Fall Feeding Frenzy
Octubre 07, 2019 Austin 1 foto
Bass (Largemouth)
Bass (Largemouth)

Trip Summary

It’s starting to feel like fall! Sort of…. We finally had a few small cooling fronts move through the Central Texas region in early October. This allowed the water temperatures to drop into the low 80, which triggered the shad migration in parts of Lake Travis. Over the past several weeks, we’ve continued to catch a good number of bass at the entrance to major creeks and some offshore structures. However, in recent days we had some very nice cooler weather move in briefly where the daily high was in the 70s and 80s! Combined with a low-pressure system and some good wind, the bait along with the bass moved about half way up the major creek arms of Cypress Creek and Sandy Creek on Lake Travis. The key to a successful trip was targeting shallow points where you could see brush sticking out of the water or shad being chased by bass. I used a variety of baits depending on the wind and depth I was fishing. On these days, 5 or 6 feet was going to be deep fishing. Most of the bass fell for a ¼ oz sexy shad spinnerbait, a ¼ oz Texas-rigged tube in bluegill, or a 1/8 oz belly-weighted white fluke. All three baits could be worked from a few inches to a few feet of depth without getting hung up on the brush or rocks. You can’t be too shallow this time of year. At times, I had the boat sitting in 3 feet of water and was casting a spinnerbait or fluke right at the bank into inches or water. When I came to a ditch, I would switch to a ¼ oz shaky head with a speed craw to go after the bass hanging out a little deeper. This made for some great, fast-action fishing for about two days until the region was once again consumed by another high-pressure system and rising temperatures. Don’t overlook main lake pockets this time of year. Not all bass are going to migrate to the major creeks. A large portion of bass on Central Texas lakes are resident bass. They will live out their lives in a very small area of the lake. The biggest bass of the week was a 3.85# caught on a very shallow, wind blown rock pile next to a catwalk after dark! I threw the ned rig a little too far and it got hung on the rocks. When I popped the lure free from the rocks the rod immediately loaded up with a bass. After several spectacular jumps I was able to get it into the net. I’ve caught some big bass on net rigs up to 6 pounds. Be sure to use the heavy wire rigs if you’re going after bigger bass. A three pounder can straighten the hook on the light wire ned rig hooks. We are expecting another cool front this weekend. Keep an eye on your electronics and look for the bait balls. They will continue to move further and further up the major creeks. As the waters continue to cool, keep that bait moving! You’ll find your trips will be successful! Tight Lines.
Randal Frisbie
Austin, Texas, United States
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Other reports from this captain

Summer Bass Fishing – Lake Travis
Summer Bass Fishing – Lake Travis
Julio 23, 2022
To say it’s been a hot summer here is Central Texas would be a huge understatement of the relentless heat we are experiencing. The first 100-degree days starting in May this year and continued through June and July. I been running mostly early morning trips for the past month so we can get to the first marina by 6:15 am when the sun is just starting to come up and the bass are starting their morning feeding frenzy. We are usually off the water by 10 or 10:30 when the temperature is just getting into the mid-90s. Even with the water temperature pushing 90 degrees on Lake Travis and in the mid-90s on Lake LBJ, I’ve been able to have a very consistent bite for my clients and catching 15 bass on average in a four-hour trip. With the low lake levels (33 feet low at the time of this report) the shoreline has exposed new layers of limestone to the wave action. This is given the lake a very nice lime green stain and reduced the visibility from 15 feet down to about 3 feet from the dam to Lago Vista. (25 miles). This is helped the bite tremendously in the past few weeks. A dropshot worm and a shaky head craw continue to put up to five Guadalupe bass in the boat each trip. There are about three 100 yard stretches around the lake where I’m able to rotate through throughout the week and catch several Guadalupe bass and an occasional largemouth bass. These areas are all deep bluff walls on the main lake where the boat is sitting in 50 to 70 feet of water, and we are throwing the bait right at the bank. The strike usually happens in just a few sweeps of the rod as the bait falls down the various ledges on the bluff wall. This bite is supper soft, and even experiences anglers can miss the bite. When I doubt, set the hook!! Fishing the bluff walls is not something I focus on during the trips. It’s more of a spot along the way from marina to marina. The first spot and last spot of each trip have been one of three marinas that hold several hundred bass. Yes. Hundreds. During a few brief periods throughout the day, you can see 40 to 50 bass breaking the surface in a feeding frenzy. This is the time you want to have your bait in the water and not looking at the bass in amazement! This happened a few weeks ago when I was reeling a solid bass on a whopper plopper. My clients were from up north and have never seen such