Hello Folks,
I hope you and your family had a great 4th of July spending time with family and friends celebratin’ this great country with some good food and fireworks.
I also hope you had a chance to do some fishin’. We are slap dab into summer and it’s been kinda hot. If you are plannin’ on goin’ fishin’, you need to get on the water early and take advantage of the mornin’ bite. It seems the bass are in their summer mood and that means as the sun gets up and the temperature rises, the bite tends to slow down.
The panfishin’ has really slowed down this past week accordin’ to Kyle at Bitter’s Bait and Tackle. You can still catch a few bluegills and shellcrackers in Lake Monroe and Lake Jesup on red worms, and crickets. You will have to move around quite a bit to find ’em. Once you locate a bed, you should be able to catch ’em. The folks who have been fishin’ in Lake Jesup for specks report that it has slowed down as well. Those anglers had a good run this year on specks, so we will have to wait for some cooler weather to come our way to get those ol’ specks to bitin’ again.
If you want to catch some bass again, you need to get on the water early. The bass are feedin’ right at daylight, up until 9 a.m. or 9:30 a.m. Once that ol’ sun gets up and the wind lays down, the bass seem to move to deeper water and take a nap. I’m not sayin’ you can’t catch any bass durin’ the day but it’s a slow bite until the sun starts goin’ down.
Kyle also reports that the bass fishin’ in the Maitland Chain has been pretty good if you are fishin’ shiners. Most of the folks are freelinin’ shiners over the top of the submerged hydrilla and eel-grass beds. The bass fishin’ has slowed down a little this week on John’s Lake. Kyle was fishin’ the lake for a couple of days this past week and he reports that it was kinda slow for him. You can still catch some bass, but you need to cover a lot of water to catch ’em. Kyle says he caught his bass on a variety of lures, a slow-sinkin’ Senko-type bait, lipless crank-baits, and a couple of bass on top-water baits.
As everyone knows, it’s summer in Florida and you will have to get creative with the type of fishin’ you want to do while you are on the water. You want to try all your favorites ways of catchin’ bass but don’t be afraid to try something different. We have been gettin’ some nice showers in the afternoon, so look for some runnin’ water that is flowin’ into the lake. If you are fishin’ the St. Johns River, fish the feeder creeks, and around the bridge pilin’s, where you have water flowin’ around the pilin’s. You can fish the laydowns and submerged trees if the water is flowin’. There is always a way to catch ’em; you will just have to figure out a way to get ’em.
Good luck and I’ll see ya next week.
Tip of the week: movin’ water.
Save a few and good luck!
