KVD and the Toyota Guys

[aarchdale@coresleep.com]

I turned my free Lowrance buff inside out the other day so i wouldnt look like a complete idiot.   They really do feel good on a cool morning

 

[Bill Babler]

We had the pleasure of hosting the MotorGuide team here at the Lodge.  It was for sure tough in the Point 16 to Long Creek section of the lake and that is a big chunk of this pond.  The guys caught what they caught mostly on a crank bait, blade and topwater.  I could really give a flip about this talk of shallow.  There are fish right now to be caught and for some reason Cindyjo is the only critter on this board doing the right thing or at least doing it and telling about it. 

There were fish caught this past weekend in extremely large numbers and I mean quality fish.  Most all the best reports are coming from up the White River.  Not Shallow.

Lots and lots of keeper size fish, coming from 60' just pretty much where they are most of the time at this time of the year.  30' to 60'.  You have to drive right over them to pound the bank, so take a look at the depth finder as your coasting to the shoreline and you might see the graph light up.

There were 4 guides up the White River last Thursday thru Sunday that had their clients catch and release close to 500 fish.  Lots of keeps in the mix.  Not a one of them made a cast a rifle shot from the shoreline.   They fished humps, flat rolloffs and channel swings above Baxter, some of these guys did not have to move at all after the 1st. stop fishing a single location for as long as 4 hr.  None of them saw a single tournament boat on Sunday.  Those guys stayed pretty close to BC.

Take a breath, rethink and use your underwater eyeballs and that War Eagle jigging spoon instead of your shallow water surf tools and see what's lurking in the  Briny Deep.

Good Luck

[crazy4fishin]

Bill - you must be right...I read the Bass Master article and it talks about how these guys really had to work for their fish and for most all of the keepers were caught before 9 a.m.- I was also surprised at how many blanked....heck I do that on a regular basis!!

C4F

[Champ188]

They had a very bright day without much wind. On TR or any other highland reservoir, that doesn't bode well for the shallow bite.

That said, there's a lot of stealth and trickery that goes into catching fish shallow out of these kind of lakes. Sun angles, wind (what little there may be) and just knowing the right spots from years of experience all come into play. There weren't a lot of locals fishing the Toyota deal, so those who tried to power fish in those conditions signed their own death warrants.

Bill is dead right in that deep is where the money bite is at right now.

OK, that's two death metaphors in one post. Time for me to go.

[vernon]

9 hours ago, Champ188 said:

They had a very bright day without much wind. On TR or any other highland reservoir, that doesn't bode well for the shallow bite.

That said, there's a lot of stealth and trickery that goes into catching fish shallow out of these kind of lakes. Sun angles, wind (what little there may be) and just knowing the right spots from years of experience all come into play. There weren't a lot of locals fishing the Toyota deal, so those who tried to power fish in those conditions signed their own death warrants.

Bill is dead right in that deep is where the money bite is at right now.

OK, that's two death metaphors in one post. Time for me to go.

"Dead" on!

[merc1997 Bo]

22 hours ago, Bill Babler said:

We had the pleasure of hosting the MotorGuide team here at the Lodge.  It was for sure tough in the Point 16 to Long Creek section of the lake and that is a big chunk of this pond.  The guys caught what they caught mostly on a crank bait, blade and topwater.  I could really give a flip about this talk of shallow.  There are fish right now to be caught and for some reason Cindyjo is the only critter on this board doing the right thing or at least doing it and telling about it. 

There were fish caught this past weekend in extremely large numbers and I mean quality fish.  Most all the best reports are coming from up the White River.  Not Shallow.

Lots and lots of keeper size fish, coming from 60' just pretty much where they are most of the time at this time of the year.  30' to 60'.  You have to drive right over them to pound the bank, so take a look at the depth finder as your coasting to the shoreline and you might see the graph light up.

There were 4 guides up the White River last Thursday thru Sunday that had their clients catch and release close to 500 fish.  Lots of keeps in the mix.  Not a one of them made a cast a rifle shot from the shoreline.   They fished humps, flat rolloffs and channel swings above Baxter, some of these guys did not have to move at all after the 1st. stop fishing a single location for as long as 4 hr.  None of them saw a single tournament boat on Sunday.  Those guys stayed pretty close to BC.

Take a breath, rethink and use your underwater eyeballs and that War Eagle jigging spoon instead of your shallow water surf tools and see what's lurking in the  Briny Deep.

Good Luck

bill

as for cindyjo, there is another part of her answer that not anyone is paying attention to and that has to do with timing.  she stated very clearly than she was fishing from 3 to 6 o'clock.  these bass are on a pretty specific eating cycle right now as far as the ones that are gathered up on shad.  you can whack them first thing in the morning, i little bit mid day, and then late of the evening, and when they are done, they disappear like they were ghosts.

right now, there are very few areas of the lake that the bass has any shad really gathered up.  yes, there are shad all over the lake, but they are all in very small pods scattered everywhere, and they might have a fish of two with them.  but, which ones?  so, as with cindyjo, she has learned and understands the when and where to look.

the catching is easy, but it is the knowing when and where to look for them that get much more complicated.  many bassers seem to forget that locating the bass is, by far, the most difficult part of the process, and you understand that.

i can not count how many times, you have suggested to everyone to get off shore once in a while.  sure, there are always a few bass on the shore, but not the majority of them.  a bass by itself can be quite difficult to get to strike at anything, but when there are lots of bass together, they are much easier to get them to strike at something because of the competition.  so, since i am not that great of a fisherman, i feel the need to try to find those bass that are much easier to get to bite.

bill, thanks for sharing, but way to many bassers do what they see most of the pros do, and that is rev up the troller and cover as much water as possible..

bo

[BearFisher10]

Bo you are 100% right about the timing deal. I've found a some places lately that are loading up like this in the last two weeks and they will literally all disperse and there isn't a trace of them until they show up to feed again. Some of the spots they just settle down and won't hardly bite but that's only on a few of the locations though. I'd like to think I'm proficient with my electronics and finding bass off the bank or offshore whatever you want to call it, but I can honestly say I have had nowhere near the luck in the size/weight department that you and Cindyjo are catching. I'm not calling you liars at all, I'm just questioning if the different sides of the lake are just not quite in sync right now. I've been fishing the exact same depths and types of spots, but on the James instead. The difference is all these spots are loaded with KY's and the occasional LM. The catch rates are ridiculous but they're 95% shorts, and the keepers haven't been much over 15 inches. 

I guess I'm gonna have to try this out on a different part of the lake whenever I get the time. 

[Hammer time]

Had a buddy take 3rd in club tournament with 15.62 flipping 1/2 jigs on deep docks.

Thats always a great pattern this time of year. Or 5/16 finesse jig on docks.

[merc1997 Bo]

1 hour ago, Hammer time said:

Had a buddy take 3rd in club tournament with 15.62 flipping 1/2 jigs on deep docks.

Thats always a great pattern this time of year. Or 5/16 finesse jig on docks.

those guys caught some nice ones, and first and second place did also.  a 3 lb. average is very good.

bo

[Hammer time]

1 hour ago, merc1997 said:

those guys caught some nice ones, and first and second place did also.  a 3 lb. average is very good.

bo

They did bo, my buddy flipped docks intire 8 hours of tournament. For only 8 bites. Didn't get first bite till 12:30

That takes confidence and commitment, tuff for me to commit all day especially without a bite till noon.

As you stated bo fish eat in cycles and sometimes you gotta stick with it until they feed!