You can learn a lot by simply observing

It pays to pay attention, to observe and understand what’s happening around the lakes and rivers, and not just when we are making time for actually fishing.

My journeys often take me near the water. They highways I drive on a regular basis cross many of the reservoirs that I visit most frequently. Sometimes, I admit, I take the long route just for the opportunity to check on an out-of-the-way lake.

Time permitting, I stop the car to stretch my legs. What I see often is educational.

An angler learns that a stalking heron and a flock of diving gulls are clues about the whereabouts of the game species’ food.

I’ve flicked my bait near a feeding heron and have been rewarded with a strike from bass, crappies, northern pike and other shore-cruising predators. I have cast under the airborne assault of squawking gulls and reeled in largemouths, smallmouths and white bass.

That’s when I’m doing my thing. I’m fishing, and my eyes and ears are tuned to whatever cues nature is providing.

But I learn about fishing even when I’m not casting.

Recent early morning crossings of the U.S. 224 causeway over Berlin revealed a cluster of boats. Grouped too closely for their mutual fishing location to be mere coincidence, those boats might as well have been a neon sign flashing “Fish here!”

In my mental notebook, I make an entry. “Fish the channel break near such-and-such place (hey, I can’t give away such a valuable secret) in October for walleyes.”

Some days, I stop my car on the causeway and peer across the lake. The dimples made by shad feeding near the top are not scattered evenly across Berlin’s surface. I don’t need sonar to show me where the baitfish are located; I can see them with my own eyes (and bifocal lenses’ assistance, of course).

The mental notebook entry goes like this: “By mid-October, the baitfish are back on the main lake flats near U.S. 224. Crappies sure to be nearby.”

Speaking of Berlin, its water has receded to winter pool — and been there for several weeks. That means the muck that formerly was under water has begun to dry and will support foot traffic.

The time is right to explore the places where you drove your boat last summer. I’ve done this. Take a map on your trek and mark stumps, foundations, old bridges and road beds, gravel shoals and other structure. You’ll be impressed at what you find — and gain understanding about why those spots yielded fish.

Mosquito Creek Reservoir’s level also is on the decline. It’s 3 feet below summer pool this weekend. But trudging Mosquito’s shoreline will reveal far less than what you’ll discover at Berlin.

Instead, those who wish to get an eyeball perspective on the structure that rests on Mosquito’s bottom are best advised to travel by boat. Idle along the east and west sides, and you’ll see stump flats, barn and house foundations, rocky humps and other fish-holding stuff.

I did this recently and was awed by the amount of rocky structure I discovered. I’ll most certainly be working those areas next spring and summer when the water has again covered them.

It does pay to pay attention. Invest a little time this fall on just looking around your favorite waters, and you’ll reap better results the next time you go fishing on them.

jack@innismaggiore.com