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Bill Babler
Bill Babler

9-19-18 Big Jig Bite Lake Wide

As Eric Prey and Pete Wenners have been alluding to on their videos the jig bite here is extremely strong.  Bass are just gorging on Crayfish.  Seems like a lake wide bite, it has been for me as in the past week I have been from point 1 on the White to point 15 on the James to  point 23 on the White.  It is going all over the lake.  Boat positioning is critical for this bite as it seems to be right at the thermocline.  With lake temps today at 83 degree these fish are holding in the 26' to 36' range and most are bottom hunting and not suspended.

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Big baits and heavy equipment are the ticket on deep jig fish.  Notice how that Nichole's craw is just flopped over it is extremely soft and swims like a complete alive thing.  I'm using Falcon MMC Signature Rods in Heavy Action and also Falcon Cara Amistad.  15lb. carbon line

Lots of power pole boats on the lake practicing for a late Oct. derby.  They are catching them, flat out hammering them.  From what I heard today its taking about 2 hrs. to put 14 to 17 pounds in the boats, with lots of LM and SM in the 4 lb. range.

These guys have not going out early, they are catching them all day long, sunshine or clouds it does not matter they are feeding up.

I have visited with Champ about this bite for years, it is a big bait bite, with lots of the pro's using 5 inch baits and 1 oz. jigs.  They are using big jigs and bigger trailers.

My absolute go to bait on this bite is the 3/4oz Pig Sticker Quick 5  with a Nichole's Texas Craw trailer, either in Copper or WMC.  Jig color is either GP Orange, Brown Orange or WMC.

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The Nichole's craw is a very large trailer suited for the 3/4 oz. jig and the colors are about as good as I have seen matching up with the Pig Sticker.

A lot of the pro's are throwing hard heads or Biffle Bugs in that 3/4 to 1oz size.

Most of these fish are coming on the flatter stuff holding right at the channel breaks, and dragging the edge or winding it with the hard head is money.

That's about the best information that I can give you.  Good Luck

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Great report Bill!   I don’t have enough to start a new thread.  Hope you don’t mind me posting here.   Caught the k at dusk from the dock on table rock yesterday.  One knocker spook.  Boatless this morning so ivy ok the fly rod to Taney below the dam.  Pics of the best 2 below.  Picked up the boat this afternoon.   Hope to have a better deep jig report tomorrow.  

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3 hours ago, SplitG2 said:

Great report Bill!   I don’t have enough to start a new thread.  Hope you don’t mind me posting here.   Caught the k at dusk from the dock on table rock yesterday.  One knocker spook.  Boatless this morning so ivy ok the fly rod to Taney below the dam.  Pics of the best 2 below.  Picked up the boat this afternoon.   Hope to have a better deep jig report tomorrow.  

 

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Quit fishing my slip!

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I tried to find this bite for 2 days and never got it going only got 1 short smallie on the jig and he was in a point in about 12 ft could mark tons of fish in 25 to 35 but they never gave the jig a chance wish I could have had the days you have been having they look fun 

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The wife and I came down for a few days and fished and spent one day in Branson for anniversary vacation. Caught some nice Kentucky’s drop shot and the best was this 4lb 4 oz largemouth I took on the jig Friday morning before we left, caught it close by and the wife wanted to see it so I run back to the dock for a bit before sending him back to the abyss. 

 

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Guys I have been fishing these deep runs and rolls this time of year for the past 25 yrs.  They are locations that 99.9% of fishermen drive by each day.  Steven and I were fishing one right in the middle of the lake day before yesterday and it was only 17' deep on top, I mean right square in the middle.  I have never seen anyone on this stuff, that is not a local or a touring pro or local that looks for it this time of the year.  There are tons of great guides and locals that don't try and mess with this deep jig bite as there are usually other deals going on too.

I'm all over this right now, but I have also had my butt kicked at Shell Knob, and I'll tell you either way good or bad.  I did however hear that a similar bite is going on at Shell Knob, just not on the deep gravel but it is also a big, big jig bite.  Promised not to mention where or how but from what I heard yesterday it is producing the same as the down lake deep big jig bite.

Here are a few that look for it and fish it, or have in the past that I learned from and fished with.  There are many others also, but on some of these locations I have never seen a fishing boat.  I wish the fish were on them all the time but their not, only an early Fall Bite.  They will be gone before I know it.

Brian Snowden, Chris Tetrick, Bill Beck, Buster Loving, Tim Sainato, Tim Paige, Bob Tindle, Mike McClelland, Dan Langley, Rick Holmgren, Phil Stone. 

The other day with Steven it really was super that a boat load of keepers blew up all over us.  As I've said many times it is always better to be lucky.

Good Luck

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Donna and I fished a full 8-hour day Saturday, launching at Cow and fishing down as far as Jake's Branch and up as far as Schooner.

Bill is right … this is not an easy bite to get on and it has to do with being on the right spot than anything else. Guides make their living fishing, and the great ones like Bill have dozens of these pinpoint areas in the middle of nowhere that it would take the rest of us ages to find. If you ever wonder why he's so free with information on here … other than that he's just a really nice guy … part of the reason is that the rest of us couldn't find his fish and set up on them right if we had the GPS coordinates for every spot he fishes. 

So back to our trip Saturday … Donna and I tried HARD for hours to make this big jig bite work out in 25-40 feet of water. Late in the afternoon, all we had to show for it was half a dozen brown fish, of which two were line burner keepers. So as I'm driven to do, we decided to close the day by moving up shallow. Ended up finding a pretty decent bite on a jig, spinnerbait and crank bait … nothing huge but a mixture of SM, K's and LM. Certainly, the wind and dark skies helped but with nighttime lows in the 50s on the horizon, we are about to see a good shallow bite develop.

I'm ready. 😎

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None of us are a TR seasoned guide or a Mr Babler but we all have the one quality it takes to find these fish we are after and that is persistence and don’t give up which is easier said than done for sure, I feel like I really accomplished something by finding  that bite, too bad it was the morning we had to leave, but none the less it was great, thinking about a 3 day weekend end of week and early next week, with no expectations of course, makes it easier to go home empty handed. Good luck fishing!

 

 

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