Lake Amistad Fishing Report:

April report 2010

The spawn has started about ten days late this year due to a cold winter. The weather has warmed up over the past week and the fish really moved up.
Most of the protected coves and creeks are in the low 60's with the main lake in the upper 50's in the mornings. The lake is about four feet low and dropping a bit which has made the water clarity a little stained or chalky in some areas. Most of the hydrilla and other grass is decent from the bank out to 15 ft and in some areas it touches 20ft or so.
 
If you like to sight fish well Amistad is probably the best in the country for that.  Bass in Amistad will spawn as deep as 27ft and as shallow a 6 inches so they can really spread out.  Just a small percent of the bass spawn shallow enough to see,the rest are just out of sight.  I would rather fish for deep spawners and staging fish this time of year. Don't get me wrong I will sight fish but will do it on perfect days or might just look in key areas every other day.
The deeper spawners and staging fish are almost in the same areas and depth the only difference will be that the spawning fish will be scattered in an area next to isolated structure.  where the staging fish will be in a school around one piece of structure, usually a high or low spot in the grass or around bush draped with grass in or near a drain.
The baits I will fish in water 12 to 20 ft for these fish are weighted weedless swimbaits like a blackdog soft swimmer, mission fish...crankbaits dd22, strike king xd6...  suspending jerkbaits luckycraft dd 100, stacee minnow... any of these in natural patterns work well.
The shallower I get, baits like a 1/8 oz weighted hook fluke, senko, light Tx rig.  Try swim baits like a king shad, tru tungsten jointed swimmers, ospery talon as well as jerk baits and even lipless crankers.
 
My recent trips have been successful with numbers averaging 35 bass per day with the best five weighing 23 up to 28 lbs. The average weight of the bass is great most are over three pounds and very healthy!
 
Thanks,
Ray Hanselman

www.amistadfishingguide.com