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Fishing remains great into autumn
Though summer has only just officially ended, the facts point clearly to the reality that fishing season is winding down.
We anglers still have all of autumn stretching out in front of us, but time ticks quickly. Wise use of precious fishing hours will help us gain maximum value from the days we can spend on the water.
I have an informal system to guide my decisions about fall fishing. It is nothing complicated, but it really does help me get the most out of the final fishing trips before I store the Bass Cat for winter.
The period of Oct. 1 through the middle of November is a seven-weekend span. I have a couple of weekends already scheduled for other activities (hard to believe, but true), so this year, I’ll have at least five remaining opportunities to fish — unless the weather really deteriorates.
My “system” matches the waters I want to fish with the best remaining weekends on the calendar. Experience over the years provides a pretty clear picture of the three best fall fishing opportunities: the Ohio River, Lake Erie and Shenango Reservoir.
I have a very good game plan in my head for attacking those waters even today, weeks from the actual days I’ll be fishing them. And that’s the beauty of my system. I know on the drive to the ramp that morning how I’ll spend my time on the Ohio, Erie or Shenango.
So what’s my schedule?
I’ll do Erie first, weather permitting. The forecast always trumps the calendar when it comes to the big lake. A blustery forecast for changes my mind convincingly.
Erie’s oversized smallmouth bass feed aggressively in October as the lake cools and the baitfish move around the 15-foot breaks. Put me around 3- to 5-pound smallies willing to bite my tube jig and I’m a happy fellow.
The good fish tend to locate around the more pronounced breaks in the fall, but they might also be schooled on flats. It’s a good idea to watch your sonar for evidence of bait. If you spy baitfish, drop a lure and let the fun begin.
So notch me a Saturday on Lake Erie. Then it’s down to the Ohio River.
The river is another smallmouth fishery close to home. It can be fickle in the summer months because fishing success there depends to a large extent on the current. But come fall, the smallies gorge on shad and attack crankbaits, spinnerbaits and topwater lures until ice makes the ramps unusable.
Current has been light all year thanks to the low-water conditions throughout all of the Ohio River drainage. This has made the fish more likely to gang up around the vegetation that grows out into 6 feet of water on sandy stretches of river bottom.
I turn toward Pennsylvania in November and the big largemouths and smallmouth bass that roam the shallow cover in the weeks leading to Thanksgiving. A square-billed crankbait, willowleaf spinnerbait and a bulky jig are the only three lures I need to entice strikes from the last bass of the season.
My favorite tactic is to drop the electric motor on a stretch of shore that sports scattered tree limbs, trunks and stumps. Work the lures over and through the cover and hang on for some jarring strikes as the bass are tricked into believing they are gobbling shad.
My fishing is not necessarily done when the Shenango bite wanes. That’s when I put the boat away, dig out my waders and dust off my noodle rod for late-autumn steelhead fishing on Ohio’s Erie coast.
But that’s a whole other story for another weekend soon.