I have been noticing our dog the last week. In the morning she is curled up sleeping and is lethargic but in the beginning of the afternoon she comes to life and starts bouncing off of the walls. I thought the fish might be on the same schedule so I went to Lake Chicot after lunch today. At the ramp the North wind was blowing waves against the rocks and small bass could be seen chasing shad. Fishing started about 2:45. With a 1/4 ounce Red Eye Shad I caught 12 before I started the motor and could have probably caught 100. The fish were small but I kept on throwing hoping there would be some larger ones in the crowd. After a dozen and no big ones, I cranked up in search of some larger fish.  The bicycle dock was the first stop. In the past the fish have been schooled up there along a 300 yard stretch of bank. I caught one by a brushpile that was bulldozed up during the drawdown last summer. A dock that usually has fish around it was next but it is the one where the man saw me catch one as he drove by a few months ago and stopped. I left it then and came back to find him on the spot. I uncharacteristically gave him a small piece of my mind. I’m sure that didn’t deter him from fishing the spot again and again. That place was empty too. Sometimes the wind blown banks concentrate the fish so I headed for the one close to the welcome center. Nothing doing there either. I headed back to the bulldozer piles and dropped a worm in and around them. A few fish bit and were caught but with the wind blowing it was difficult fishing. After all the piles were fished I headed to the squirrel log and fished it with the swim jig used at Beaverdam with Richard. One cooperated. There was plenty of light but I called home and reserved a seat at the dinner table. Back at the landing the small bass were still wearing out the shad. I couldn’t resist catching a few more. The ending tally was 33 bass.

At 3 in the afternoon I started after seeing a fisherman coming in who said “They ain’t doing nothin’ “. Those were not particularly encouraging words. When I got to the 70 spot, immediately I saw some schooling bass chasing shad and I thought that guy was wrong. A small school, but a school.  A redeye shad is a great schooling bass bait so it went in first, then a DT-6, and then a worm, all with no results. Continuing down the bank and hoping for more schooling activity I alternated the aforementioned baits and added in a 5XD. Upon coming to some shallow water there was much fish activity but a Goo was the first fish on the line. There were stripes mixed in with small largemouths and they were wearing the numerous shad out. When the bait hit the water there would be a silver spray of shad. Why would a fish hit an artificial bait when there were so many of the real thing? Some did and maybe these two were going to share.

Real biggies. Leaving the little fish I tried a deep point where I immediately got bit. Upon setting the hook the worm was cut off and the line frayed thanks to a gar. After another bite of that sort I left for another couple of spots before retiring for the day. I caught 7 bass and an assorted amount of stripes, goos and gars.

Richard and I met at the landing at BD this morning about 6:30. We tried to start early because I had to leave to get back and see about some work being done at my house. After we launched, we headed North down the bank with 3/16 oz. spinnerbaits. The fish nipped at them a couple of times but none made it to the boat until Richard broke out the swim jig. I have not used a swim jig much and I was eager for a lesson. I got what I wanted. We caught most on a swim jig but some on the spinnerbait and some on a Yum version of a swim Senko which is a straight short worm with a club tail to make it swim. The swinning worm only had a 1/8 oz. weight. The swim jig we used was a 3/16 oz. custom made one with a creepy crawler tail.

In the background you can see what kind of territory we were fishing in. We probably caught most on the jig. Richard had a spate of bad luck that lasted about half the day. He would hook a fish and have it half way to the boat and it would come unpinned or it would get close to the boat and start frolicking and come loose. I watched and tried to figure out what was happening so I might be able to offer advice on how to make a correction but there was nothing I could see that would help. We tried to figure how many got away that way and came up with conservatively at least a dozen. As the time to leave approached, so did a thunderstorm and the fish were biting pretty good. Just as we got the boat out it started to sprinkle. We ended a fun day with 15 bass, a crappie, a gar, and almost a 7 to 8 pound catfish. The FOD was 4 – 1.