Don’t fish for the cache at the posted coordinates. There's a better place to make a cast.
One of my favorite things to do is fishing Lake Lanier. When I combine it with geocaching it makes it even better. A big THANK YOU! to all the COs who have placed geocaches all around the lake and on the islands!
Lake Lanier is the world’s top fishery for spotted bass and what makes things fun for anglers is the variety of conditions available that are loved by those spots. The water column ranges beyond 100 feet and is littered with all the structure and food prized by spots. There are ditches, docks, seawalls, riprap, ledges, brush piles, timber, rocks, sand, clay, blow throughs, blowdowns, road beds, bridges, points, pockets, and drop-offs all around. A good lake map and sonar come in handy to find them. The spots’ main food sources are blueback herring, threadfin shad, gizzard shad, bluegills, crayfish, and a variety of insects and other aquatic creatures. They hunt their food in schools or wait to ambush it where structure conceals them.
But how do you find and catch spots in a 38,000 acre impoundment? It’s not so easy to do and everyday offers a different challenge, but there are a few things you can do to improve your odds. Most significantly, know what’s important to the fish. That includes survival, reproduction, and comfort. Survival means they have to eat, keep from being eaten, and be surrounded by water with sufficient dissolved oxygen concentrations to sustain life. The one thing that overrides eating is reproduction, so you have to know when and where they lay their eggs. And finally, comfort means water temperature and pressure, which are both influenced by weather conditions.
Finding and catching spots is both an art and a science. The science helps you find them and the art is to convince them to eat something that’s not food. To do that, an angler must present a lure in a place where spots are eating similarly looking and behaving food. To know that, one must know how their prey behaves. For example, herring, which are normally very speedy swimmers, spawn in shallow waters and vertical surfaces after the bass spawn. Shad spawn during spring, summer, and fall, in shallows as long as the water is warm enough. Herring go to open waters to the surface during sunny days, while shad go deep. At night, shad and herring are in shallow water and around lights, particularly LED lights. During wintertime, herring and shad concentrate in the backs of ditches. Crayfish like rocky points and ledges. Insects and other land creatures are found near shorelines. Be aware though, that cold water slows down the food and the spots, so do the same with your lures. One must also keep in mind that the lake has a thermocline in summertime, where oxygen levels are only sufficient for spots to live in in the top 35 feet of water or so while, during wintertime, oxygen mixes evenly throughout the water column. During daytime, spots are not likely to come up to the top of the water column when the surface water is greater than 85 degrees F. The best place to find a spot during summertime is on a hump or brushpile just above the thermocline, where the oxygen levels and water temperature are best for them. This is usually about 25 feet deep.
I breakdown spot movement into four distinct seasons – spring, summer, fall, and winter. But spots don’t have a calendar, they go by water temperature. My breakpoints are lake surface temperatures from 55 to 85 degrees F for spring and fall. Higher temperatures are summer and lower temperatures are winter. The difference between spring and fall is the reproduction movement. Spring is broken down into three movements; pre-spawn, when spots head towards shallow water (they hatch their young where lots of zooplankton live to serve as baby food); spawn, when they are on shallow beds (females make beds and stay until eggs are fertilized, then males take their place to protect the fry - and they will bite a lure because it's now an intruder); and post-spawn, when spots leave the shallow waters to go eat lots of shad and herring.
The really artsy part to fishing for spots are the lures. Why so many colors and types? Does the Zoom Bait Company really need over 400 worm colors, some smooth and some in SEGMENTS? Should my spinner bait have willow blades or Colorado blades?; single blades or multiple blades?; gold blades, white blades, or chrome blades? It’s all situational and I’m not even going to talk about rods, reels, and line. Your choice of lures is best governed by whether it's sunny or cloudy, windy or still, day or night, is the water is warm or cold, and is the water clear or stained? The lure should "match the hatch", meaning the same size and color of the food source where you place the bait. Here are some of my lure recommendations for 10 different situations. Sometimes you have to try several different types of lures in the same place to get a strike and it's always helpful to make a cast that places your lure spot-on a brush pile to get a spot on!
Here's a deep ditch with standing timber during wintertime. I recommend spoons, a drop shot crawfish or worm, a jig, an underspin, or a shaky head. Give the spoons a stong pull and let the rod tip follow the line down and be ready for a stike on the drop. Move all other lures an inch at a time with 8 second pauses.
It's fall and topwater is back, baby! Here's a good underwater hump near a deep water drop off with brush piles on it. Call them up with a stick bait such as a zara spook or a cane walker. Make sure they have rattles!
It's the dog days of August and here's an underwater point with a steep drop off. There is brush in 28 feet of water. Start with a plopper to activate them. Then slowly pass over the brush with a spy bait, a popper, or jig heads with soft swim baits.
It's post-spawn and the spots are leaving the backs of creeks to go to the main lake. Try these deepwater docks with a swirlybird, rooster tail, crankbait, or grub on a jig head. The best docks have brush under or in front of them. Use a steady retrieve.
It's early summer with some lingering topwater action. Try this island surrounded by rocky ledges near deep water with stick baits deep – such as a sammy or zara spook, or in the shallows with a jitterbug, crankbait, or a fluke. Work both sides and the end of the blowdowns thoroughly.
It's summer at night and no wind. Try a wake bait or hard swimbait (I love a white sebile) over this deep hump that's covered with brush piles.
It's June and the blueback herring are spawning on this seawall. Try a soft swimbait, grub, jitterbug, crankbait, stick bait, popper, and crawfish jig. Make sure your popper makes big splashes!
It's fall and the shad are spawning on this blow through. Try a worm or crawfish on a shaky head, a drop shot, ned rig, spinnerbait, or stick bait.
It's August and I see nothing suspended over the river bed. No point in wetting a lure.
It's July and these humps near the river channel and steep drop offs have plenty of brush on them, which are now the spots favorite place to be. The best brush tops off at 25 feet. Use a drop shot crawfish or a weightless fluke just over the brush or a Carolina rig with a worm right in the brush.
Congratulations to FTFers The Cache Outlaws, beldredge, and Da Posse for winning the tournament in the biggest fish category. It took three grown men to haul it into the boat and every time the story is retold; the fish gets bigger and bigger!