Bartletts Ferry Fishing Report – July 2010

Bartlett’s Ferry: Level: 0.3 feet above full pool. Temp: High 80s to low 90s. Clarity: Clear.

Bass: Decent. “It’s getting to the old summer toughness,” said Dennis Hudson, who won his three-hour, Tuesday-night tournament recently with 8 1/2 pounds. He said the grass bite is picking up pretty well if the water level is right on the day you’re fishing. If there’s some water in the grass, it’s hard to beat a creature bait like a Sweet Beaver, Texas rigged on a light 3/16-oz. weight. “Just enough to make it sink,” Dennis said. Also, every week someone has been bringing in a solid 5-lb. or better fish from out deep, Dennis said, but they’ve been having a hard time putting together a limit to go with it. The deep bite is coming off the ends of the deeper points or channel-ledge breaks in 10 to 15 feet. Halawaka Creek is a good place to go looking for them with a big worm, like a Zoom Ol Monster, in green pumpkin. The upriver bite in the moving water around the shoals has been decent, also, if the they’re not pulling water too hard to fish up there. Reaction baits like spinnerbaits, flukes and buzzbaits are good options upriver. Dennis said you can also catch a few fish on a green-pumpkin Zoom Trick Worm threaded on a shaky head and fished under boat docks and out in 10 to 12 feet on the rocky points. Small fish are starting to school up under the Halawaka Creek Bridge, like they do every summer, to feed on the small shad funneling in and out of the creek. Dennis said you can see spots and largemouths all around the bridge pilings, but they’re tough to catch. And, even when you can get them to bite, they’re usually small fish. If you want to mess with them, you can catch them when they start actively popping shad on the surface. Fish a small Pop-R or a crappie jig dropped a couple of feet behind that same Pop-R. Dennis said the shad kill over the winter was tough on the forage base, and a lot of the fish are pretty skinny. Finally, the mayfly hatches should start showing up any day. Look on the banks for the mayflies and fish popping them off the surface. Throw a Pop-R, a Trick Worm or a tube into the activity.