Fishing Report for Largemouth Bass using Bladed Jigs in Spring (Pre-Spawn)

Item: Lake Fork
Author: T-White

T-White

Blue Ambassador

3/4/23

Lake Fork

Species
Largemouth Bass
Season
Spring (Pre-Spawn)
Technique
Bladed Jigs
Structure
Standing Timber
Forage
Shad
Water Temperature
60°

I fished the lake on March 4th for the first Team Trail Outdoors TX tournament of the year, and I also fished the lake the day before for practice for the event. The water temperatures ranged from 57-70 degrees depending on which area of the lake you were in, with the backs of big creek arms being the warmest water and the main lake being the coolest. The day was sunny with morning temperatures in the lower 40's and warming up to almost 80 degrees by the end of the day, with a slight breeze coming from the south throughout the day. The water clarity on the lake ranged from about a foot of visibility to about 3 inches of visibility, the water was cleaner on the main lake and dirtier in the creek arms and pockets. We spent the day as far back into the major creek arms as we could get knowing that the fish were on the verge of spawning back there, and we threw wacky rigs and chatterbaits around the standing timber, flooded brush, and grass in the backs of the creeks, keying in on flatter banks with a good amount of cover. Anytime we would find a hole in the brush or grass along the flats, there always seemed to be fish in them, and we caught a good amount of fish also rolling the chatterbaits by laydowns and standing timber out a little deeper than the bank in 3-6 feet of water. In the morning when it was a bit colder outside and the water had not warmed up yet, the wacky rig was the key, and in the afternoon when everything had gotten considerably warmer, they were chewing the chatterbaits. We were also able to find and catch a few bed fish on the lake during this trip, and we used a standard texas rig to catch those fish off the beds, switching between a summer craw bait or a white bait depending on the clarity of the water and the depth of the bed, as sometimes we could only see the white baits. We used an array of beaver baits such as the Missile Baits D Bomb, the Strike King Rage Bug, and the Knockout Craw from K.O. Baits (check them out on Instagram @k.obaits)! Overall it was a great day on the water, we caught a limit of unders for the tournament that went 8.41 pounds which was good enough to get us 17th place out of 197 teams and a nice check, and we were also able to catch several slot fish, our best 5 in that regard went around 19 or 20 pounds with several fish (including the one pictured with the report) in the 5 to 6 pound class! Lake Fork is the place to be right now if you want to catch them up shallow! Good luck everyone and tight lines, thanks for reading my reports!

Bladed Jigs Essentials

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