By Ronnie Parris
Hey folks, I hope all is well! It’s been an awesome summer for fishing in our mountain lakes. I’ve been lucky to have multiple lakes to swap around on to chase the best bite. It’s awful easy to get stuck in a rut and stay on one lake, or fish one technique or one bait when you’re having good luck, but sooner or later you’re gonna have to try something different.
Start of the year, we had just come off an unbelievable spotted bass bite, fishing artificial baits, working the shoreline, an in a matter of days, that bite was over. Luckily, after years of guiding, I’ve got enough data saved to know what’s potentially gonna be the next bite coming up. So we jumped on the lower section of Fontana for some great trout fishing, catching rainbow, brown, an steelhead. The best tactic was to slow troll with artificial baits, with some bites coming right on the surface, while others came in 80 ft of water.
Good electronics are a must for this type of fishing. You have to be able to put your bait at the correct depth to catch these fish. As this bite slowed, we were able to hit some smaller lakes that were fishing really good as with the trip in the photo. On this trip I had my great friends Rory and Michelle out for a great day of catching rainbow trout, largemouth bass and a yellow perch. We really had to keep changing baits and technique as the day went on. We used a variety of baits, from crawlers to power baits to shiners, fishing at times with no weight to varying the size of weight for the depth and mood of the fish.
As fall is fast approaching, I look forward to one of my favorite, fun fish. Really big bluegill are gonna be schooling up, and that spells action. My favorite bait is the catalpa worm, but crickets, crawlers, power baits, hoppers and wax worms all work well. Hook size and style makes all the difference. I always used to go with a small Eagle Claw till my buddy, Doug, got me hooked on using a small lead head. Not only do the fish hit it better but don’t tend to swallow it, so releasing a fish is easier.
No matter the time of year or species of fish you’re after, don’t get stuck in a rut and you will catch more fish. As always take a kid fishing!