Sleepy Lake

For spring break we took a short trip to the East Coast. Two of our friends moved recently to Virginia, and their house was just a short walk from a neighborhood lake.

The lake was actually a small reservoir, and the shoreline access was limited to the small embankment that served as a “dam” between the lake and a brackish backwater of Chesapeake Bay on the other side. It didn’t look like a prime fishing spot, but my friend Justin had sent pictures of some impressive largemouth bass that he had hooked last fall. We fished a little bit each day and caught quite a few fish. In addition to bass, we caught pumpkinseed, crappie, and even accidentally snagged a couple of gizzard shad that were schooling near the water outlet pipe.

The biggest fish (all of them!) went to Justin, and the biggest one of all reminded me of something I have been saying for many years. In fact, it is one of my Seven Secrets of Bass Fishing! Big bass, and big fish in general, will often take surprisingly small lures. Something I see repeated over and over in fishing videos is anglers targeting big fish, like giant trevally, with big lures, who then take a break to fish with light tackle, only to hook a monster and then, invariably, lose it because they are running with lighter line. Big fish like to eat little fish!

I had tied a small green and white jig onto Justin’s light tackle spinning rod and caught several bass with it. At one point Justin picked up the rod and started fishing his way along the shore, heading towards a small cove. Suddenly, I heard a splash and looked up to see him hooked into a fat largemouth. I helped him land it and noticed right away that it had completely inhaled the little jig. Justin admitted that the fish actually ate when he had paused to detangle a wrap of line from his reel, allowing the lure to flutter all the way to the bottom and stop. This is actually another secret of bass fishing: try retrieving as slowly as you can, with frequent pauses. All the biggest largemouth bass I have caught have taken the lure only after I let it sit motionless for several moments.