headed to DA BEND

Hey Joey. I cant say much that will help….I havent been lately and Im on my work week until Wednesday. Still trying to decide if I want to join the circus that is the McDonalds tournament on my next weekend off. The last time I made a bass trip was May 16-17. Dad and I fished a tourney and caught fish in the Indian Mounds area. There were still some hitting shallow diving crankbaits and Senkos in 2-6 at that time. We didnt have any big fish but we had a good time. Ive heard of some good frog action and/or wacky worms early and late. Joe Joslin posts good reports on toledo-bend.com. Heres his report from June 3rd….. FISHING REPORTS/BASS: We have caught a lot of bass during the month of May and fishing remains good-to-excellent, especially for numbers of bass. We are still catching some nice bass, we had one eight pounder last week, but we are not catching as many big bass as we were several weeks ago. Bass are still in transition from spring to summer but are starting to move to normal summer patterns. One prime example is that on a guided trip Tuesday morning, we encountered a group of schooling bass chasing shad on the surface. We moved in and caught a few of them before they scattered. The school did contain some nice two pound bass which indicates summer patterns are developing. We caught the schooling bass on a new topwater bait, Top Dollar, and on a tailspinner called Knock Off, both lures made by Bill Norman. The Top Dollar is a different looking bait, especially the nose and the placement of the line tie. In addition, the lure has a rear weight transfer system which allows the angler to cast it further which makes it an even better schooling bait where long casts are a must. We are still catching bass on wacky worms and Texas rigs. The wacky bite is mostly early, late and during cloudy conditions with Berkleys Shaky Worm(5 and 7 inch) and Senkos (5 inch) our favorites. We are mostly working wacky rigs on points with grass in depths of 8 to 12 feet which is basically on the outside edge of the submerged grassline. Our Texas rigs are also productive in these medium depths during low-light conditions but we are also working deeper water (12-25 feet) during late morning/mid-day bright conditions. Deep diving crankbaits (DD22s) are still putting fish in the boat with shad patterns and blue/chartruse productive colors. Also have a report from Holly Park. They are a bit vague in their reports but it gives you a starting place anyway….. The lake is holding close to full and the water temp is warming a little above 80 degrees. The bass are biting better early and late on worms, some wacky and some carolina rigs, buzz baits, frogs and a variety of other things. They are a little deeper in the middle of day. Good luck and let me know how you do. JimJim EbarbMany, LA (Toledo Bend Lake)2004 Cougar/ 225 OptimaxHumminbird Helix 12 Chirp SI on BalzOut Mount at bowLowrance HDS 7 at bowHumminbird Helix 12 Mega SI on Ram Mount at ConsoleLowrance HDS 8 in dash at console

I was on da bend monday evening and tuesday morning. The evening bite was great on chug bugs. The morning bite was not quite as good but the size of the fish averaged a little better also caught a few fish on red eye shad. If you got a little wind dont be scared to throw a chug bug in the middle of the day also go back in the small pockets with water at 5 to 6 ft. deep still some good fish hanging in the backs of the creeks and pockets. Lots of small bream in the backs of these areas spawning. I was fishing from the alpine flats to the north side of the mouth of palo gaucho bayou. Hope this helps good luck and have a fun and safe trip.

Good Luck! The lake is really low right now with them drawing it down for dam repairs. I would pick a spot and idle right now as the boat lanes have some stumps showing, and a bunch just under water so I would not trust them.

They quickly dropped it to work on the dam and stopped generating at 165, and it has slowly gotten down to 164.43 as of this morning. Thats about 3-4 feet lower than it normally is this time of year. I made a couple of mid-lake trips last week when the temps had dropped. It was 45 last Monday morning when my sister and I headed out at daylight. I didnt do any serious searching….just hit some points, docks and a couple of small coves with creeks running into them. We caught around 20 fish anywhere from 6 inches to 4 pounds. Had luck on white/chartreuse Chatterbaits, same color spinnerbaits, and a chrome/blue back spin trap. We saw a few fish chasing bait but typical of school fish they were up on second and gone the next.Jim EbarbMany, LA (Toledo Bend Lake)2004 Cougar/ 225 OptimaxHumminbird Helix 12 Chirp SI on BalzOut Mount at bowLowrance HDS 7 at bowHumminbird Helix 12 Mega SI on Ram Mount at ConsoleLowrance HDS 8 in dash at console