Cooler weather has shad in shallows in backs of creeks
With changeable weather currently playing a capricious role in bass fishing at Jordan Lake, guide Jamie Olive of New Hill said there’s a way to defeat its effects on largemouths.
“With the warm front we had last week, then the cold front this week, bass went back to a summertime pattern,” said Olive (919-625-0707), with fish pushing away from the shorelines and into deeper water.
“Bass had just started chasing shad in (the) creeks,” he said. “Then, with the warm spell, they went back to deep water.”
Threadfin shad, the major baitfish at Jordan, usually move toward the shallows when water temperatures drop.
“They’d already moved up because the lake had turned over about two weeks ago,” Olive said. “When the lake turns over, that cooler water comes to the surface. Jordan’s (surface temperature) dropped from the low 80s into the low 70s, and that’s the signal that usually means bass start chasing shad.”
Cooler water means more oxygen, and bass are more comfortable in that habitat, as are baitfish. That’s why they come out of the summer depths to go to Jordan’s shorelines each fall — a pattern not unlike springtime’s prespawn and spawning periods.
“But we fished shallow for two hours Wednesday and didn’t get a bite, so we backed off and started catching them in 12 to 14 feet of water,” Olive said.
“We gradually moved back and started using Carolina rigs with soft plastics after I read the (depthfinder) and found bass in deeper water,” he said. “Then we began catching ’em.”
With the latest drop in temperature, Olive said he’ll try shoreline fishing again before searching for bass in deeper water.
“If I was going today or (Friday), I’d hit the riprap and rocky shorelines first with lipless crankbaits on the windy sides,” he said. “I’d try the riprap bridges and the backs of creeks and work toward secondary points.”
Olive said bass he caught deeper earlier in the week were “full of shad … like little footballs because the lake’s full of baitfish.”
“They aren’t on fire yet (in shallow water), but it ought to happen soon,” he said.
Around riprap or rocky banks, Olive said he’d throw spinnerbaits and lipless crankbaits in chartreuse, gold and chrome.
