If I could pick only one place to fish in July, I’d fish the Tombigbee River on the Tenn-Tom Waterway and the Aliceville Pool. At this time of year, you really can catch quality bass off the old river ledges there with a Mann’s 15+ and a 20+ crankbait. My favorite colors are blue/chartreuse, black/chartreuse and Tennessee shad. Your best ledges will be found around the mouths of creeks. My favorite creek mouths to fish are Pumpkin and Coal Fire.
River fishing is always best in the summertime, when the bass pull out of the creeks and the shallows and start holding on those river ledges. At this time of year, the Tombigbee River is fairly stable and clear. You’ll find the bass stacking up on those river ledges.
If you can locate the bass, you often can catch several from one spot. Catching from five to 20 bass from one place on these underwater river ledges isn’t uncommon.
Current is the key to knowing when bass will bite on these ledges. On the Aliceville pool, current is often determined by when boats lock through the dam. Every time the lock opens and closes, and the bass feel that current, they’ll usually start biting. You can catch bass when current isn’t coming through the lake, but you can catch more bass when there is current moving through the lake.
I like the Aliceville Pool on the Tombigbee because I won the 2004 B.A.S.S. tournament there. I didn’t catch a limit of bass every day, and I lost a really big bass on the last day. However, I had four bass with a five-bass limit, and those four bass weighed a total of 20 pounds. My biggest bass weighed 8.5 pounds.
Aliceville Pool once was known for producing a large number of big bass. In recent years, the size of bass you’ll catch there has decreased, but at this time of year, you still can catch 4- to 6-pounders if you’ll use your depth finder and work the river ledges with deep-diving crankbaits.
When I’m fishing a Mann’s 15+ crankbait, I’ll use 10-pound-test line. When I’m fishing a Mann’s 20+ crankbait, I’ll be using 12-pound-test line.
One of the keys to fishing deep-diving crankbaits at this time of the year is to overpower the crankbait to the bottom. By that, I mean you want to select a crankbait that will dive deeper than the bottom you’re fishing and faster than a crankbait that’s designed to fish at the depth of the bottom.
For instance, if I’ll be fishing 15 feet deep, I’ll use the Mann’s 20+ crankbait. If I’m fishing a 10-foot-deep bottom, I’ll be using the Mann’s 15 + crankbait.
You can’t beat bass fishing in Aliceville Pool in Mississippi during July for fun.
EDITOR’S NOTE: Paul Elias, a professional fisherman since 1979, has won five B.A.S.S. tournaments and the 1982 Bassmaster Classic. Today, Elias still competes in the B.A.S.S Elite Series, the highest level of tournament bass fishing.
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