a site. The stood there holding their rods which has the little swimbait dangling just inches away from the tip of the rod. “This would be a great time to make a cast!”, I said. I ended up boat flipping my bass just in time to grab the net to haul in their catches. It’s always nice to triple up!! The whopper plopper is such a simple bait for beginners. I’ve had youths as young as 9 years old catch some pretty good bass the past month on it. That bait tends to call the fish up from the depth where they are suspended around the marinas when they are not feeding. At time, it can even get a lethargic school fired up into a brief feeding frenzy. This is the time of year you always want to have your favorite topwater bait on deck and ready to cast. The marina bite should continue through summer and into early fall. Once we start getting some really cold night and there is fog on the lake in the morning, I’ll start looking for bait transitioning to the major creeks. When this happens, the bass aren’t far behind. There are many factors that can make fishing during the dog days of summer a success. Knowledge of fishing patterns, as well as what’s under the water, are key to catching bass when the water temp is pushing 90 degrees. Let Captain Randal with Central Texas Fishing Guide help guide you to success in fishing!
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Warm Winter Bassin’ in Central Texas
Warm Winter Bassin’ in Central Texas
Diciembre 5, 2021
Winter is typically a very predictable time of year for fishing a specific pattern to catch deep, lethargic bass in Central Texas. You can usually find some deep offshore structures and throw a drop shot, structure jig, or Carolina rig to entice the lethargic bass to strike. However, this late fall / early winter has been a little different with the record-breaking heat wave covering the Central Texas region. Instead of the water temperatures dipping into the 50s, they have been steady at 65 degrees from the surface down to 50 feet. For the past month we’ve focused our attention much shallowed in the 5 to 12 foot range and catching good numbers of bass by fishing the grassy coves around the Pace Bend area of Lake Travis. Since the last big flood in October 2018, the grass has slowly been growing in the sand that was washed down from the lakes above Lake Travis. This factor, along with a consistent lake level, has allowed the aquatic grass to take hold and flourish. Grass is an absolute bass magnet when it’s not the main cover on the lake. The grass seems to pull the bait fish away from the closer docks where they would normally hang out. Where the bait fish goes, the bass tend to follow. We’ve been seeing huge pods of bait fish shallow in the top two feet of the water column near the grass. This isn’t typical in the winter when the water has been historically much colder. The two baits that have been catching 20 bass in a half day around the grass are the soft jerkbait and a whacky stick bait. If there are clouds and a little wind, ripping a soft jerkbait over the grass has been eliciting very good strikes from the active bass that are chasing down the bait fish. Following up in the same area with a finesse bait such as a whacky rigged stick bait tends to catch some of the bigger bass. The weather has produced many high-pressure systems sitting over the regions since September, making it the hottest September on record. These systems have continued through December, which also makes it the hottest December on record. Most of the days on the lake have been high-pressure days with very little wind and absolutely no clouds. If you can’t fish the grass in the first few hours of the morning or the last hours of daylight, it’s been extremely difficult to pull any bass out of the grass during the day. Once the sun gets high enough in the sky to cast good shadows around the docks and bluffs, we’ve switched over to the drop shot and shaky heads to load the boat with bass. Lake Travis has really become a finesse fishing lake for numbers with such clear water. A drop shot rig is probably the most frequently thrown rig on the lake because it reliably catches lots of fish. Many of my clients have caught lots of five, six, and seven pounders on the drop shot rig in 2021. Lately, I’ve been working some of my old favorites back into the line-up, like a weighted whacky rigged stickbait and a Texas rigged baby brush hog. Getting these baits down to the depths of 25 feet has been successfully catching the bigger bass. So even with the warmer weather the days are getting shorter, which may be driving the bigger bass into deeper waters out of habit. So if you’re hitting the lake this winter and the bite is getting tough, a simple change in depth can make a huge difference. Start on the main lake points or the bluff walls with a jig or drop shot and move further into deeper water until you find them. With good electronics you can quickly find where the bass are orientated in the water column. No need to fish the entire point if you’ve located bass suspended off a ledge in 30 feet of water. I hope you find this information helpful as we enter the winter months! Just remember, the bass will move deeper in the winter but may come up to feed if the bait moves shallow. Follow @fishingwiththefriz on Instagram and let us know if these tips help you have a successful trip on the water!
