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Bass Fishing

Tips for catching post-spawn smallmouth on Pickwick

April 1, 2012 David A. Brown

It’s often called the “Lake Erie of the South,” and the abundance of big smallmouth more than justifies that moniker for Pickwick Lake. However, while northern anglers bounce around in monster swells, anglers in the Magnolia State do their smallie work in much more hospitable conditions.

Indeed the TVA lake shared with neighboring Alabama and Tennessee holds a healthy population of smallmouth that find abundant habitat throughout its 43,100-acres. And with long southern growing season, Pickwick smallies grow fat and sassy on a diet of threadfin shad, gizzard shad and all the yellow perch they can catch. […]

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Honey Badgers

April 1, 2012 David Hawkins

Few Mississippi game fish are as predictable as crappie. In the spring they spawn about the time the dogwoods bloom. It’s sufficient to say the greatest number of crappie caught each year are hooked during the progressive spawning season. […]

Bass Fishing

Shallow-water Cranking

April 1, 2012 Michael O. Giles

After working a shallow water cove for quite a while with no results, Justin Giles turned his boat toward deeper water and peered intently at his LCR until we crossed a slight drop off. Giles dug into his bag of tricks and pulled out a nice looking crankbait with a short lip, and changed lures. […]

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Truth be Told

April 1, 2012 Chris Ginn

There’s a saying in the U.S. Army that you can tell a soldier is lying if he starts his story with, “This ain’t no #@!%.” That’s why my military intelligence started tingling like Spidey sense when Trace State Park Lake Ranger Jeff Rosamond began telling me how good the bream fishing was in this 600-acre lake located near Tupelo. […]

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Crappie hotspot: Bay Springs Lake

April 1, 2012 Phillip Gentry

Bay Springs Lake, also known as the Jamie L. Whitten Lock and Dam, is the northernmost lake on the Tennessee-Tombigbee Waterway. Located off Highway 4 near the town of Dennis in Mississippi’s Hill Region, the 6,700 acres of water and 133 miles of shoreline that make up Bay Springs provide crappie anglers with loads of slab crappie that are often overlooked by anglers on their way to bigger lakes.

Our guide this month is the owner/operator of Honey Hole Guide Service, Charlie Kent. Born and raised in Baldwyn, Kent has been fishing the crappie-infested waters of Bay Springs since the lake was created by the Corps of Engineers in 1979. […]

Bass Fishing

In Plain View

March 1, 2012 Chris Ginn

Bass anglers are visual creatures. We like blinking metal flake on our boats. We like crankbaits that push the limits of the color wheel. And we like throwing to targets that we can see.

That’s why I was so impressed when Kenny Churchill idled into Cane Creek on Ross Barnett Reservoir near Jackson. My eyes immediately told me that Cane Creek is what I would call a target-rich environment.

The co-owner of Performance Outboards wanted to show me how to fish the winter remnants of lily pad flats that carpet Ross Barnett Reservoir during the summer. […]

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First-Day Feathers

March 1, 2012 Michael O. Giles

Mark McPhail set up quickly beside a large tree under the cover of darkness in the spring woods. As the night sky slowly melted into day with an orange glow rising on the horizon to the east, he sent a few soft tree yelps in the direction of an old gobbler that he had roosted the night before. McPhail was met by a lusty gobble that indicated the old monarch was game and meant business.

A few minutes later, the gobbler pitched out of the tree and landed a mere 7 to 8 yards away. Before the gobbler had a chance to make another move, McPhail’s shotgun roared and another Eastern gobbler met its maker. […]