I live near to Pinchot lake and have tried fishing many times this summer.  I can not catch a bass there.  I'm trying different baits but I think the main problem is location.  Does anyone have an area you have had luck with or can suggest a spot to try?  Its a quite large lake and I'm really not sure where to start.  I know there are plenty of bass and other fish in there.  It's worth nothing there appear to be a lot of people, even in boats, that do not catch anything.  Maybe it is over fished or time of day?  

 

I'm open to any suggestions.  

 

Thanks. 

I have another question. I've seen lots of references to using a map to find the fish.  I was able to locate a lake map which shows all the depths and man made structure.   

 

What do I want to look for?  Areas with steep drop offs?  

That place gets fished hard.  All I've ever caught there was sunnies.  Granted I haven't been there in decades.

 

I know that Pinchot has grass mats running along the shore. I would start early in the day and throw topwater frogs over that grass. Just some random advice. I haven't fished it but have hiked around the lake. When I saw those grass mats first thing I thought about was a frog early in the day. 

To answer your 2nd post, deep drop offs can hold bass in the dead of summer. If a drop off comes up to a big, shallow flat that is good too. 

On 7/7/2017 at 5:01 PM, Cargojon said:

That place gets fished hard.  All I've ever caught there was sunnies.  Granted I haven't been there in decades.

 

Well I've been playing with the map and went out and scouted some area last night with my daughter.  We fished some of the coves and I landed a pretty good size bass.  The area we were at was very rocky, I'm going to have to figure out what to have her fish.  I used a chatter bait and she kept snagging hers on rocks, don't want to lose that guy.  Might try tubes or worms.  

 

Early morning top water might work good to.  The one morning we were there I saw lots of bass close to the shore, I wasn't thinking far enough ahead to cast down the shore further than they could see.