Tournament anglers love Black Lake this time of year. It’s clear to see why.
North and Central Louisiana bass anglers can hardly wait for the bass tournament schedules to come out each year. As soon as they find out where they’ll be fishing, they can begin the planning process that they hope will lead to big stringers of bass and even bigger checks. While some anglers may dismiss a few of the tournament sites as nothing more than glorified gar holes, there is one lake that shows up schedule after schedule that gets more attention than Barack Obama’s bare chest.
Black Lake in Campti usually appears on those tournament schedules in February, March or April, and a quick look at the weights it took to win these tournaments the last few years is enough to make grown men either giddy with anticipation or somber with trepidation.
Russ McVey operates Southpaw Guide Service in Northwest Louisiana, and, while he doesn’t guide on Black Lake, he has fished enough tournaments there to realize that this is one water body that forces anglers to bring their “A” games.
“When you look back at the Reeve’s Marine Tournament Trail events there the last few years, you’re going to see winning weights that are 20-plus pounds,” McVey pointed out. “And the plus part sometimes pushes those weights up toward 27 and 28 pounds with a five-fish limit.”
Like many of the raft lakes along the Red River, Black Lake is an intriguing combination of green cypress trees, grass, water hyacinths, creek channels, sloughs and bass with eyes that bulge beyond the sides of their heads.
“There have been some big bass caught at Black Lake the last couple of years,” said Porter Trimble, host of the Southern Woods & Water television show. “I know of several 10-pounders, and one guy I know caught one that was right at 13 pounds. That’s pretty impressive by any standards.”
Black Lake, a combination of three distinctly different yet collective areas called The Prairie, Black Lake and Clear Lake, shows up on those tournament schedules in February, March and April because those are the three undisputed best months to fish the lake.
As the grass and water hyacinths begin to proliferate with the increasing water temperature, many anglers turn to neighboring lakes that are easier to fish. While some regulars fish Black Lake no matter the month, there’s no doubt that the period from late winter to early spring is the best time to be on the lake.
Beginning in February, anglers frequently find bass relating to the cypress trees that are closest to the main channel that runs through the middle of Black Lake. As bass begin their initial foray from deep to shallow water, McVey typically finds them first relating to trees in 7 to 10 feet of water.
“Unless we have some early warm weather, February is typically when you want to fish the deeper trees,” he said. “I like to look for trees that are either right on the edge of the drop-off or those that are at the end of a cypress-tree point that runs from the channel up to the shallow areas.”
As bass move from their deep wintering areas to their shallow spawning spots, there are many techniques, lures and patterns that will catch the fish. Sweet Beavers, Swim Bugs, Brush Hogs, jigs, spinnerbaits, crankbaits and jerkbaits (soft and hard) will catch fish at one time or another.
However, with all the many productive patterns that work at Black Lake during February and March, McVey and Trimble each pointed out their absolute favorite lures and patterns for fishing the lake. While each may produce one of those double-digit bass on any given day, each has proven to attract the size bass it takes to add up to a 20-pound sack.
Swim a jig
For McVey, swimming a jig at Black Lake takes into account two different situations in which he finds bass suspending either under or near cover. The first situation is one that helps McVey catch bass under the hyacinths whether they are dormant or green and growing.
“Bass will relate to the hyacinths even when they’re dormant,” he said. “They still hold lots of heat, and bass will sometimes suspend right under the hyacinths to absorb some of that warmth. You’ve kind of got to punch and swim at the same time to effectively work a jig around this stuff.”
To begin with, McVey chooses a Southpaw Custom Jig that is heavy enough to break through the mat — that’s the punching part. You’ve got to get your jig below the hyacinths before you can swim it underneath them.
Once his jig breaks through the mat, McVey begins to yo-yo it in a swimming motion in such a way that it never goes all the way to the bottom. This action results in a jig that bounces around and actually bangs the bottom of the hyacinths, and no self-respecting bass within earshot will allow this to go on very long without attacking that jig.
“The other way to swim a jig is the more typical way, and it involves fishing it around the cypress trees,” McVey said. “Bass often suspend somewhere up and down the tree trunk, and the key to catching lots of big fish is to figure out if they want a vertical drop or a horizontal swimming motion.”
When bass attack McVey’s jig as it falls to the bottom, he knows that means it’s time to pitch and flip. However, if he knows bass are on the trees, but they aren’t eating his jig on the drop, then he switches to swimming a jig.
“This usually works best after the water has warmed up a little,” said McVey. “If it’s really cold, they’ll be right on the bottom. But if they’re suspended, you can pitch your jig about 4 feet past the tree then just swim it by the tree trunk while moving it up and down a couple inches with your rod tip.”
McVey cautioned that there are many different ways to swim a jig, and he pointed out that it pays to experiment with it as you fish it. For instance, if you know bass are suspended at 4 feet, try swimming the jig up to the tree just under the surface then letting it drop down about 3 or 4 feet before resuming the swimming motion again.
“You might also want to pitch it right up on the tree and let it fall 3 or 4 feet then start swimming it,” he said. “Then again, you could try pitching 4 feet past the tree and letting it sink a few feet then swimming it by the tree in that 4-foot zone. It definitely pays to try different swimming actions.”
Wobble a Rogue
With the exponential expansion of grass in many of Louisiana’s lakes, Trimble believes there are few places where anglers can still effectively throw the old, indispensable gold Rattlin’ Rogue with the black back and orange belly.
“Black Lake is one of the few lakes that I fish where I can still hammer them on a Rogue,” he said. “Before all the grass gets up around the cypress trees, you can work on them with a Rogue. But to really get the most out of it,
I don’t jerk it underwater in the typical fashion. Rather, I keep it on the surface to pull up suspended bass.”
Trimble tries to cast his Rogue on a line that allows him to cover three or four trees on one cast, and he casts about 4 feet past the farthest tree. He then positions his boat so that he can work his Rogue as closely to each tree as possible without getting it so close that his lure continually hangs in any secondary cover beside the tree trunk.
After making his cast, Trimble simply twitches his rod enough to make his Rogue submerge just barely under the surface. Then he allows the bait to wobble completely back to the surface before repeating the same action again and again all the way back to his boat.
“With all the cypress limbs that hang so low to the water, I prefer to do this with a 5 1/2-foot medium action All Star Platinum rod,” Trimble said. “A short rod like this with a pistol grip makes you a lot more accurate caster as you can make little simple roll casts with the top down low and stay out of the tree limbs.”
Even with all the big fish in Black Lake, Trimble sticks with a maximum of 15-pound-test line on his Rogue rod. Any heavier line would mess up the action of the Rogue, and it wouldn’t get nearly as many bites as it would otherwise.
“If you let the rod do its job, you shouldn’t have any trouble landing big bass on this setup,” Trimble said. “The medium action works great with those little treble hooks that are on a Rogue, and as long as you don’t horse them too much, you should be able to get them in.”
There are surely many more ways to catch big Black Lake bass during February and March, but giving McVey’s swimming jig techniques and Trimble’s wobbling Rogue pattern a try means you’ll at least be in the ball game during your next tournament. Both patterns can turn you into a player.
