When I think about summertime memories, one of my favorites involve something that anyone can replicate to make their own memory.
Last July, I was fun fishing on High Rock Lake, and I got on an epic dock bite. It was about 10 o’clock in the morning and they really shouldn’t have been biting, but a recent rain had brought good flow to the lake. When it’s so stagnant in the summertime, if you have some sort of moving current that brings food to the fish, that can really make for a good opportunity.
It wasn’t muddy, but the water had good color, and I kept hitting a few key docks. I rotated several times with a 1/2-ounce chartreuse/white spinnerbait and caught fish each time.
Overall, I would say docks are about mid-pack in my summertime preferences, but it really depends on the fishery. It really comes down to what the fish have available to them.
In the Carolinas, it’s not like the springtime or even the fall when you can just go down a stretch. In the summer, I feel like it’s particular docks — maybe a deeper dock with current on it, maybe one that has brush and deep water nearby. This may not be something I’m going to go do for half a day, but it might be something where I go run three or four key docks.
When docks are one of the only real pieces of cover you have, you’re forced to fish them. You just need to identify the ones with the right features.
In the summer, the fish want to be around current or deep water 90% of the time just because of how hot and stagnant the water can get. You need one of those close by, if not on the dock for it to be productive.
As far as my bait selection, that spinnerbait I used at High Rock last summer won’t be nearly as much of a player on a clearer water lake like Norman. But when you talk about a lowland reservoir like High Rock, where it’s shallow and it’s dirty even when it’s clean, a spinnerbait is a good choice.
On that lake, depending on where you’re at, a deeper dock can be in 4 feet. In a lake with deeper docks, a jig can be a gigantic player when the water’s dirty. But when the water’s clearer in the summertime, I’d lean more toward a small boot tail swimbait, a drop shot or a shaky head.
Also, even though a lot of people don’t have the patience to throw a wacky rig, I think summer’s a great time to throw this on those deeper docks. You really don’t know where those fish are going to be suspending under those docks, so a slow fall helps you cover the water column.
The wacky rig is such a subtle approach that takes so long to get to the fish. On clear, deeper docks, a wacky rig is one of my favorite things.
Like I said, this is not the time of year I’m going to go down a giant stretch of docks; I’m going to focus on maybe three or four key docks on a stretch. If I think it’s going to be a productive stretch, I’ll really soak ‘em with that wacky rig.
When it comes to fishing a dock, I feel like there are two approaches. Some guys will only make one cast to where on the dock they think the fish are sititng, and then they’ll run a lot of docks and only make that cast. Personally, I really like to pick docks apart, even if there’s a strong pattern.
If I find a strong pattern, I’ll definitely focus in on it, but I’ll still want to fish the rest of the dock because, especially in the summertime, if you get bit, it’s probably a good dock. A good dock will have a lot of shade on it, so the fish may be in various places.
They may be sitting on a post, or they may be sitting in the heart of the dock. It’s summertime and those fish don’t want too move far, so I want to cover as much of the dock as I can. That fish may be sitting on the other side of the dock, and if I don’t put that bait in front of his face, he’s not going to bite.
I try to put my bait in as many different angles and as many little feeding windows as I can. This gives me the best chances of making more summer memories.
