Summer Panfish...

[Corey Bechtold]

Well, the Summer is definately here and the lakes are getting warm. A lot of people don't fish Panfish this time of year because they think they are too difficult to find. Fact is that they aren't hard to find it just might be a matter of time.

Lakes right now have very good weedgrowth and the fish will find cooler temperatures in the weeds. Getting in there can be challenging but if one was to concentrate his/her efforts on fishing prime times of the day the chances are better that the fish would become more active. Morning and evening are the best times to search out the aggressive feeding fish. Both Crappies and Sunfish will take advantage of the rising and setting sun to get a good meal. I typically like the evening bite for 2 reasons. 1) With sunset occuring late in the evening this gives me more time to sneak out after work. 2) As the sun starts to drop the temperatures are more comfortable for me and with less intense sun I don't have to slick up with sunblock.

Taking advantage of the evening bite I will take my kids out and we will rig up with a 1/32 or 1/16oz jighead tipped with a soft plastic (Power Tube, Minnow, Gulp) and we will search out the deeper weedlines in search of cruising fish. Once we fan cast an area and stumble into some active fish we will try and get more vertical by motoring over the fish and jigging them.

Now is a good chance to get out and fish for Panfish. The fish are settling into their summer patterns and can be very eager to bite.

Good fishing,

Corey Bechtold

[ole matty]

After read this post I went out to small lake mayb 200 acres? In south central lake n first fish 10 to 17 fow between weedline and scattered weeds. Caught a lot of small bluegills so I changed my lure to 1 inches tube n bang bang bang 3 nice bluegills from 8 to 9 n half inches in rowand many more crappies as there r no size to them and went to north east central lake drifting 1 in tube 12 to 18 fow caught few more crappies they tend to smack the tube when its free fallin. N some northern which I tho its those slab but naw...but sure got my blood pump on utlralite rod. N finally got my dad on few crapies as well.