I fished a new to me lake in aitkin county last weekend.
I caught fish on deep rocks, weedlines, and hard bottom areas.
For those fish a 3/8 finesse jig, 10″ power worm Texas rigged, and a rugby head with a 6″ finesse worm all caught fish.
I tried shallow too and had luck casting a spinner bait and a weedless paddle tail up in the rushes and around heavy matted weeds beds.
Great day with lots of action, I just didn’t find any real quality fish. Most were in the 1-2lb range. Water temp was 78°
Fished 2 different lakes on Sat. One in the morning and one in the Evening. Catching most of my fish on deeper weedlines ( 14-18 FOW ) All the mid summer weedline baits are working well. Caught fish on Jigworm, Neko, and Dropshot on both outings. The Neko has been catching the most fish, Then again its what I am fishing the most. Water Temps have been 79-81 the last few outing. Been a rather tough year for big fish this year for me. I did try a new lake on Sat. evening and the wife got a 20.5 and a 19.25. Both were really nice heavy fish. Both were caught on a jigworm (1/8 oz. with 7″ black powerworm ) The fish seem to be starting to group up in larger schools finally.
That report sounds familiar(?)! Good job, always good to try new lakes.
Pitching docks and banging lures off pontoons, boat lifts, etc. 
I’m after a new state record bass. 
Snoopy bobber and chunk of hot dog is the ticket for me once it gets this warm. Break out the Spongebob slip bobbers if they’re on the deep edge of the weed line. 
Just messing with you. Have fun out there.
Have fished a small lake 3 times in the last couple weeks. There are a lot of 2” give or take gills from the spawn. We saw 3 very nice bass chasing them shallow. One was the biggest bass I’ve seen in the lake, that took a swipe at my buddies 6” gill he had on at the side of the boat. Bluegill cranks and spinnerbaits have brought some big fish, but not much for numbers. Plastic brough more numbers but small fish.
Ned one day then Neko the next day mostly on weed edges but its been sporadic for numbers for me.
Fishing in Platte Lake on points and slop with frogs, buzzbaits is miss, miss, miss, hit one or maybe two quality fish. I tried a juice dock here last night, and while I didn’t get a bite. I did see a few elusive sunfish. I really hoped there would be more at the bottom of the food chain around by now. I haven’t found a reason to spend more than an a 1/2 hour in Platte.
Fishing in Sullivan in July was consistently productive. Fishing prime time in the first couple of hours of daylight and the last couple before dark is a key to my topwater success. The reeds were hot early in the month, and areas of rice and rice/reeds are where I am finding fish now. I did have one solid afternoon to evening trip within the last two weeks fishing whatever was in front of me down the shoreline. Pads caught fish, docks caught fish, rice caught fish, trees caught fish. I tried replicating things in the morning with little to show for it. The same thing happened on an offshore reed bed bite; When the reeds weren’t going in the morning, I pulled out the surrounding weed flat and started plinking an occasional Platte Lake Special on a buzzbait, fun morning. Most fish are somewhere around 2lbs give or take. 3lbs happen about every third trip and 4lber every 8 or so. No 5lber for the year.
what’s working…or not working
NOT bass fishing been working pretty good
Heard skipping Docks been hot
It’s been a sporadic bite for sure. Docks have been the best for me and the deep bite hasn’t really materialized like normal for me. I’m not sure if they haven’t schooled up yet for some reason but the bite isn’t great out deep yet. I’ll be out all day the next two days so I’ll have some more info after that.
Fished a lake I hadn’t been on in 4 years. The water is hot and low, 80 degrees. Majority of our fish came on jig worms, and ned’s on the deep weedline. Did catch one chatter bait fish. Mostly small bass.
It’s been a sporadic bite for sure. Docks have been the best for me and the deep bite hasn’t really materialized like normal for me. I’m not sure if they haven’t schooled up yet for some reason but the bite isn’t great out deep yet. I’ll be out all day the next two days so I’ll have some more info after that.
Ya for some reason the deeper weedline bite seemed to take a little longer this year to kick in. With the warm temps I would have thought it would have started earlier. Also finding schools of fish grouped up have been tough, although it seemed to get better the last few outings.
I think I’m going to head out to Washington/Stella this afternoon and see if I can’t find some smallies. Never fished it but been meaning to for the past few years.
Fished 2 different lakes on Sat. One in the morning and one in the Evening. Catching most of my fish on deeper weedlines ( 14-18 FOW ) All the mid summer weedline baits are working well. Caught fish on Jigworm, Neko, and Dropshot on both outings. The Neko has been catching the most fish, Then again its what I am fishing the most. Water Temps have been 79-81 the last few outing. Been a rather tough year for big fish this year for me. I did try a new lake on Sat. evening and the wife got a 20.5 and a 19.25. Both were really nice heavy fish. Both were caught on a jigworm (1/8 oz. with 7″ black powerworm ) The fish seem to be starting to group up in larger schools finally.
I fished a tourney with my dad a couple weeks ago. All out better fish came off a long narrow point in the depths you mentioned.
Our 5 best were 4.4, 3.59, 3.23 and a couple that went 2.05. The bites were split between a drop shot and Neko with the drop shot catching the 2 bigger fish.
