Toledo Bend is such an expansive body of water that somebody somewhere will be able to figure out a shallow-water bite.
However, Bassmaster Elite Series pro Denis Tietje said bank-beaters sometimes struggle because of the grass along the shoreline.
“Grass dictates whether more fish are up shallow or out deep,” Tietje said. “Any time you have deep hydrilla, naturally it holds some fish back, especially the bigger fish. If they don’t have that grass out deep, they’re going to move up to the closest thing they can get to that has some structure.”
Where anglers can find shallow grass, the bank beaters can catch a lot of fish. But when there is an abundance of deep grass, the bank beaters tend to struggle.
At Toledo Bend, this becomes a matter of fishing north versus south.
“There is so much hydrilla on the south end, those bigger fish hold out deeper,” Tietje explained. “And since the water is clear, they move in and out so quickly to spawn that you might not ever know they were there.
“That’s where that deeper inside grass line where the grass stops and the sandy bottom begins in 10 feet of water becomes so important, because that’s where they’re going to stage on their way in and pull back to when they’re done spawning.”
On the north end, Tietje explained that plenty of bass spawn in 5 to 6 feet of water, which will be the key depth up there unless they start pulling water.
“If I’m on them shallow on the north end and they start pulling water, I pull back out to the tops of some of the sandy humps,” Tietje said. “Out there, I’ll throw a lot of (Rat-L-)Traps to locate the males, and then slow down with a swim jig or lizard to aggravate them more around their beds.”