Hottest Day of the Year equals Hot Bass Fishing Round Lake 9-25-2017

[djkimmel]

Felt like I needed some more slow, small lake therapy so I headed back out the Round Lake on Monday, September 25th, which caused some people to question my intelligence since it turned out to be just about the hottest day of the whole summer! It was a real SCORCHER helped along by having almost no wind most of the day so the heat just steadily pounded its way into my body.

I did try to beat the heat somewhat by starting really early, more than a couple hours before dawn. Makes me tired by the end of the day but it almost always leads to some really, really good early topwater fishing!


As has happened a number of times this year, I started off catching my biggest or one of my biggest bass of the day! Only moments after pushing my rowboat off shore my 5/8 oz. black Jitterbug got smashed by really big ole largemouth bass! SLAM!! The fight is on!!! It was only about 5:17am - lots of time to go and hopefully lots of exciting bites to come!!

Missed another bass minutes later. Hooked it though on a follow up cast with a King Shad though after it wouldn't hit the Jitterbug again. Just tossed the King Shad past where I was bit and slowly reeled it along through the shallow water I was fishing. But then I lost the bass next to the boat! I think I needed to sharpen the big hooks on that King Shad!

Actually ended up catching another bass and a pike on the King Shad fishing it slow and shallow. I actually wanted to use my black rattling Colorado blade thumper spinnerbait as a follow up lure in the dark but I forgot to put it in my voluminous tackle!!


I nailed this nice bass on the Jitterbug a short time later shallow along the outside pad/weed edge! So that helped! Solid keeper!


I lost another nice one on the Jitterbug in the dark. Hooked it and lost it again on a follow up with the King Shad again - need to sharpen those hooks I'm pretty sure... Didn't miss this little buck on the Jitterbug though! Small bass. Big heart! Just smashed it!!

Still pitch black out and real early but the sun is coming...


Jitterbug bite died at sunrise again like a switch had been thrown somewhere... Switched to a combo of a buzzbait and the 110 Whopper Plopper. The #$!%!! pike kicked in at dawn too like this one that jumped all over the Plopper!! By early afternoon I had 2 more biteoffs (1 expensive Tungsten sinker - they just LOVE those!!) and a messed up medium-sized Optimum swimbait. Had a BIG gator over 3 feet long follow the swimbait to the boat later in the day up shallow in sparse weeds despite the day being really bite and incredibly HOT!!

The 'offshore' bass bite died hard and fast this morning! Earliest and hardest shutoff I've seen this year... I was stubborn for a while about it. Maybe it was the very bright sun and super hot day with almost no wind at all??


Then I did what anyone would do on a blistering hot day with a bright sun and ZERO breeze. I went super shallow, and it worked... First spot I checked the bass were snapping at the Sammy. 1 to 2 1/2 feet deep is all!! It wasn't a totally blind choice. I had seen bass whacking things up shallow along this stretch of thin weeds and pads while fishing closer to the break looking for schools of bass.


Very next cast another small nice keeper jumped all over the Sammy as I dog-walked it through the shallow, sparsely covered hot water. I was basically sight-fishing bass I saw actively feeding up shallow on the trillion minnows that are all over the lake this year!! Some of them were very tiny as you'd expect from such skinny water fish but there are some adults roaming around up there with them. I've been seeing them more and more lately, probably as the fall feed bag is being put on, and thanks to all those minnows I've been mentioning that are around the lake this year.

After milking the area for what it would give me I moved along towards more open shallow water that is near what can be an excellent deeper inside turn closer to shore. They've killed almost every speck of weed off through this stretch but there are more shallow weeds nearby, and that quick access to deeper water. In past seasons, this was one of my secondary hot spots, and was pretty good earlier in the year when it had actual weeds. I still cruise through it because bigger fish sometimes visit...


Not all the super shallow bass were small! This mini-toad slurped down the 90 Whopper Plopper like a dink. But when it jumped I was like... 'it's on like Donkey Kong!!' There were a few skinny strands of this muddy algae grass and I saw some real small minnows come flicking out of the water running between them so I cast the little stealthy ghost minnow Whopper Plopper 90 past it and this super nice bass was the result!!! Put up quite a fight with several crashing jumps because its main choices were - take to the air or pound my lure into the mucky, sparsely-weeded bottom! It did both quite well but thanks to my fairly heavy line (20 pounds test) I won!! Yes! My second biggest bass of the day. Helped my afternoon heat wave not seem quite as vicious as it was.

Caught a decent number of bass on the little Plopper up shallow. Lot's of small ones but some nice ones too. It seems to be a good choice for skinny, clear, sparsely-covered water so far in my experience. Don't do very well with this tiny Plopper in more open and deeper water. Maybe it's just too quiet for those situations? It doesn't even have rattles. Which might be nice at times though...


I actually caught bass on a number of lures but topwater reigned supreme all day on this blistering hot, mostly glass calm September day!! I was fishing along the outside edge of shallow milfoil and pads when this little walking popper started kicking butt!! Lot's of small bass but some fun keepers too!! Had another little hot stretch on it while other people nearby seemed to be struggling for bites.


I could actually again see many of the bass I targeted either swimming shallow or when they went on the attack against the many schools of bait roaming the shallows. I saw a wolf pack of bass chasing minnows in a super shallow pocket between some pads and caught one. I quickly let it go and threw a cast out to the right of that spot because I saw a boil that looked nice. Even though this little popper (forget the brand and model) has a sharp little rattle and walks real nice I just let it sit dead still. The water was very shallow shallow and mostly clear and open. Worked great because this solid keeper smashed the little popper shortly after it rested still!!

Was my last decent keeper of the blistering hot day though I kept catching small ones here and there. By the time I stopped fishing and went to shore to call it a day I think my thermostat was popped open. I probably stayed too long for such a super hot, calm day but who could leave easily when the bass are jumping on the topwater lures?!?