The lake is in great shape right now as summer approaches. I feel like we had another good spawn this year. This makes the third year in a row where we've had noticeable success with our spawn, and we should see better numbers of fish in the upcoming years.

Having good cover in the form of flooded vegetation or aquatic vegetation is critical for the survival of freshly hatched baby bass. Thankfully, we've had an abundant amount of it over the past three spring seasons.

The water level is right at full pool. That's a great thing as we head into summer. Water temperatures are around 80 degrees at this time.

May was a pretty good month for fishing. Numbers were great on the good days, and we had a lot of big fish as well. I'm betting June will be another good month.

Right now we are transitioning from the more shallow patterns of spring, to traditional summertime fishing. While fish can still be caught shallow all summer, the majority of the quality bass will be deeper.

We are already finding bass on deep offshore structure, and many more will show up out there soon. The depth they are holding really just depends on the area of the lake, but at the time of this report most of the deeper fish seem to prefer a depth somewhere in the mid 20's. I find them a little more shallow on the upper ends of the lake.

I have two favorite techniques for early summer here: deep crank baits and football jigs. These just seem to work best for me for bigger fish. Sure, I can catch some on big worms or Carolina rigs if I have to, but I prefer the other methods for now.

For the jig, I use a Santone football head in 3/4 oz. and 1 oz. I use several different colors. My favorites are "beans and carrots", "pb&j", and "Mexican heather". If the water is clear, " bullfrog" is my top choice.

I use several different crank bait brands, but the one I throw the most is the DUO Realis G87. It's a Japanese bait that casts extremely far and dives deeper than 20' with ease. Lake Fork Marina and Oak Ridge carry this brand and the colors I use. I primarily use the deeper diving 20A model.

The problem with offshore fishing on our lake nowadays is seemingly everybody knows how to do it. Even the less obvious areas are getting hit pretty hard. The key may be finding some "off the wall" area that everyone else will overlook. I used to fish deeper offshore structure exclusively throughout the summer, but now I supplement some shallow to mid-depth patterns because of the increasing pressure from anglers out deeper.

Hopefully this report points you in the right direction. As always, I'm happy to help any way I can so feel free to contact me before your trip.

Here are some of the big bass we've boated over the past few weeks.