Pro Fishing Tip Fall Factors For Great Lakes Smallmouths

BassFan

The BassFan staff recently had the opportunity to spend a day on Lake Erie out of Dunkirk, N.Y. with Great Lakes smallmouth guru Joe Balog.

November on Lake Erie? Yep. And the surprise was an unseasonably warm day – dead calm, a high of 70 degrees and bright, high skies.

What that meant was, instead of a nice chop and an active bite, the fish were neutral to negative. But it was good news in a way, because if you're going to spend the day with Balog, it's a far better lesson to watch him work for fish than see him windmill 20- to 25-pound limits.

After a slow start and long search, Balog finally honed in, refined his presentation and the team caught 35 bass, with several over 5 pounds. The biggest was 6-04 (shown in photo).

Here's a look at how Balog attacked the day.

Freak Warm Trend

A lot of BassFans in the North or Northeast probably remember the strange weather pattern that settled in during the first week of November this year. Again, highs pushed 70-plus degrees with lots of sun and little wind.

The day Balog arrived in Dunkirk was the fifth consecutive day of the warm front, but it would be the last. A cold front would come that night and the barometer was already falling.

The water temperature averaged 50 degrees, and because of the calm weather, water visibility was about 20 feet.

"Sometimes you have to take a step back and realize that people see Bassmaster TV and tournament results and think you can catch 5-pounders all day long on Lake Erie," Balog noted while searching. "But it's not always that easy. There are a lot of fish, and they're usually aggressive and easy to catch, but by no means can you go out and crack 25 pounds every time you go fishing.

"What we're encountering today is the right time of year and great weather, but the fish aren't necessarily keyed on feeding," he added. "We've had a very long period of stable, late-summer-like conditions and the fish aren't biting that well."

He made that determination after an hour of fishing "classic structure" with solid marks on his Humminbird 1197c Side Imaging unit. Onscreen, we were able to discern subtle rises and ridges in the main basin, and even graph large rocks – all with fish. But the fish just weren't going.

So Balog decided to expand his search. Here's an overview of what he looks for in November on Lake Erie.

Where He Looked

"Even though it's warm, the day length, the moon and the season in general – all these things trigger fish to migrate deep and feed for the fall," Balog said while watching his graph. "When I'm putting the boat in during November, I'm licking my chops because I know the fish will be grouped up and ganged up on deep structure.

"From my experience on the Great Lakes, we don't have any strong migration of fish shallow in the fall, which is so typical in other bass fisheries. The smallmouths just move toward wintering areas where they can feed efficiently on gobies and shiners. For the most part they'll start to set up on classic winter structure, which is fairly large structure, but they'll be on key areas like the corners, points and drops that have deep water nearby – almost basin-like water around them."

He added that in the western basin of Lake Erie, they might be in 25 feet next to 35 feet of water. In the eastern basin, they're more likely in 40 to 45 feet next to 60 feet.

He also clarified the term "classic fall structure." more