Atchafalaya Basin angler looks for deepwater access and structure
When Ben Suit wants to target bass in September in the Atchafalaya Basin, he looks for, among other things, canals and bayous with deepwater access and structure such as laydowns, stumps and overhanging branches.
One of the top choices often turns out to be Miller’s Chute, which is off the G.A. Cut (also known on most maps as Lake Fausse Pointe Cut) on the west side of the river between Bayou Benoit Landing and Myette Point Landing along the West Atchafalaya Basin Protection Levee.
The New Iberia native who grew up fishing the nation’s last great overflow swamp with his father, Kevin Suit (who fished it from boyhood on with his parents, the late Jerry and Margaret Suit), has learned it well. Suit, 36, who now lives in Port Arthur, Texas, where he moved five years ago to open his State Farm Insurance Agency office in nearby Orange, won back-to-back AOY titles in the highly competitive New Iberia-based Louisiana Bass Cats in 2018-19. Suit also won a local Wednesday Night Hawg Fights Bass Tournament Series team title with his brother, Zach Suit.
His success in the Atchafalaya Basin paved the way for those hard-earned honors, and one of his go-to places over the years has been Miller’s Chute.
“Miller’s just has a lot of the things I’m looking for,” he said, reaffirming the need for deepwater access and structure.
“Some of the things I would be looking for is relatively deep water near the bank,” he said. “Deep could be a 1-foot change. It doesn’t have to be 10 feet of water. I’m typically looking for some sort of cover, laydowns, stumps and overhanging treetops touching the water.”
Lures to have on hand
Suit’s first artificial lure of choice, he said, is a crankbait in “classic Atchafalaya Basin colors” … chartreuse/black, sexy shad or any shad.
“On deck, I pretty much keep a crankbait,” he said. “When the wind’s blowing on the cover is when I lean on that crankbait. The big deal with fishing cover with the crankbait is trying to make it redirect, to hit it.”
The Texan, who caught a 10.75-pounder at Toledo Bend in October 2022 (as well as a 9.75-pounder there in July 2026), has another favorite bait ready to go at a moment’s notice, and that’s a surface bait.
“Besides a crankbait, I’m a big fan of a topwater bite. It really lends itself to the same (pattern) — cover and structure. Buzz baits, Whopper Ploppers, plastic frogs, that kind of stuff. I fish that as long as I can on shady banks,” he said, noting he occasionally mixes it up with a topwater popper-style lure.
“Then, I guess the only other thing — and I don’t do it a ton, I keep it in my back pocket — on hot days when the water’s stagnant and not moving, I will flip a black/neon soft plastic creature bait into that cover,” he said.
Because he doesn’t flip a lot, he grabs anything he’s got with him, and that’s usually a Missile Baits D-Bomb or a Big Bites BFE or YoMama.
Suit said he prefers water color to be stained, perhaps 4 inches of visibility, when the spillway gets extra low in September.
“I’m trying to avoid black water at that time that’s typically stagnant,” he said.
The Miller’s Chute pattern also produces bass in similar oilfield canals on that side of the Atchafalaya Basin along the G.A. Cut, he said.