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Overlooked Fall Bass Patterns
Overlooked Fall Bass Patterns
Octubre 3, 2020
Bass fishing in Central Texas during the fall can be challenging when the bass aren’t exactly where you expect them to be this time of year. Ask any angler; fall fishing is working fast baits in the backs of coves where the bass are chasing shad and you’ll load the boat! Well, that may have been true in past years when September cold fronts signaled the beginning of fall, and the water temp drops to the lower 70s and stays there. However, 2020 has been the hottest year on record, and the water temperatures on Lake Travis are still pushing 80 degrees in mid-October! During my morning trips, we have been throwing a wide range of moving baits such as spinnerbaits, poppers and spooks with limited success. We’ve been focusing on the smaller coves that are located very close to deep water, right off the main lake. After catching a few smaller bass where the bass should be feeding, we can quickly troll to the point or main lake walls to catch the bigger bass that are still hanging out close to deeper water by throwing one of my top three baits: drop shot, ned rig, shaky head. This is been a consistent pattern since late summer. The key has been to fish very slowly and to not overwork the bait. You really want to feel the bait pulling through the brush and bouncing off the rocks. For my afternoon trips, we are pretty much fishing deep water main-lake docks. The boat traffic has died down significantly since Labor Day, and we can easily get behind these docks to fish without having to battle the wake of dozens of other boats. If the sun is up, the bass are under the docks and walkways behind the docks. We’re able to pull two or three bass off each dock and move to the next one, doing this without ever making contact with privately-owned docks. For our best run a few weeks ago, we pulled twelve bass off a series of six docks with several bass pushing four pounds! So why are the bass still hanging out close to their summertime locations, and not feeding in the backs of the coves? Bait and water temperatures are the two key factors that drive bass behavior. The bait is still suspended off the bluff walls and marinas in 40 to 60 feet of water. I’ve seen very little bait in the backs of coves on days that I scout around for new water to fish. However, you can pull up to any deep bluff wall on Lake Travis and see thousands of glass minnows and bluegill hiding in the shadows. Until the water temp drops below 75 again, the bait isn’t going to commit to move back into the coves. Once they do, the bass will surely follow. This time of year, it’s good that have a good lineup on deck. I’ll have several reaction baits ready to go: a spook, a medium diving crankbait 5 to 8 foot, and a spinnerbait. These are the baits I’m starting with around the bluff walls, points, and the brush that leads into the coves. I’ll work one side with reaction baits then switch over to finesse baits on the way out. My top three go-to finesse baits are: the drop shot, ned rig, and shaky head. We may catch one or two bass on the way in, but we’re catching 5 to 10 bass on the points and bluff wall just outside the cove. At some point, the patterns will switch, and you’ll be able to figure out pretty quickly what the bass want to eat with the approach. Follow @fishingwiththefriz on Instagram and let us know if these tips help you have a successful trip on the water!
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