River fishing

[Big dreams]

I want to get everyone's opinion on something.  This is in regards to a river system such as Wixom Lake in Gladwin County.  What is the single most desired place to find fish?  Would it be flats, drop offs, cuts, docks, stumps, sea walls, inlets, current, points, etc...?  I fish these types of systems moreso than lakes.  If anyone is not sure what I am referring to, the river has fairly wide spots of a couple of hundred feet.  I think the deepest spot in Wixom is 40' or so.  Not sure how long it is but I would guess 12 miles, could be way off.  I know it is long.  The average current is probably 3-5 mph. 
I realize weather, temps, and other conditions dictate where we all go to first.  But lets say any given day, a place with this many attractions, where would you try to target first?

[Genie]

This is way generic, but fish are lazy.  If possible, they would literally sit in one spot and have current bring them food and take away their waste.  With rivers, the best is to look for areas that can come close to this.  With rivers, there is always the original "trench" that was the original river as well as feeder creeks.  These are typically silted in for Michigan rivers because they are so old.  Find where these used to be and those will be the highways that fish travel on.  From there find the area that give the most things fish like in the least amount of space.

That is not detail, but that is what I do on new rivers and some old ones to change things up.

[GPaquette]

A lot of times with big reservoirs like Wixom there's not one thing to look for. It's about what your confident in as an angler. There's everything for everyone, deep points, miles of slop, hundreds of boat docks, etc. Figure out what you like to fish and find the spots that suit you.

Personally, I always look for something different, there are a lot of points but the ones with more logs and stumps on them may be better, or docks next to deep water may be better than those on shallow flats. On bigger river system like this it is more effective to break the lake down in sections, one day fish the main lake, another fish up the river, and another fish in main lake coves, for example. Don't get caught up to where your jumping around everywhere, before you know it you'll have driven 50 miles.

The most important thing in my opinion is a high detailed map of some sort, this takes out the years of experience it would take to find all the little contour changes throughout the lake. 

[Big dreams]

Both good comments.  I find myself resorting to old ways rather than trying something new.  This is good when the bass are there however, makes it frustrating when they are not.  I try to fish at least one new technique each year.  Last year was the jerkbait.  This year I would like to focus on drop offs and possibly punching mats.  Thanks for the input here.