Lake Blue Ridge Fishing Reports – August 2021

Blue Ridge: Level: Full pool. Temp: 81-85 degrees. Clarity: 12 to 15 feet.

Bass: Guide Eric Welch reports, “It’s your typical summertime fishing on Blue Ridge. Blue Ridge is a deep, clear lake that gets a tremendous amount of recreational boat traffic from July 4th until Labor Day weekend. This pushes the fish down deep, which only gives you three or four hours of decent fishing, starting at daylight. Then you will get a couple of hours before dark and into the dark hours. If you have a good, bright, clear night, the herring baitfish will feed on the plankton, which will also have the bass actively feeding. This helps with the first hour in the morning. Throw a Whopper Plopper, Strike King Sexy Dawg Jr. and a Pop-R. Once the sun gets up, it’s time to start looking for offshore humps with deep drops or brush. I’m targeting these fish with a drop shot, using a 4.5-inch RoboWorm or some type of minnow-looking bait. My next choice is a Ned rig with a TRD worm. I’m using St. Croix spinning rods, 7-foot medium light and medium, spooled with Sunline Siglon 12-lb. yellow braid with Gamma Touch fluorocarbon leader. Target deep, rocky banks, points and laydowns. Fishing these days has become like all the other sports. If your kid plays baseball, the $400 bat will make them better than a $60 bat. The same is starting to play into fishing, especially with the electronics now. Lowrance has ActiveTarget, Garmin has LiveScope and now Humminbird has MEGA Live. It just depends on how much you want to spend or which units you want. If the older generation would of had this technology 40-plus years ago, we wouldn’t have anything to fish for now. The biggest key to summertime fishing is knowing how to read your electronics, not just the sonar but also the mapping. I use Humminbird Helix because I have grown accustomed to their mapping, but I also use the Garmin 1022 LiveScope. If you pull up to a hump, point or brush and you don’t see any fish on LiveScope, it’s time to leave because they’re not there. Good luck.” Guide Eric Crowley reports, “The spotted bass bite I’ve been fishing is mainly with a crankbait or a spoon if they are deeper than 25 to 30 feet. They seem to be schooled up when feeding because you go a while marking fish without a bite, and then catch a half dozen in one spot.”

Walleye: Guide Eric Crowley reports, “This summer continues to be one of the best in years. The walleye bite has been steady with fish holding in 40 to 60 feet just off the bottom near bait balls. This is when a spoon really starts working. I like a 2-inch gold Blue Fox Vibrax. There’s a few color variations in the same line, and they all catch fish in this super clear water. Use 10-lb. fluorocarbon or less. You can forget getting bit in the daytime. Weed edges, rock lines or edges are all holding fish. Work that Vibrax for a few minutes, and if you’re not getting bit, move on to the next spot. This is where the Auto Chart live feature comes in handy on the Humminbird units. You can find and follow the weed edges precisely. Live bait can be used in the same areas as the spoons and will put fish in the boat, as well. I like a 1/0 circle hook or an octopus hook for medium-sized baits. This is just enough weight to get it down to the fish, and again use a light leader. The trolling bite is good at dawn or after dark running deep-diving crankbaits while clipping main-lake points or over the weedbeds.”

Trout: Guide Eric Crowley reports, “The trout bite has changed from last month as the fish have moved much deeper, but they are still feeding, and we are still catching them daily on live baits, spoons, swimbaits, and we’re even catching them on drop-shot rigs. The average fish is probably 15 inches, with several fish over 20 inches in the past few weeks. Again in this heat you want to be out in low-light conditions early, late or in the rain even.”