I was throwing a junebug spiderjig and had a couple light hits around submerged rocks in 6-8 ft of water, but nothing would stay on. Brian was throwing a candy corn colored senko type bait made by bass pro shops. With no success in the deeper water we decided to try something a little more shallow.

On our way to the north end of the lake brian saw some rocks in 4 ft of water we had never seen before (the lake is down 2 ft). We stopped and brian threw his candy corn stick bait at the rocks. He instantly hooked into something big. His rod doubled up and the fight was on. After 10 seconds it was over and we never saw the fish.

After a brief cursing session brian threw right back in the place he had hooked up, and instantly the fight was on again. This time he landed it. It was about 24 inches and 6.5 lbs. Sometimes things just work out I guess.

We kept fishing for another hour, but the wind had picked up and the temp dropped. In all we landed one smallmouth and 4 largemouth. Not a bad first trip if I say so myself!

Just for you Brian, here is the profile.

I got on the water around 1:30 and fished some black and blue fleck hula grubs on a 1/4 ounce jighead on the East side of the lake, with no luck in the first 30 minutes. I then decided to switch gears and hit the West shoreline since I figured the water would be a few degrees warmer from the strong morning sun.  On the way over I hit some of the submerged rock piles with no luck.

Once on the other side of the lake I started throwing watermelon cabin creek spider jigs and texas rigged senkos around my favorite deeper water docks (which aren’t so deep anymore now that the lake is down over 2 feet).  I got a strike on my third cast and landed a 2 lb largemouth bass on a jig. Hoping I had found a pattern I kept fishing the sunny side of docks on the West shore.  20 minutes went by and finally another hit, again off a deep water dock, and another 2lb largemouth.

I didn’t find any other fish on the West side, but did catch a couple smallmouth on the North shore fishing some submerged rock piles in 6 feet of water.  Senkos produced nothing no matter what color, size or presentation I threw… One of the smallmouth I caught was so dark it look black.  As I was reeling it in I actually thought it was the first freshwater tautog (a.k.a. blackfish for those who don’t know what a tautog is).

I fished for another 45 minutes on the East shore with not as much as a hit, and then I called it a day around 4:30… It wasn’t a great day but with a cold front coming through this week, lowered water levels, and cold fall water, at least I caught something.

Hopefully I will be able to get out at least one more time this year on the lake, but it may not happen if the weather continues to get colder and the lake gets more shallow.

We got out on the water around 7:30am and started fishing shallow structure with everything from texas rigged senkos to spinnerbaits with no luck. After finding nothing in the shallows we went across the lake to fish deeper water and structure. Brian stuck with a senko and I switched over to a black and blue spider grub (technically it was the chompers hula grub). We both fished around the docks and pontoon boats (the ones that are still in the water) with minimal luck.

We both persevered with our respective baits and fished for about an hour with nothing more than a couple nibbles, until we got to some deeper docks on the north west shore of the lake. Just as I was commenting that I should be getting fish on spider grubs this time of year, I hooked up with a 2 pound largemouth. The next cast resulted in a 2.5lb largemouth. Having thought I found a pattern we continued fishing the deep water docks, and managed to find another 6 or seven fish including 2 smallmouth. Brian ended up landing only a smallmouth and 1 largemouth on the senko, despite his 5 hours of hard work casting and skipping his bait under the docks.

Largest fish of the day was only about 3lbs, and they were few and far between, but hopefully once our weather pattern settles down and the rain stops we will see some better fall fishing. If anyone is having success with other baits this time of the year let me know via the comments section below!

On my third cast with the swimming senko, I landed a 2.5lb largemouth off of a marker buoy. I was fishing it just like I would a regular senko for the most part, but would give it some swimming action around structure. This swimming action seemed to be the key since senko fishing had been slow the last few times I went out. Over the 45 minutes of fishing I landed 7 keepers (largest was about 3lbs), and I missed 3-4 good strikes.

If your senko fishing has slowed down this time of year I would recommend trying the swimming senko by yamamoto baits or kinami. I was using the 4 inch watermelon with red flake for those who were wondering, and the water was moderately stained last night.

