Trip Details:
- Where: Blue Springs Lake
- When: 5-10-2020, afternoon/evening
- Air temp: low to mid 60s
- Water temp: 62 degrees
- Water clarity: 20-25 inches
- Weather conditions: Mostly cloudy turning into sunny skies, south wind switching to north in evening
- Target species: white bass, wipers (hybrids), crappie
Baits used:
- For whites/wipers – swimbaits, crankbaits, jerkbaits, crappie jigs
- For crappie – shallow diving squarebill, Bobby Garland crappie jigs in various shad patterns
Equipment used:
- Wipers/whites: Spinning reels and casting reels with anywhere from 8-17 pound fluorocarbon line
- Crappie – 6 pound Mr. Crappie Hi-viz mono with Lew’s 6’6 combo spinning reel
Notes:
We started at the blow hole on the south end of the lake with minimal success. We had bites but nothing that would quite take it. There were many anglers on the bank casting out towards the blow hole and having good success on quality whites and even a few wipers. It was clear the fish preferred to be on the shallow side during our time in the area. We stayed back so as not to disturb the bank fishermen.
For those who don’t know where the blow hole is on Blue Springs, this should provide some perspective. The blow hole is a popular area to target white bass and hybrids, especially after a rain. Jacomo is in the upper right quadrant and Blue Springs is the left and bottom. You’ll notice a boat on the left side of the photo pointing towards the bank. You should be able to see the circle of bubbles in front of it. That’s the blow hole. As you can see in the photo, there is some nice parking and access for a short walk down to the area.
Mid-afternoon we moved to the dam and used sonar and side scan to see what kind of activity was going on. We found shad schools on the East side of the dam and lots of schools of whites. We caught just under 25, but only 2 or 3 that were over 10-inches. Most were in the 6-8 inch range. They were hanging in 7-12 feet of water in depths up to 13 feet.
Eventually we moved back to the north side of the Woods Chapel Bridge to look for crappie and found a few on a shallow diving squarebill and on jigs. I was fishing the jig without a bobber just letting it fall back to the boat. Definitely didn’t find the numbers we were hoping for.
Final thoughts:
While we caught quite a few fish, the quality was very slow. We messed around a lot with my drone and GoPros so that probably hurt us a little bit. Boat traffic was very heavy on the main lake throughout the afternoon but quieted down about 5 or 6pm.
The key for us was using the electronics to find the fish. Once we saw them on the screen, we were definitely in them. The quality just wasn’t there.
I did hear a little later in the evening that some folks had been trolling crankbaits along the dam the same day and did fairly well catching a good number of quality sized crappie. With the cool weather that has moved in, that’s probably the best way to find them as they scatter a bit back into deeper water. We should still see some shallow action in the coming week after the inclement weather passes.
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