Fall 2025
C
lear Lake has been on fire
all year, kicking out huge
bags of fish in tournaments and producing great action for bass
anglers every season. The summer-to-
fall transition is coming up quickly, and
the bite will continue to progress with
the season. There will be many ways
to catch them, but the swimbait and
jighead minnow are expected to be great,
according to Garrett Dixon of G-Ratt Lures.
He shared some insight about how he’ll be
targeting the famous lake this fall.
TIME FOR SWIMBAITS
While the G-Ratt brand makes all sorts of lures, the swimbaits and glide baits are part of what makes them so popular, and it’s one of Dixon’s favorite ways to target bass on Clear Lake. The time is coming for those styles of baits to shine as the water cools.
“It’s coming into that time, the fall and then the winter, when the swimbait bite gets really good on Clear Lake,” he said. “One thing I like to do with all of the grass is fish isolated grass clumps with the weedless Executioner, and then you can fish the top hook version down deep on the rockpiles. That’s something you’ll be able to do from now all the way until April.”
For colors, he says pro blue is a nice, versatile color swimbait that produces at Clear Lake, and he fishes both the weedless and top-hooked versions with a simple retrieve. His other favorite colors are Tennessee Shad, Threadfin Shad, John Pearl Shad, and Guida’s Sexy Shad. Any of those choices would be great for Clear Lake and similar fisheries.
“I like to give it that nice, steady, and slow retrieve and work it through the grass or rocks as slow as you can,” he said. “For the weedless bait, I like to use an 8/O Owner Beast or TroKar Swim Blade hook for the 7-inch bait. I fish both on a new Sneaky Pete Rod I’m working on and a Douglas 805 X-Matrix and 25-pound fluorocarbon.”
Photo: Garrett Dixon
THE FORWARD BITE
Fishing with forward-facing sonar has accounted for many big weights on Clear Lake this year, including the record-setting WON Bass event this spring by John Pearl. It’s a bite that continues to be a factor in all months, but the late summer and fall will be prime time as the baitfish get more bunched up, according to Dixon.
There are many ways to fish with live sonar, but a jighead minnow is a great tool, and G-Ratt now has its own version. The Rocker Shad is a minnow bait built just for this purpose.
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