I also threw a spinnerbait for a while with no success, so I guess it is back to slow and low for a while until the fall bite turns on…

After minimal success we decided to try the docks on the west side of the lake since we hadn’t fished them in quite some time, and it turned out to be a good move. We landed another 10 fish on senkos from under the docks… The fishing wasn’t easy though since the fish were suspended way under the docks and pontoons boats requiring an accurately skipped bait under the docks. The recent rain made this even more difficult since the water levels were up a foot or so from last week.

Most fish that we landed were decent quality in the 2+ lb range and one monster topping out at around 6lbs.

Here’s a few shots of this chunky hog.

That is one fat bass… Especially for the end of summer!

Hopefully this pattern will hold up until the next time I have a few hours to spend on the lake. It has been cold at night lately so I would imagine the fish won’t stay on the docks for too long. If you are fishing this weekend, give the docks a try and you might very well land yourself a trophy! In case you were wondering, this fish was released unharmed to fight another day.

Nothing was real big last night but it sure was fun to have some hard-hittin’ topwater spinnerbait action!

I threw everything I had in my bag including senkos (wacky rigged and texas rigged), spinnerbaits, topwater, and jigs, but for 2.5 hours of fishing we only landed 5 fish, of which only 1 was a “keeper”.  Total tally was 1 on a wacky rigged senko, 1 on a texas rigged senko, and 3 on a spinnerbait retrieved quickly across the surface. All fish were largemouth bass.

Overall we had fun even though the fish didn’t cooperate, and Sally enjoyed barking at everyone on the lake!

The next night we decided to try again and finally got everyone over for some skiing action… On the boat was Me, Kate, Erik, Jeff, Buddy, Robbie, and Jack. Out of everyone Erik was the only one to get up on the skis this day… Tubing is a different story, I could not be thrown, but everyone else took some good diggers.

Here are a couple shots from the day on the water:

Erik skiing:

Here is a shot of jeffs leg after hitting the water hard!

 Once we were done abusing ourselves tubing and skiing we decided to rig up the poles and go out for some late night catfish… We tried stink bait nuggets, hotdogs, and night crawlers, but the only thing we caught was a buzz… By 11:30pm we called it a night.

My mom caught the first 4 bass and started getting cocky, but I came back with a couple largemouths on a senko, she caught a few more,  then I switched to a yellow and white spinnerbait, and landed 3 fish on 3 casts.  After that the spinnerbait bit turned off. I swicthed between a senko and a silver pop and chug, landing a couple fish here and there, but my mom stuck with her wacky rigged senko which produced a steady bite all night.

Although I tried to come back, it just wasn’t in the cards… Final numbers were Mom: 13, Me: 9.  The biggest largemouth went to me (~3lbs) and my mom had the biggest smallmouth (~2lbs).  Overall it was a good night considering they just treated the lake for weeds on July 15th.

As always a little less boat traffic and little more respect on the lake would be nice, but that is probably asking too much.

I got onto the lake around 630pm and it was warm out but the wind was really ripping from the south, making fishing shoreline structure all but impossible. I decided to throw a spinnerbait and just let the wind push me along the shoreline. Thinking a little outside the box, I chose a black 1/4 spinnerbait with silver blades. I landed 7 largemouth bass, 1 big yellow perch, and 1 smallmouth. The biggest fish was around 2 pounds. Most fish were caught next to knocked down trees or submerged grass mats.

This was by all means a slow night of fishing for Cedar Lake. I decided to call it a night around 9pm as it started getting dark and there was still some bigger boats on the lake, and I didn’t have a running light on my boat. On the way in I fought the wind and white caps on my trolling motor powered jon boat. It took twice as long as it usually does to get across the lake. The second I got the boat cleared out and my gear put away, the wind died down, and the lake turned into glass… Go figure!

The fishing wasn’t great, but it was one of those nights where the air is warm even with a strong breeze, and we had a great sunset. It was the kind of relaxing night I desperately needed…