Lunker Lines

April is a post-spawn bass month at Bogue Homa. The females will be coming off the bed, and they’ll want to feed up to help recover from the spawn. But they will still will be holding fairly close to the spawning area in shallow water.

I enjoy fishing Bay Springs Lake  in March, because I like catching largemouth, spotted and smallmouth bass on the same lake, often in the same places and sometimes on the same lure. 

I think February is the best month of the year to fish Ross Barnett Reservoir for bass, which are in the prespawn mode and moving shallow. In many sections of the country — and Mississippi — you will often be fishing for bass in deep water in February, but on Ross Barnett, you’ll catch most of your fish in water 3 feet deep or less.

Maynor Creek, a 450-acre body of water near Waynesboro, is my pick for great January bass fishing at this difficult time to catch bass.

Bogue Homa’s fishery, with its numerous creek channels, active bass and an abundance of vegetation, is a great December fishery. Early on, you’ll take bass on top; they’ll be along the edges of drop-offs later in the month. Often, bass will concentrate in creek channels all winter, particularly when the air temperature is cold. Generally, December bass and the shad they eat will still be in a late fall pattern. 

Catching 30 to 50 bass per day is what you can expect in November on Pickwick Lake, which corners Mississippi, Alabama and Tennessee and should be one of the hottest lakes in all those states this month. One of the main reasons I’m choosing Pickwick is because the shad will be moving from deep to shallow water and will be schooling on the surface, and there’s a wide variety of ways to catch those bass. 

When I think of Mississippi lakes I like to fish in October, Bay Springs Lake comes to mind. A 9-mile-long reservoir on the Tenn-Tom Waterway northeast of Tupelo, Bay Springs has populations of all three species of black bass: largemouth, smallmouth and spotted. 

This month, I’ll primarily fish my home lake, Bogue Homa, near Laurel. I understand exactly where September bass should be, and I know the lures to fish for success. Bogue Homa has a good number of largemouths 3 pounds or better, that will be relating to the grass and the grass lines coming off its banks. 

Because bass don’t have sunscreen, sunglasses or air conditioning, in August, they’re looking for shade and cool water. Ross Barnett Reservoir has numerous lily pads, providing shade and cooler water where the baitfish also can feed on the algae on the lily pads’ bottoms, and big, thick clumps of grass.

I choose the lakes I pick each month, since I know where the bass have to be, and what baits they’ve historically taken. That’s why for July I’m selecting Bogue Homa.

I’ll choose 1,075 acre Lake Okhissa near Bude, Mississippi, for June bass fishing. A Bill Dance Signature Lake in the Homochitto National Forest, Okhissa is deep and clear with plenty of hydrilla and dollar pads. The bass will be on their summer pattern, so I’ll be fishing a frog pattern and a flipping and pitching pattern.

Pickwick bass fishing can’t get any better than in May. From only two or three schools of bass, you may catch 30 or more bass per day. If rising water happens, the bass will be in this newly inundated water in the grass, bushes and trees. About the middle of May, the bass will be pulling out of the creeks and staging at their mouths or in the cuts and ditches in the flats leading to the river channel. At the end of May, I’ll look for bass out on the main river channel. 

Several events are happening at Ross Barnett this month that make this lake a super pick.

Depending on the weather, bass spawn early at Bogue Homa in March. An angler probably may have a 5-fish bag weighing 20 to 25 pounds. With those opportunities in mind, how do you go about putting fish in the boat?

In February at Pickwick Lake, the bass family will be having a reunion and ganging up.

In warm weather with active bass biting the Alabama Rig, you might have a 50-fish catch.

But even on cold, rainy days, I expect to catch 20 to 30 schooled-up bass suspended at some strategic places on bluff points.

January is a fickle month at Ross Barnett, with warm weather some years while other times feature temperatures below freezing the entire month.