Toledo Bend is a little low if you haven’t noticed! As of now we are at 160.85FT (AKA 11.15ft low). The boat lanes at this point are just a suggestion rather than the rule. I personally have not had any stump contacts in the main lake (knock on wood) but I do want to warn everyone to be extremely careful inside any and all coves/cuts. I have been following the same routes saved on my GPS for over 3 months now to help cut down the odds but still don’t go wide open ANYWHERE! Now to the fun part with this low water……the fishing!!!!!
Baits and Structure:
Bass fishing on Toledo has gone from good to almost too easy with the cool weather moving in. I have been concentrating on the south end this year and have found some great new areas with all this low water. This is a great time to break out the video camera and take a survey of some prime spring time fishing spots. I know it will be awhile before it fills back up but when it does that information can me priceless. I have had more trips of “site seeing” this year than ever. Back to the fishing, we are hitting any grass we can find with deep water nearby first thing in the morning. When I say nearby, I mean I can turnaround and cast into 15-20ft of water. We are throwing topwater such as yellow magic, spooks, buzzbaits, and always a frog (hollow belly and buzz style) Then follow up with the swimbait. I have been having great successes with the Shadalicious and YUM Money minnow. The color seems to change day to day but natural is always a winner. Once the sun gets up, you have two options. A- you can go to some depth (12-25ft) with jigs, Texas Rigged 10in worms or DD22s and hit main lake or secondary points and humps. B- (My Favorite!) Get the topwaters, jigging spoons and swimbaits ready for some schooling fish. They can be found in almost all major creek arms about ˝ way back as of now and are a real blast, especially with kids or the wife. Most people say they want to catch bigger fish so they always go with option A. Well let me tell you, with the cooling water temps, the bigger fish are right there with those schoolers. I had two last week that were 6.1 and 5.9 on back to back cast to some “small” schoolers. They way to target those bigger fish is to put something alittle bigger that will hold back the 10-14” fish. I chose to throw a Large swimbait on a 845SW Rosewood Denali Rod with 20lb Florocarbon and cast to the outside edge of the school. They also can be below the fish if in deeper water.
Locations: I am getting bite almost everywhere we go on the lake as of now although some are better than others on any given day. Six mile creek and Indian creek are good areas this time of year. I also like Housen and mill creek though more difficult to enter with the low water, but taking your time to ease through the stumps is sometimes will worth it.
Good luck to everyone.
Guide Wolfgang
409-273-2712
