A good bass competitor went out at 5:30 am and caught nothing.  His boat even has the T V in it at times.  Saw the bait & big fish with them. No movement for anything he tossed.

Thats sounds like a bad news, I had same day like tat once, I saw the fish/fishes and I trow everything I had and non bite. Same time few other boats got a good bag. So it is really depends. BTW that happened to me in Castaic lake, CA which knows as tough lake always.

That's why it's called fishing and not catching. Happens.

 

Good call ironbjorn.   

last time out to check indexed sparkplug effects. Trolled a 6 " Rapala floater at 150'.  Pull out a wall hanger PERCH.  Only fish hitting lures. Looked like a small Walleye. C & R ?

Fished one of my favorite lakes 2 weeks ago in a tournament, barely eked out 40" of bass, still got 2nd place and big bass with only 3 fish. Went back last Saturday and had a 17-18 pound bag in the same areas doing the same stuff. 

 

Some days they bite your junk, some days they don't. 

I’m waiting for the river to calm down and clear up some. I’ll be right back there at it again. I’m gonna fish hard as heck and anticipate Smallies will be biting. 
 

Will lake fish a time or two until it gets back to a somewhat normal state on the river. 
 

Keep at it, fish hard. 

I think it takes a while to get in synch with a fishing area, and then you need to fish it regularly to stay in sync. Each body of water has it's own idiosyncrasies and peculiarities. 

 

For me, since I pretty much only fish the lake (and the lagoon below the dam) that is close to my house due to quagga restrictions, it seems that conditions will prevail for a while, and then suddenly shift for one reason or another. Adjusting to those shifts can be a challenge and result in some less than stellar fish counts. 

 

The other thing that can be challenging for me is that much of the time, is that I just wanna fish the way I wanna fish. And that can change from day to day, or even on the same trip. I usually try to do a heat check before trying methods, patterns or areas that I don't normally fish just to get a feel that the fish are still willing to eat something.

Bingo big handle.  But part of my problem is ALL fish are FAT with food & hot surface & day light just puts some in the bottom weeds. Lures at BEST ?? just a tap / bump.  A strip of raw meat & life is good.  I do not catch a 6" perch & cut it up for bait.  Not my style.  Worms & a spinner maybe.  I am doing make work jobs on the boat, motor and wiring .     ☺️

 

  A very cloudy, windy and rainy day would be fine.

Live Bait?

It is Fantastic in August !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!1

 

But  just do not like doing it that way.  I am not squeamish. I clean & cook some. I just like to fake them into biting a lure.  I am now using a rubber worm & doing O K. 1 to 3 bass & perch per day of fishing is too depressing.  I am really doing a jigging retrieve now. 

 

Side note about wildlife.  I have No sunrise birds chirping.  No birds looking for worms in moist green grass. NO  NO  flying bees , wasps, flies. only 1 flying white Cabbage butterfly. No mosquitoes or swarms of insects around me going to the boat.

 

What disaster is going on ?  Down to 2 big rabbits. No bunches of little ones. No more game animals..............Almost nothing day or night time.

 

Add in . No crows or dead animal bones or feathers.

Sounds like a waste land, what the heck is going on up there?

We had a record drought during late winter & spring time. It is finally ending. River is coming up from record lows.  It is like that way back Silent Spring ?  I am concerned about a recovery even happening.  Bad water green slime is suffocating everything again. Slime is not making enough Oxygen .  No small fish in shallow water at all this spring & summer. The slime reappears strongly in water above 72 to 74 F  it seems.  That is most of August normally.  I am old & cranky without fishing.  Useless non productive fishing does not help my attitude at all.  

2 hours ago, Spankey said:

Sounds like a waste land, what the heck is going on up there?

These folks found some good fishing, then again they are direct descendants of Roland Martin 

Good one !   I am the only idiot still trying to catch something in my sterile shallows.  Going deep in to the main river.  After a B L & T sandwich.

The B L & T was great. Caught 5" fish for hours,  Everywhere.   Thrilling

18 hours ago, TnRiver46 said:

These folks found some good fishing, then again they are direct descendants of Roland Martin 

Nice vid. I intend to get there. I’ll do my darn best to hunt them down and find them. Try to get them to bite. I think what I use here at home will get bit there also. 

10 hours ago, cyclops2 said:

The B L & T was great. Caught 5" fish for hours,  Everywhere.   Thrilling

I don’t think I would be overly enthused by catching 5” Smallies for hours but that might tell me to fish deeper. Holding tighter to the bank most times will produce the smaller Smallies. Try to find a nice drop off. Maybe crank right down to it or slide some plastics down to it. 

You are right on with my shift to a different style. Those 5" were all non bass. I was getting multi fish biting very lightly on some casts. I picked up 2..... 1 oz. weights for the echo's at 40  to 60 feet. I will use a couple of Rapalas as searcher lures.