I am fishing a manmade lake and the water level has dropped severely. The flats and vegetation are out of the water. The dam area consists mostly of rocky banks and sheer cliff dropoffs into anywhere from 15 feet to 60 feet. The rest of the lake consists of sandy banks and bays with scattered rocky points and banks. Pounding the banks has been unproductive using rattletraps spinner baits and other normal baits. Where have the small and large mouth gone? Where do I start looking?

when water drops it usually causes the bass to move to off shore structure  and the out sides of points.  try dropshotting ,splitshotting and dragging a westy worm up structure.

Finesse tactics such as drop shotting and also try a Natural Colored tube on offshore structure.

When I can't seem to get any fish off of the bank I tend to look for offshore cover such as a sunken tree.  I like to bump the tree with a crankbait or spinnerbait to get some bites.

I've had the same problem for thirty-plus years. Most(read 'all') of the reservoirs I fish are drawn down for flood control, the boat ramps high and dry. Dragging a small boat across a mud flat to get it in the water doesn't feed the Admirals' cat.  I have a bunch of ponds which are stocked with Trout(Bass food),  scoped for times like these, after the water temps. are in the high forties/ low fifties.

Don't miss this chance to scope out your reservoir structure and cover that are exposed now. Take pictures and GPS readings of the stumps on edges, old bridges , channel junctions, outside grass points, etc. You may be the only one who knows where they are when the water covers them.

Bud

I fish several lakes that are operated by the TVA. Every year, they draw the lakes I fish down from 20-80 feet depending on the lake. During the draw down, the fish are moving out to the deeper structure, or they will pull back out over open water and suspend. However, once the draw down is complete and the water level stabilizes at the new low level, the fish will move back up to shallower water. At this time, you need to consider seasonal patterns.

I am not sure where you are fishing, but the last time that I went the water temps were in the low to mid 40's. I was catching most of mine in 10-25 feet of water along a shelf that was 80 feet from shore.  The shelf dropped from 10-30 feet. If you are fishing cold water, slow moving lures are normally more productive.

With the info you provided, that is about all I can offer. If you want to add more info to your scenario, you can get more specific information. Most important for me this time of year would be water temp and color.