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rock pile that is holding a good school of fish will often be the first to clean up when the Tennessee Valley Authority turns on the generators at the dam. Current starts to flow, baitfish start to move, and bass start to gorge. When that happens, a guy who has nothing in the livewell can have 25-pounds in just a matter of a few casts.
Many of the anglers at this year’s Forrest Wood Cup spent the bulk of their practice time looking for that bite. There was only one problem; it wasn’t there. What happened was that a few intense rainstorms rolled through the area in the days leading up to the event producing strong rains that started adding fresh runoff into the creeks around the lake, and the bass in those creeks responded to the inflow, and began feeding.
How do I know this? Because the majority of the anglers in the top-10 told me so. I started noticing in interviews that most who talked about how tough it was, and how they couldn’t seem to find a steady bite were those who were trying to make sure that the
offshore bite was their focus, or a part of
their game plan.
Those who lived in the creeks – or at least shallow - fared significantly better. Nearly everyone in the top-10 was focused on the shallow bite. Several anglers, including champion John Cox, third place finisher Todd Auten, 7th place finisher Jacob Wheeler and 9 th place finisher Brandon Cobb, spent their whole tournaments so far back in creeks, it took camera boats hours to find them at times.
WHAT’S THE POINT?
To sum up my thoughts; as I’ve said for many years, bass anglers are creatures of habit. For several years, springtime tournaments on the California Delta were won with bags in the high 20’s to low 40’s. The talk of the swimbait and wakebaits bite were rampant. Then, things changed. All of a sudden, a winning weight would be in the low to mid-20’s and instead of a 15-pound limits being pointless, all of a sudden, they were worth a small paycheck.
Word amongst anglers was that “The Delta is off, those meat fishermen are killing the population, or the environment is changing and it’s killing the fish.” Fast
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