I am looking for some advice-I fish Devils Lake in Lenawee Co. Mi- I am new to this sport and am unsure where to locate fish.The lake has alot of large sandbars with both gradual and sudden drops as well as large spots in the lake where it gets shallow then deeper quickly-from reading posts here am I correct in assuming that I should be working these spots as well as the usual shorline spots around docks boats etc...? I have a good fishfinder but am not finding but a few isolated fish. Thanks in advance-love the site-good info and good people-happy fishing!

Personally, I don't use a fishfinder to find fish, I use it get an idea of the bottom. I've caught fish where the fish finder said there wasn't any.

To answer your question, Yes, fish those quick drops, especially if there is cover around them. Docks are always a great producer as long as there isn't a ton of activity around them.

Just look for cover and structure, and you'll find fish In the deeper areas, look for humps or creek channels, creek channels = bass highways.

From the lake map on DNRE's website, that looks like an interesting lake.  From what the site says, you've got both LM & SM Bass to chase, so now the questions.....

What are you looking at to catch?  LM?  SM?

Have you been targeting any of those gravel bars?

I see some emergent weed beds.  Are they lily pads, reed beds, or both?

What types of submergent weeds are in that lake?

What type of fishfinder do you have?  Do you know how to determine how hard the bottom is by looking at the return signals?

With all that gravel there should be crawdads, what about forage fish?  I see perch and bluegills, but are there any good populations of shad?

Looking for primarily LM-I have had decent luck with SM using plastic worms fished on the edges of sandbars or along other drop offs. I have a Humminbird 587(?)-yes I am able to differentiate bottom type to some degree but not an expert for sure! The lake has some reed areas,quite a few lily pad spots which I do fish-although with no sucess yet-other weeds I know include but not limited to milfoil-I have fished the milfoil areas around the12-18 ft depth with diving crankbaits and lipless as well.Not sure if I'm just too early in season or wrong time of day for areas I'm targeting.

For the last year of so I have been using the BBZ method of locating fish with good success. The first key to locating fish is identifying structure. The best description I have heard for structure goes like this... If you took a metal bowl (represents the lake), turned it upside down and hit it with a hammer, then flipped it back over the dents would represent the structure in a lake. Its basically the contour of the bottom with all of the cover removed. Points, ridges, humps, creek channels and flats are the primary structure that hold fish. You can find fish in or near these areas year round. Any cover (trees, weeds, tires, blocks, stumps ect...) associated to structure is added value.

So the system basically works like this...any piece of structure has a value of 1. Any piece of cover on the structure has an added value of 1 point. A condition like wind could even have a point value. So for example lets take a flat. To start the flat has a value of 1. Add weeds to the flat it now has a value of 2. Lets say the edge of the flat drops off into a creek channel its now a 3. Add wind and its a 4. And so on...So using this value system some things will remain the same all the time. Things like weed growth are seasonal and things like shade and wind can change several times through out the day. Things that stay the same in most cases can be identified on a map before you ever hit the water giving you a head start. Any structure that has the same point values should have a similar bite creating a pattern. Now that the structure is broken down the next step is to find out where the fish are active in the water column. The top, middle or bottom.

gobig(and everyone else who has helped)-that is a great way to approach the situation-as the first person responded,maybe I rely too much on the fishfinder because of my lack of knowledge.I am going to get a copy of the topo map of the lake,then use that in conjunction with the fishfinder to rate the spots and go from there. It should be a great start and help narrow the search-thanks again.