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Highlands Today

Perfect Storm Carries With It A Perfect Week

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DAVE DOUGLASS

The Tampa Tribune

Published: August 24, 2008

The last-quarter moon phase occurred Saturday night at 11:50 p.m., which means we enter into the "perfect week" of the early morning bite at its best.

Ah, this is the time of month where the summertime bass angler has it made in the shade. It's cool in the morning, with moderate winds, and water temperatures are lower, and the moon is the closest to the earth on Monday. Bass will be jumping into boats and eating everything in sight.

Bass anglers love to get up very early and be on the lake 45 minutes to an hour before sunrise and have three tournament-size bass on the boat deck, measured, photographed, kissed, and released back into the water before the sun rises above the trees on the shoreline.

This is the week we live for and this is the week it's upon us.

The major daily peak feeding migration happens between 5:30 a.m. and 10:30 a.m.

With all the rain from tropical storm Fay, it's anyone guess as to when fish will aggressively feed during this period. I would say the lakes further south in Highlands County will experience an early bite, and the further north the lake, the later in the period they will bite. The rain bands of the storm are still happening at night in the Avon Park area and, from what I hear, the Lake Placid lakes are not getting as many rain bands.

Each day this week, the daily migration will increase in duration and intensity and start slightly later by about 40 minutes - as usual. Everyone should be able to gradually produce better results on a daily basis. If you caught fish in an area yesterday, today will yield more fish because more fish will have joined in the process and eager to feed.

By Thursday, some great fishing stories will be told.

This forecast is based on the hope that the recent storm's effects will not negatively shut down fish. Bass should be returning to natural migration quickly, and each day will provide significant positive progress back to the normal habits. The smaller and deeper lakes should recover faster than the larger shallow lakes.

Fishing Facts

One fact anglers should be factoring into their fishing trip is the migrations will be heavier in the areas of the lake where streams and runoff are flowing into the lake. With the increased lake levels, fish will be moving (or have moved) into the new shoreline vegetation to feed and hide.

Fishing Formula

Try using loud, noisy baits designed to handle thick weeds.

This will include top-water baits and spinner baits retrieved along the surface. If this doesn't promote strikes, try the opposite approach and work baits across the lake bottom trying various retrieve speeds and pauses.

Areas where deep water is near should hold more fish than other areas. In all cases however, fish should be found in shallow areas more often than in recent months, or, dare I say, years, due to the drought.

Fishing Flash

Lake Istokpoga's lake level is at 39.25 feet above sea level (ASL) and the spillway gates are all open almost six feet in order to stay even with the two influents, Arbuckle and Josephine Creek.

This type of water release will definitely cause fish to follow the flow south, so be checking the areas such as points, bars, and new hydrilla growth for major migrating fish, moving 10 miles to the areas in front of the spillway.

Lake Okeechobee is above 12.5 feet ASL for the first time since 2006 and rising fast due to the massive amount of water flowing from the Kissimmee Chain of lakes down the river and from Lake Istokpoga. It is predicted to reach well above 13 feet by the middle of next week. This is great news.

There are two low pressure systems out in the Atlantic, one of which is predicted by all computer tracking models as potentially moving along the same route as Fay did.

We can only hope that it will progress into a tropical depression and end up being our second tropical storm of the year. Models predict if this happens it should arrive by the beginning of next week or so.

Fishing Feature

I spoke to a fellow angler last week before Fay arrived, and he informed me that his latest trip on Lake Arbuckle was quite eventful, boating several bass, the largest being in the seven-pound range.

He reported the boat launch was easy to navigate through and the lily pads were healthy throughout the lake. Fish were in the usual places along the west and south shores, especially at the mouth of Arbuckle Creek.

He used plastics, topwater frogs and crankbaits, and caught bass with them all. However the larger bass hit the Ugly Otter being slowly retrieved through the pads in three feet of depth.

Since Fay went through, this lake has risen by a foot or so and it might be more of a challenge to locate fish, at least for the next few days.

Fishing Fiction

A very popular fiction is, "If bass see your line, they won't bite." Nothing could be further from the truth. The largemouth bass by nature is very aggressive and will attack anything which comes into their territory most of the time. The only time a high-visibility fishing line would cause bass to move away or "spook" is when they're suspended and not in the feeding mode, and therefore won't strike anything anyway.

A high visibility line will attract the larger bass toward the area it invades and interrupts by being there. When she arrives to see what's daring to trespass her area, a very tasty bait with the proper action to provoke a strike happens to be swimming by - it doesn't get any better than that.

Fishing Tournaments

The Wednesday Morning Black Bass Fishing Tournament is open to the public. Next event is Aug. 27 on Lake Jackson. Time: 7:30 a.m. to noon. Pay at ramp - entry fee $30.00 per boat. One person may fish alone if you do not have a partner. For information, contact Paul Tardiff at (863)385-8007 Home, Cell (863) 446-1310 bassbutchie60@aol.com or Dwight Ameling at (863)471-3305.

Dave Douglass is a bass-fishing guide and bass tournament angler and CEO of S.O.S.-Florida Lakes, Inc. He can be reached at 863-381-8474, or e-mail him at davedouglass@sos-floridalakes.org.

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