The Bass Insider Issue 1 September 2013 | Seite 14

The Bass Insider Issue 1 September group of bass remains in the upper half of the creek in shallower water. The second larger population spends the summer in lower, deeper half. Both populations will cluster around key structures along the channel. In the upper half bass will be scattered in smaller schools. In the lower halves, they will form large schools in places where anglers can catch plenty of bass. Key structures may be where a roadbed intersects a creek, a hump on the ledge, a major bend in the channel, or a stump bed adjacent to the drop-off. One of the best areas is where the creek dumps into the river channel. On major creeks that have 15 feet or more water, you can still catch fish on the bends of the creek channel itself, but you need that deeper water close by. LATE SUMMER – In the late summer, bass in most dams swims to the backs of the creeks as they follow bat fish. Both predator and prey stick close to the channel banks. They hold to the same type of structure they did in the deeper water, except the depths are shallower. In the late summer bass may hold on banks as shallow as 3 to 4 feet that drop into channels 6 to 8 feet deep. If they have stumps on them, so much the better. WINTER – It takes some really brutal weather to drive the bass back to deep water for the winter. A little cold front won’t do it. But when the fish do move, they’ll head back down the channels to deep water to spend the winter, and huge numbers of fish will pack into one little area. They’ll be near the mouths of the creeks or adjacent to deep bends, down in the bottom of the channels in water 12 to 30 feet. HOW TO FIND BASS ALONG CREEK CHANNELS once an angler knows the type of structure to look for, it’s time to go exploring for creek channel bass. As in fishing river channels, a map and a generous portion of planning are important in locating key structures. Before I ever go onto the dam, I study the creek channel I plan to fish, noting how it runs and where it changes directions. I can quickly pick out places that have a high likelihood of holding bass. I’d rather fish a channel that’s got two bends than one that’s got 20. This means I am looking for the fish in a smaller haystack. And second, I still run and look at the whole channel, because lots of time the map will not be very accurate. If I can find some little feature that’s not on the map, that’s like a secret spot, and it can be good because other anglers won’t know about it.

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