Bass Fishing Apr - May 2020 | Page 48

Wellspring of Bass the middle of the channel, and you could see a big ol’ circle with a water-color dif- ference and bubbles coming out of it.” Keep an eye out also for above-water springs. They might flow from a crack or crevice, seep from a bluff wall or simply roll down a hillside. “We’ve got some [at Amistad] that come in just trickling out of the side of the banks,” Brauer says. “They’re like mini-waterfalls coming in. We’ve got some that run full time. Whether they’re a waterfall or coming in underwater depends on the lake level. “Anytime you’ve got a current situa- tion coming into a body of water, it’s always going to attract baitfish. Even though those are not big areas, you can a lot of times catch a limit off them.” 5. Scan with electronics Some of the real masters at finding springs find most of them with elec- tronics. Or they use the electronics to dial in a spring’s location and any near- by structure. “A lot of times, especially as the water gets full on the Tennessee River, you can’t see them [visually],” says Knight. “But in your side-scan you’ll see 46 a weird-looking round spot or some kind of big crevice.” In Florida, pro Tim Frederick finds springs the same way, though usually by chance. He says there’s usually hard sand around them, but the source of the spring can be very obvious. “You can graph over it with 2-D sonar, and you’re going to see it. It looks like a vein. You’ll go over a hole, and it’ll go to a softer bottom. It’ll go way down on your screen, like the bottom will drop out of it.” Fish the Area, Fish the Spot On the Tennessee River, Knight says there are times he can park in a spot and hammer fish by casting directly to the source of a spring, which might be the size of a truck bed – give or take. “Whenever you catch so many out of a little hole like that, I wonder about some kind of aquifer, or some type of underwa- ter tunnel that could be connected, like some secret, magic bass world,” says Knight. “I get off in some weird thoughts about it sometimes because you might be sitting there, and it’s 2 feet deep on this huge 10-acre flat, and there’s one spring that’s the size of a pickup truck bed, and you catch 30 or 40 bass out of it. Where do they come from? How are they not just stacked and you see fins and tails sticking out of the water?” On other reservoirs, springs bubble up into deep holes big enough to park in the middle and cast around. A drop-off or grass edge near the spring could be good. Or the effects of the spring might make an entire pocket productive. “At Grand, I just kind of fish the area,” says McCaghren. “They’re not big, but the fish are still set up there. They’ll be on the little points or rock changes. Nowadays, they’re on docks, but when I started fishing them there was about a third as many docks.” In Florida, spring fishing can be very area-driven, too. FLW pro Brandon McMillan has enjoyed some successful outings on the Harris Chain around New Years, taking advantage of spring- fed canals where bass move up early to spawn. “They’re pretty much community holes,” he says. “They’re the ones that are gin-clear, and they stay relatively the same temp.” McMillan figures the canals are home to a solid population of resident FLWFISHING.COM | MAJORLEAGUEFISHING.COM | APRIL-MAY 2020