near the drop itself. They won’t usually be on top of it in shallower water unless it’s a bright warmer sunny day with the surface temps rising a degree or two and light winds. If the top is less than 10’ and after it drops it levels out at let say 23’ I want to keep my boat from 19-22’ this lets me know I’m near the drop itself. Just make a medium cast on top of it and lift and drop the bait back to the bottom on a controlled slack. Most of the time you won’t feel the bite, they will just be on there when you lift back up on the bait. Occasionally you will feel your line jump on the drop. I use the standard lift a few feet of the bottom and follow it back down most of the time but I will experiment with the retrieve a little by making quicker lifts off the bottom or slower, higher or lower and a lot of the time I will give it a few twitches as it falls to slow the fall some and give it more action. To make sure you are landing your bait on top count it down. If it sinks for 3-8 seconds then you’re on it but if it sinks for more than 10 seconds you probably aren’t close enough to it. The biggest mistake to make is to float in on top of the ledge then most of the fish you should be catching are either under you or behind you in the deeper water. It’s very important to stay off it and make the right presentation. Gear: I use spinning and bait cast gear when I fish the blade bait. I have a 7’ MH rod on my spinning reel and I’ll use a 7’ MH on my bait casting. I like the MH rod better because I like to feel the vibration of the bait more and I feel more bites on the MH than a medium or light action rod. I use 10 to 12lb test Gamma fluorocarbon line on my outfits for blade baiting. I feel it’s very important to have that nearly invisible line especially in the winter months when the water is usually clearer. I have caught many bass like this in the winter time from 50 degree water all the way down to 39 degree water. It’s fairly simple and it works great. Many days you will catch from 10 to over 40 bass. Recently the Bama rig has became deadly during winter months also. Last year I had a phenomanal time using it. Fish the same areas but try the rig out and hold on! I hope this helps whoever reads this to catch more bass in winter. The same locations you catch them in winter will also be good places to find bass on during pre spawn, post spawn and summer.
Posted on: Tue, 05 Nov 2013 20:13:43 +0000
Trending Topics
Recently Viewed Topics
© 2015