Unfortunately we needed those 2 2 lbers upgraded to mid 3’s to get the win.
They were not stacked on the spot and we would catch a couple then leave and come back a couple hours later to catch a couple and leave. We did this 3 times.
Another weird thing was they spit up a lot of crawfish in the live well. However my dad could not buy a bite with a jig or a Texas rigged craw. He fished both of those most of the day.
The bites were split between a drop shot and Neko with the drop shot catching the 2 bigger fish.
Ya I just laugh when people say all you catch on a dropshot are smaller fish. Often some of the bigger fish I catch each year come off of a dropshot. I took advantage of the great sale scheels had yesterday on the Berkley flat side worms. I had never used them much due to the cost and how fast they tend to get beat up. But at 1.99 a pack ( normally 7.99 a pack ) I bought $60.00+ worth of them to use. They also had the same sale on the 5″ general stick worms. I bought all they had remaining in my favorite color. Should be good to go on Dropshot and Neko baits for the rest of summer and probably into next year.
I have also been fishing almost exclusively with a dropshot for the past few weeks with great success, dragging out over deeper weed beds and sometimes right up shallow.
My new confidence bait is the Zman Finesse Shadz — it has a slotted hook keeper in the bottom that keeps the hook completely hidden and free from snags. And in true Zman fashion, I recently caught about 30 largies over the course of two days on a single shadz including a 22″, several 18-19″ and ton of 16 inchers.
The other day I ran out and tried some of the Berkely Powerbait flat worms mentioned above and while they work great I found they last about 2 fish maximum. You also need to lightly skin your hook to keep it snag free, and yesterday I had something happen for the first time ever…
I fought what looked to be a 20+ inch all the way to the side of my kayak, and at the last second broke off. It turns out the hook never set, and was still fully skin hooked on my bait — they must really like the taste of those baits because all that old feller would have had to do was open his mouth at any point during our fight and he would have been free to go!
while they work great I found they last about 2 fish maximum
I’ve notice a similar lack of durability with the berkley maxscent products. I’ve been using some maxscent tubes and they last about 2-3 fish before they rip.
<div class=”d4p-bbt-quote-title”>Michael Best wrote:</div>
The bites were split between a drop shot and Neko with the drop shot catching the 2 bigger fish.Ya I just laugh when people say all you catch on a dropshot are smaller fish. Often some of the bigger fish I catch each year come off of a dropshot. I took advantage of the great sale scheels had yesterday on the Berkley flat side worms. I had never used them much due to the cost and how fast they tend to get beat up. But at 1.99 a pack ( normally 7.99 a pack ) I bought $60.00+ worth of them to use. They also had the same sale on the 5″ general stick worms. I bought all they had remaining in my favorite color. Should be good to go on Dropshot and Neko baits for the rest of summer and probably into next year.
Good luck with them! I will have to look into them.
I had bought one package of XZone flat bottom worms last spring. That is what I was using. Green pumpkin, we had really clear water.
Good old classic tube jig on weed edge has been the most effective bait for me the couple of weeks, specifically for largemouth. I tend to first try moving baits over tops of weeds and edges (if not too terribly deep) with crankbaits or chatterbaits but they haven’t been working well at all lately, so I’ve had to slow down and use plastics instead to get consistent action. They also seemed to be schooled up together a little bit too.
However, the other evening I tried a smaller tube and ned jig for smallmouth on deeper rocks and got nothing. Motored up on top of the rocks and spotted quite a few fish just roaming. Managed to catch a couple on topwater but they didn’t want anything else (tube, maribou, jerkbait).
Neko and tubes this morning
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Nice fish Bearcat.
This weekend the Neko was king. Got 2 on weed tops with a jig and pig thought I had a pattern no go back to the Neko. They wouldn’t touch a Ned rig or a jig and and a craw. They don’t seem to be schooled up much.
The top were my 2 first fish of the day. Got a few hogs. About to call it a morning, hasn’t been bad.
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Darn nice largies there. Looks like some good conditions today too.
Darn nice largies there. Looks like some good conditions today too.
Last night it looked like rain all morning so we woke up at 4 and decided to make a call. Weather has been in our favor. The bite wasn’t hot and heavy. We each caught 10 or 12 fish. Tube and green pumpkin neko was the ticket. Tube took big fish of the day.
That a deer you are holding up Bear? Thought you were done? Kidding aside nice bucket!
That a deer you are holding up Bear? Thought you were done? Kidding aside nice bucket!
Took the morning off of working at home and the cameras are already in the woods. I am excited to get some venison, but bass mania with grubson was well over due. Those are 3 nice fish on the day. As the morning went on it seemed we could pluck just 1 off a spot and the rest wouldn’t hit. So lots of moving and sharp shooting very small mid depth structured spots.
Nice fish BC.
WTG Bearcat! Those are nice fish. 
Seems like the late summer smallmouth bite on the river is getting going. Fished a lot of top water and swim baits this weekend. Little jig and crawler to. Sundays trip was just a hole lot of catching fish. Plenty of action right on the river bank but it also paid to run those lures back towards the boat a ways to. Looking forward to some cooler nights in the future to start pushing those frogs towards the river banks.
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