pros quick tips
Find Activity
b y R O y H AW k
Zones
sUmmeR
time ne- cessitates finding ac- tivity zones to find fish. I spend a lot of time on southwestern desert lakes and in the dead heat, I look for grass, current, windy banks, creek inlets, or small fish working in an area – anything that generates oxygen, activity or increases the energy of an area. If there are none of these going on, you are likely in a dead zone and the fish are just not there. Once I do locate areas of activity, I will start working a reaction type bait – be it cranks, topwater, or spinnerbaits – to locate any fish that might be present. I work the activity zone quickly with these baits to determine if there are any active fish and if not, I quickly move on to the next area. Once I hook up, I will switch from reaction baits to a slower presentation like a jig (I fish a lot of Pepper Jigs in shad patterns in the summer) so that I can milk the area for everything it is worth.
Locate Areas Fish
load Up
AfteR
by CLIFFORD PIRCH
the spawn and as the weather warms heading into June, I look for areas like deep offshore points and breaks where the fish will school that have access to deeper water as well as feeding areas. Bass will tend to move to deeper water to recover after the spawn. At the same time, they are looking to build back the body weight they lost laying eggs and standing guard of the fry. These hungry fish will concentrate in these offshore areas which are abundant in food and have access to deeper water. Once I locate these areas, I will typically approach the fish with a finesse type bait like a Roboworm on a dropshot rig. The advantage of using this type of set-up is that you can quickly determine if these fish are on the chew as the finesse rig will get you quick bites if these fish are active.
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Summer 2013