by Larry Ewart of Atomic e Baits
Those who attended the Bassmasters Elite that went out of Waddington NY saw plenty of quality bass at the scales, should see an even better showing next year when they come in August 2018. Now that water levels have become more normal, we should start to see activity get even better from Massena to the mouth of Lake Ontario. The walleye fishing will pick up as waters start to cool down as well as water levels slowly going down and with the current flow a bit slower, you’ll still want to use heavy jigs tipped with a worm or minnow and bottom bouncers 3oz or more. Those 1 ouncers aren’t going to cut it as well around here right now or most other times. The perch bite will also pick up, so keep plenty of fresh bait on hand or plenty of small plastics for these guys and other pan fish as well. As the smallmouth start grouping up on the points, rapala type jerk baits and rattle trap baits work well and drop shotting is always good to try on these spots.
Largemouth should be hanging in the 6 to 8 foot weed line area, jigs and beaver type baits pitched and flipped will do good here. Always look to the weed lines of the bays for northern pike since they are going to be active as well and they love just about all baits. If you want a big northerns, try big spinners or give swim baits a try. The NY bass masters team event out of Ogdensburg should do well at the scales here on the 19th and 20thand a shot at the state team for 2018. My fishing partner and myself decided to go out and check out an area that has done me well in past years up in the Brockville area of the St.Lawrence.
Thanks to today’s GPS systems it makes it easy to keep those places in check as before the GPS came along, as we started and worked along the area it didn’t take long to see the bass were there as my partner had a few fish follow up to the boat. I tossed in my spinner bait and we backed out a few yards for a better angle and switched our baits. Rick went to and 4” atomic E-BAITS drop shot worm in blizzard and I went to a 5.25” atomic trick stix bait in Blizzard. On ricks 1st cast he picked up a nice 4lb 12oz smallmouth {He has caught around 50 bass on that same worm from last year when I first made this color} and few cast latter I caught a 5lb 9oz bass. Rick then boated another 4pounder and the a 4.8 on an atomic tube in amber gold and I picked up another 4lb bass on the trick stix as we moved along. We caught a few more here and there making for a nice afternoon on the river, with our best 5 best around 23lbs, for our very own Bassmasters bragging right.