M
Mdiscom
Yes and no. My "go-to" spot definitely has several vertical underwater drop-offs. That's where we started and got our first several fish. But like I said - we drifted with the current for a significant stretch - catching fish as we went (without significant depth changes).We had an ideal weather situation, so factor that in for sure. I haven’t been so good about getting out recently, but with the weather being awesome AND the moon waxing towards full, it would have been a missed opportunity. This time of year if we get a decent warming trend it helps a lot.
I look for a warming trend and hopefully decent water clarity, and building up to a full or new moon. That’s what I’m after this time of year, if you wanted to boil it down.
I’m curious… I know you said you found them deep, but were they in areas that had a sudden depth change? One thing I like to find for winter spots are locations with very little current. On the main river, I would expect to find that on abrupt changes in depth. Sometimes large rocks or root balls will do the same thing. In another few weeks I’m going to be all about shoreline wood, but that’s a prespawn pattern, and (I’m guessing) we are probably still in a winter pattern with some fish beginning to transition to pre-spawn.
Good stuff, I hope your next outings continue to be productive!
Thanks, Bass and Shaun, for your insights. Yes, Shaun, we were on the main river - starting in a location that has literally never failed me in the few years I have been fishing bass. We did indeed catch most of the fish deep (15-25ft) with the ned. The few fish that hit the cranks were much "shallower". I'm surprised that you (Bass) got skunked - (I follow you on this forum, and I trust your proficiency on finding/catching bass much more than my own...) I appreciate what you said about "not marking" bass. I think I have good electronics and I know that I mark fish - but I have not quite figured out how to read my electronics to know what is a fish and what is not. I need to get better at that - I mostly focus on the structure and try to fish where I think they would be. I will say that I don't think these fish were schooled up - at least not very tight. We basically let the boat drift with the current - which was certainly faster than normal Summertime flows. Usually right when I was about to motor back up to drift down again through what I thought would be schooled fish, one of us would hook another one, and we continued down. I'm sure we drifted at least half a mile to a mile.....Perhaps the schooled fish followed our baits (boat)? (that would surprise me).
At any rate, the fishing was FAR better than I expected - and unlike my bass fishing in warmer weather, all the fish were decent (no dinks). I will be out there again this week at least a couple of times to see if it was a fluke or not.