March Jerkbaiting

[MstStudent10]

I'm going to Lake of the Ozarks for a week over Spring Break this upcoming March. Plan on throwing a jerkbait most of the time. I have a pretty good arsenal of Smithwick Rogues, but wanted to break down and buy a couple LC Pointers. For LOZ this time of the year, which couple color schemes would be the best bets to pick up? Any info is greatly appreciated! Thanks!!

[Wayne SW/MO]

In my opinion, the X Rap is close enough to the Pointer to take advantage of the price. I like the Gold, which is full of perch colors, and the Ghost, a reasonable Shad bait. In my experience, while the Pointer has a slightly better rock, the rest of the action is extremely close, and you don't have to add tail feathers to the X-Rap because they already have.

I wouldn't throw one on anything but braid either.

[Ham]

I took a beatdown or two from an x-rap when I was throwing LC's. I will say that they don't exactly give Rapala's away.

[fishinwrench]

Aurora black is a must have for Pointers on L.O.

Tenn.shad and Ghost in the deep suspending rogues (if you have some that suspend horizontally).

I'm sure the X-Rap is as good as Wayne, Ham and others say, but I just have to feel that "thu-thump" to know how hard to pull it, and the X-raps come through the water too smoothly for me. I'm sure it is just a mental hang-up but nevertheless I'm a slave to it.

[Guest csfishinfool]

I'm going to Lake of the Ozarks for a week over Spring Break this upcoming March. Plan on throwing a jerkbait most of the time. I have a pretty good arsenal of Smithwick Rogues, but wanted to break down and buy a couple LC Pointers. For LOZ this time of the year, which couple color schemes would be the best bets to pick up? Any info is greatly appreciated! Thanks!!

Go with the pointers. I would say clown, or american shad on sunny days. Table rock shad or chartruese shad on the cloudy ones.Better have a spinner bait in your box too, if your luckey the water temp could be reaching 50, and if that happens that blade will crush the big ones.

[Kayser]

I don't have any rogues or pointers, but I got a bunch of Cabela's escape minnows last Christmas, in bluegill, vegas lights, and flasher colors (click HERE to see them). Curious if those would work for the stickbait bite, as they suspend well between 3 and 6 feet.

And just curious, but where do you fish the stickbaits (how deep? docks, gravel, backs of coves, etc.?), and how (crank, stop, twitch or just twitch)? My friend doesn't get to fish much, and I would like to make our weekend stay as good as possible down there.

Thanks,

Rob

[Guest csfishinfool]

I don't have any rogues or pointers, but I got a bunch of Cabela's escape minnows last Christmas, in bluegill, vegas lights, and flasher colors (click HERE to see them). Curious if those would work for the stickbait bite, as they suspend well between 3 and 6 feet.

And just curious, but where do you fish the stickbaits (how deep? docks, gravel, backs of coves, etc.?), and how (crank, stop, twitch or just twitch)? My friend doesn't get to fish much, and I would like to make our weekend stay as good as possible down there.

Thanks,

Rob

Your cadence when jerking the bait will differ from day to day. Alot of the time I start will a simple routeen of twitch twitch pause followed by a slow drag. But I've seen people pause the bait for 4 or 5 seconds and keep a good pace and do really well. But I have also caught them letting the bait sit for 20-30 seconds. Then there is the extreme case where you may need to let it set for a minute or a minute and a half. In that case it seams like if you know that there are fish around or your bait is hovering above a brush pile you might let it sit for that long. At Lake O that time of year I look on the north shore of the lake from the Gravios Arm down to the darn, this is going to be your cleanest and warmest water in the lake. Now in march around springbreak the fish are going to be getting ready for the spawn, if you can find a transition bank that may have some chunk rock on it switching to gravel this would be a good pre spawn spot. But Lake O is diffrent from alot of lakes. This last year I found groups of Bass in 12 foot of water on long gravel points,(i was two to three casts from the bank) these fish were in a typlical pre spawn spot, but one that is often over looked. Then come the docks, to say that your fishing a dock pattern on lake o is just non sense. You have to almost look at the docks like they are bank. What I mean by that is not every dock is the same. Docks close to deep water or docks on secondary points might hold fish when a dock on a straight bank wont. Another thing to look for when fishing these docks are signs that there might be brush under them. Like a fish basket, rod holders, fishing boats, or even rods on the dock. Work these harder then you would a dock that obviously has no brush under them I.E, huge cabing cruiser docks. The last advise i can give about the jerk bait and this time of year is pay attention to the type of rock your fishing. Lake O hase some banks with sparse giant black/gray rocks. These rocks will retain heat. When your on a warming trend or it has been sunny, these rocks on the north shore will heat up, it may be just a degree or two but its enough to bring bait and bass up in them. Like i said in the earlier post if the water when your up there has hit 50 degrees throw a spinner bait around, slow roll it in 8-10 feet of water on the bottom and your liable to hook a real giant. Hope this helps

Cody

[Kayser]

Hey, thanks for the advice, I really appreciate it. Hoping to get out a few times this spring, so long as classes aren't too rough.

Rob