We’re only hours away from the start of the 2023 St. Croix Bassmaster Opens Series. What better place to start the season than Lake Eufaula, and what better time of year than early March?
Giant largemouth abound here along the south Alabama/Georgia line, to the point that Eufaula is referred to as the Big Bass Capital of the World by the natives of this town, and the thousands of anglers that visit this prized fishery each year.
A total of 342 Bassmaster Opens Pros and Cos have made their way to the shores of Lake Eufaula, to try their hands on this historic fishery. And everyone here is contemplating the same thing, will the beloved shallow bite prevail or will forward-facing sonar continue to re-write the bass fishermen’s handbook.
Collectively as a sport, we’ve watched forward-facing sonar take the bass fishing world by storm the last few years, with terms like “scoping” entering the bass fishing vernacular for the first time. Garmin’s LiveScope and the following advances in this tech made by Humminbird and Lowrance have changed so much in a such a short period of time.
But it was thought that the spawn would still dominate springtime tournaments, until recently that is. In the last two weeks, we watched Tyler Rivet pair his forward-facing sonar with a jerkbait to win the SiteOne Bassmaster Elite Series at Lake Okeechobee. And then Joey Cifuentes III follow suit with a dropshot in timber the next week, to win the Gamakatsu Bassmaster Elite at Lake Seminole using his forward-facing sonar.
Merle Haggard posed a question in his 1981 country classic that’s on every shallow water angler’s mind this week, are the good times really over for good?
Longtime Pro and former Elite Series Champion Ish Monroe plans to rectify this situation, along with another. He’s here to start his journey back to the Bassmaster Elite Series and the Bassmaster Classic, with berths to both available through the Opens. And he’s more than aware of the deep brush bite that often wins here on Eufaula, but he’s piling all his eggs in the other basket.
“I think you can catch them anyway you want, from 25- feet to inches,” said Monroe.
The bass have hit the banks to start their annual spawning process. Spring has sprung a few weeks early here at Eufaula. There’s been a shift from frost covering cars to pollen in a matter of weeks. The trees have gone from budding to bursting with blooms in just days. And more bass are headed to the bank by the minute.
“I think it’s going to take 30- to 32- pounds just to get paid. They’re catching them. They up there shallow good. But as many fish as I know are in this lake, they ain’t all up there. Guys are still going to catch them in the brush piles.”
The brush-pile bite dominates here on Eufaula throughout much of the year, and with the advent of forward-facing sonar the brush is more popular and accessible than ever before. Though Monroe acknowledges bass will be caught throughout a wide range of depths this week, he wanted to make his intentions very clear. This frog fishing and flipping fanatic will be fishing shallow still, “shallow, shallow.”
“There’s a lot of hay grass in the water. And they’re on beds around that hay grass. I’d rather just go fishing than have to look at them though, just because there are so many guys that are in the way.”
Though several competitors are targeting bass off-shore, several still are shallow, given the field size of 225 boats. And since this is one of the most visited lakes in the country this time of year, hundreds of recreational anglers have also flown their northern coops to flee the colder wether and flock to Eufaula.
Because of this abundance of anglers looking around and fishing shallow, the bedding bass are very spooky and hard to catch.
“They’re in a foot of water, the beds that I’ve seen. They’re so obvious, even in the dirty water. You can see both the male and the female up there.”
In a situation like this when the bedding bass are easy to see but hard to catch, Monroe prefers to simply go fishing, targeting bass that may very well be on bed, mixed in with more that are just cruising the shallows coming off of and going onto beds.
“The lake is not bad. It’s perfect fishing color. So you can power fish them, but you still got to be quiet. They’re shallow shallow.”
Monroe believes he can fish the skinny water comfortably, confident the shallow bite will be able to compete with the new-fangled forward-facing sonar we’ve seen win the last two Elite events.
The biggest reason for his level of confidence is the unseasonably warm weather this area has seen the last two weeks, and the warm days to come. A front will push through on Day 2 of the event, but the temps will hold relatively steady.
“The cold front that is supposed to hit on Friday really isn’t that cold. There will be lows in the 50s and highs in the 80s. The wind is the only thing that’s going to be a factor.”
With winds out of the south forecasted to increase throughout Day 1 and reach their peak on Day 2, Eufaula will rear her ugly head a bit here this week. A 20- to 25- mile-per-hour wind is rough on any lake, but when it blows out of the Southwest on Lake Eufaula and collides with the current out of the North, the waves stack on the shallow flats of this section of the Chattahoochee River. This makes running, and fishing along the river more than a little challenging.
Monroe believes this will work in the shallow water anglers’ favor, making the forward-facing sonar deal around deeper brush in open water much more challenging, while the incoming weather will simply improve the shallow bite.
“It’s supposed to rain Friday, and they’re going to bite. I can live with 80 degrees and a warm rain and wind. It ain’t going to do nothing but make the reaction bite better. They’re gonna eat a ChatterBait. They’ll eat a swimjig. They’ll eat a spinnerbait, probably still catch some on a buzzbait too.”
Though the wind will make fishing certain areas a little challenging at times and others will get blown out all together, Monroe believes the weights will be strong here. The winner will need to average between 20- to 22- pounds per day to win here, and qualify for the 2024 Academy Sports + Outdoors Bassmaster Classic presented by Toyota.
Will the shallow bite reestablish itself as the dominant spring pattern? Or will forward-facing sonar continue to reshape how we look at bass fishing, even during the spawn. The next chapter in this saga will be written shortly.
