With Beaver Lake full to the brim, a bass in hand beats two in the flooded bushes.
The lake has swollen in size. There’s water, water everywhere and acres of flooded bushes, trees and grass beds where black bass roam. To some, the high water looks like a bass bonanza. Others call it a flooded mess that’s difficult to fish.
Like it or not, about 300 anglers in the Everett Team Trail bass tournament Saturday had no choice but to fish or go home. The circuit attracts the best bass fishermen on Beaver Lake. The weigh-in on Saturday at Prairie Creek park was the golden opportunities to ask them, just how do you finagle a few bass to bite in all this high water?
Three of the fishermen shared three different methods.
Flooded bushes are great places to fish for bass right now, said Nick Frakes, a competitor from Gravette. He saw bank after bank of them on Saturday. How does he know which ones to fish? Frakes pointed to a shoreline across from Prairie Creek park.
“You see how steep that shoreline is? Those steep banks are the ones to fish because you can get closer to the bushes and shoreline,” Frakes said. “I don’t fish banks that have a ton of bushes. The ones with a few isolated bushes are better.”
Anglers should be able to catch bass 1 to 3 feet deep with plastic worms or jig and pigs. Top-water lures work well early, or all day if it’s overcast, Frakes coached.
He avoids banks with a gradual slope and lots of bushes. “I don’t like to fish where there’s 30 yards of bushes between me and the shore,” he said.
Frakes took the high road and fished shallow on Saturday. Larry Walker of Pea Ridge caught several bass deep, with a French-fry style plastic worm rigged Carolina style.
“We had the boat sitting in about 25 or 30 feet of water and those fish were biting about 15 feet deep,” he said. Points are good places to fish.
“We caught some from the bushes with top-water lures this morning,” Walker added.
His biggest problem may have been catching walleye instead of bass. Walleye are a prized catch, but not during a bass tournament.
Danny Warren of Springdale has been fishing tournaments at Beaver Lake for 30 years. Bass don’t jump in the boat just because the lake comes up. Fishing can still be tough, Warren said.
His method is to start fishing around bushes in shallow water and work deeper. Once you catch a bass or two, target that depth. Warren likes the gradually-sloping banks that Frakes avoids.
Working a top-water lure or spinner bait in the newly flooded cover is worth a try, Warren said. So is flipping a jig at the base of bushes and trees.
Bass ought to stay in the shallows at least through June, Warren said. When the water warms up, bass may move deeper to cooler water.
So pick your water, shallow or deep. Chances are a bass is going to bite.
Flip Putthoff can be reached at [email protected] or on Twitter @NWAFlip