Great Lakes Bass Fishing Forum

Sometimes someone shares their pet lake with you. If you're lucky. When that happens I try to honor that by not giving away someone's gem. Especially if it seems to be flying 'under the radar.'

Derek and I went to such a lake on our almost weekly Thursday fishing trip (August 6, 2015). We didn't have much in the way of specific info. Just that the lake - I will call it Lake M - had some nice bass in it.

Unfortunately, we didn't quite crack the code but yes, it does have some very nice bass in it.

(http://glb.glwimg.com/images/derek-4pounder-long-c2255.jpg)
Derek was casting the old Ring Worm on a light rig when this long, lean 4-pounder ate it in somewhere near 16 feet of water cast away from a deep weedline.

I, being not the patient type but also wanting to catch some bass, rigged up a Carolina Rig with a heavy Tungsten bullet weight, a 3 foot leader and ending it with a black and blue Angling A.I. Stinger (http://anglingai.com/303a-3-stinger/).

First cast into the same depth approximately I got whacked. I set up on the fish and had it on for second or so. Felt like a good one but I lost it fast.

(http://glb.glwimg.com/images/3pound-plus-carolina-rig-largemouth-bass-c2257.jpg)
Only a few casts later my line loaded up and I set the hook on the Stinger to catch a solid 3-plus largemouth bass on the Carolina Rig! Much better! Ole dark spot.

But we couldn't get anymore good bites doing this so we moved along. We found a hard ridge that looked very intriguing. Anytime you can find a deeper hard bottom area in an inland lake it should be checked out. But we go no bites on it.

We caught a few small bass pitching to weedlines on a hump but nothing exciting and the bites were few. We decided to fish a couple weed points along a shoreline just to see what would happen. We were moving in and out from deeper water into less than 10 feet casting and pitching along, also trying crankbaits and even topwater.

While moving along a plain looking shoreline stretch with nothing to speak of for weeds I pulled my rod up on a 'weed' that snatched my KVD 2.5 bluegill crankbait. It kept pulling. I guess I was on autopilot because by the time I realized one of the pulls felt suspiciously like a head-shake a bass over 4 pounds jumped and threw my crankbait back to me! Darn!! That would have been a great picture bass!!! Got to pay attention if you want to get them all...

(http://glb.glwimg.com/images/bullet-craw-largemouth-bass-c2258.jpg)
I want back to tossing my most recent hot confidence lure - the Nemesis Baits Bullet Craw and just tossing it up fairly shallow I had a tap and then this bass try to run away with my 2nd to last black and blue Bullet Craw (note to self: get some more Bullet Craws ASAP!).

Crazy boat traffic started to pick up on the lake (by crazy I mean not 'fishing friendly') and we had to get back home for various activities with the families so we called it a day (kind of a short day) on Lake M. But we both decided we need to come back at some point and crack this lake's code. Because the rewards will probably be well worth it!

Luckily, there are 11,000 lakes in Michigan and so many of them are good to excellent bass lakes. We may get sidetracked for awhile trying to find even more gems out there! It might be hard to get back to some of the lakes we already have tried out.