May Closes With A Flurry

Posted on June 01, 2010May fishing was quite a roller coaster ride. By the 2nd week of the month I was quite convinced that the first stage of the spawn happened in early March, bass fry were everywhere and most fishermen reported good numbers of fish, but few big fish were caught. That usually is an indication that the majority of the big fish have spawned and moved off to deeper water, a pattern I have seen many times, but almost always in late May.

On May 11th I had a half day guide trip and my clients boated 19 bass and 8 nice crappie in 6 hours. That night we were clobbered by a 6″ rain that was the beginning of continual torrential rains that brought the lake up to 24″ above full pool. Not only was the water high and falling, but it was muddy. It took 10 days for any part of the lake to return to acceptable clarity, and even now there are portions that are somewhat murky.

The fish have started biting again over most of the lake. This past weekend I had the good fortune to share the boat with a long time guest who accepted my offer to fish with him in lieu of guiding. Sat thru Sun we boated 31, 38, and 57 bass; the biggest was a 9 lb lunker I caught out of a brushpile on a jig. The topwater action was great early, and wacky worms worked well the rest of the day.

Currently the lake is 14″ above normal and holding steady. The water continues to clear and will probably return to normal over the next week. I expect that the big fish will become even more vulnerable as the water regains it’s usual color.