This week we are in Arkansas on Lake Dardanelle. After a little bit of a stumble at Sam Rayburn a couple weeks ago I need to have a good tournament here for AOY points. Although that is always in the back of my mind you just have to go out every day and do your very best and let the chips fall where they may. I’ve found that watching points all the time brings a certain amount of pressure to this already stressful game. One day at a time, one fish at a time, makes life a whole lot easier.
As you’ve probably heard by now about half of the lake is pretty much unfishable this week – especially the main river. The lower part of the lake is not in very bad shape at all but the further up you go, it gets nasty. The water is up in the trees and flowing 7-8 mph current up there. These conditions are making the lake fish a lot smaller that it normally would. A lot of boats are piled in the small backwater areas trying to find some water that is a little calmer and a little cleaner. The water has actually been falling all of practice which I think has made the fishing a little tougher than normal but with a good chance of rain in the forecast for the upcoming tournament days I’m hopeful the fish will start biting better.
Another thing that is going on this week is a giant mayfly hatch. I’ve seen mayfly hatches before lots of times on Lake Guntersville but never one of this magnitude. I actually think there are so many of them that the fish have almost stopped paying any attention to them. Under normal circumstances you find an active tree or bush overhanging the water that has bluegill feeding on the falling mayflies and the bass won’t be far away, but I haven’t found that yet here this week. It will be interesting to see if anyone cracks that code and figures out how to catch fish relating to those hatching bugs.
As far as bait selection here you could really take your pick of any shallow-water-staples this week and I’d say it will probably come into play. I’ll have about 8 or 9 MHX rods on the deck in the morning for several different situations that I should run into tomorrow. One bait that will certainly see some action tomorrow is a square bill crankbait. For me any time I’m faced with dirty water a square bill is one of the baits that I have the most confidence in. My rod for square bills is an MHX CB-845. I’ve caught a ton of fish on this setup already this year and hopefully it’ll catch a bunch more here this week. The rod itself is 7′ in length and has a really good parobolic bend that lets the fish take the bait good. I build this rod with a short 9″ handle which really helps in making short, accurate casts.
I’ll throw my squarebill on a 6:1 reel and spool up with 14 pound Vicious Pro Elite fluorocarbon. Another huge key is using good hooks on a square bill and for me that calls for Mustad KVD Elite Triple Grips. Match them to the size of the bait you’re throwing and you will land more bass, period.
This week will be a real challenge for all of us but being able to compete at this level on a fishery like this is a real thrill but we all really like to be challenged like this. It makes us better.