Bass Fishing Florida

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Florida Stripers

Captive Stripers Spawn 900,000 Offspring

 
A small group of striped bass captured one year ago from Lake Talquin, has produced 900,000 fingerling striped bass and hybrid striped bass.

Dave Yeager, a fisheries biologist with the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission (FWC), said all of the fry and fingerlings are slated for release within the next two months in several Panhandle rivers.

Yeager, who works out of the FWC’s Blackwater Fisheries Research and Development Center in Holt, said they captured four female and five male striped bass one year ago in Lake Talquin. The nine fish, which they call brood fish, were held all year in large, circular tanks with the lighting and water temperature adjusted to mimic natural conditions.

“This is something we’ve learned and refined over the years,” Yeager said. “By controlling the water temperature and amount of light they receive, we can condition the fish to spawn.”

He said the benefits of maintaining captive brood fish include reducing manpower and time needed to collect wild striped bass, thereby increasing the length of the striper spawning season. In addition, by conditioning captive fish to spawn before wild fish, the duration of the production season can be increased.

 

Media Contact
Dave Yeager (850) 957-6177

Lake Toho Bass Fishing Early Feb 2010

Lake Toho Bass Fishing Report-Lake Toho Guides

 

lake toho bassThe first half of February has seen some great bass fishing action, as well as a few days of tougher bass fishing with passing cold front. The days the bite has been tougher than normal, numbers were down, but the best part was size was up.

 Live bait as well as artificial baits both were doing great right up to the last cold front, that was when the switch was made to use live wild shiners as well as the artificial baits.

 

 

lake toho bass fishingLake Toho has definitely been the place to be with both live wild shiners and artificial baits not only catching some good numbers, but some nice size as well. The northern end of lake toho has seemed to be the best producing area, with some nice 4 and 5 pound bass coming from right along Lake Shore Drive area. Flipping into the cover or pitching the wild shiners along the edges has been the best way to catch them. Water temperatures have finally started to climb back into the low 60’s and beds have been popping up everywhere, so the big spawn is just about to kick in.

 

When the cold fronts have hit us, they usually have brought higher winds, which has had us move to Conway Chain, now the bass as some would say are smaller on Conway Chain, with bigger numbers, But don’t tell Eric that, as he landed a sweet bass right around 5 pounds and she was looking very healthy. If you know where to fish this body of water, you will catch big bass and quality bass.

Lake Toho Bass Fishing Report Jan 16th

Lake Toho Bass Fishing

The first half on January as seen some good bass fishing on Lake Toho, as well as some tough fishing at times. The tough fishing came when we got slammed with a brutal cold front, brutal that is for Florida.

 

Water temperatures had dropped in the low 50’s for several days, with us hitting a few areas where water temperatures had hit as low as 48 degrees. This low water temperature in Florida lakes can make for some very tough fishing. We even had a day where we experienced ICE rain. Before this front hit us, we were experiencing some very good days on Lake Toho as the bass played well with not only live wild shiners, but the artificial bait bite was doing well also.

Most of our action has been coming once again from the southern end of Lake Toho so we have been using the South Port Ramp and Whaleys Landing ramp. Outside grass lines and scattered deep water  hydrilla have been the big keys to success out here for us. Trick worms, senko type baits and steel shad have been the main producers and have kept the action steady. We have started spotting a few scattered beds on Lake Toho, as well as Butler Chain and Johns Lake. The cold front has delayed the start of the spawn some, but we fully expect with our current warm up, the spawn will be in full swing and the trophy bass will be slamming our baits again.

Johns Lake Bass Fishing report for November 2009

Johns Lake Bass Fishing report for November 2009

Johns Lake BassNovember has been a pretty good month for bass fishing on Johns Lake. We have had several trips out on Johns Lake and  for the most part of the month there is been consistent schooling action going on. Deer Island Cut is usually the best bet for the schooling action first thing in the morning, but as we witnessed on a trip with clients, who were fishing for strictly pan fish, the schooling action can kick in just about anywhere on this great body of water.

Johns Lake BassSpinner baits and blade baits have been the best producers out here and usually in wide open waters. Mid lake seemed to be one of the best areas to keep a consistent catching action going on. Docks had been holding limited amount of action skipping wacky rigged Gitem K.O’s  and Gene Larew craws.

We did notice a big drop in the bite when we got hit with a very good cold front for Thanksgiving and word from the dock was this cold front really turned on the crappie bite. Schooling action on Johns Lake will with no doubt continue through March as usual with some five plus pounders coming out of these schools of bass.
With the major spawn just around the corner now, we fully expect another great season on Johns Lake throwing everything from 10 inch worms to swim baits again. With water levels up, and tons of flooded timber, bass will have all the cover needed so we expect to see some bass beds in some hard to work areas, this will make for yet another great action packed season.

Bass Fishing Forecast for January

The Spawn is on! This is the official start of the bass spawning season. Largemouth bass have feed up good the previous two months and have taken their place in the spawning areas to nest. Here in Florida we have a very great spawning season, starting in January and running into March and sometimes April. We have on rare occasion caught a bass from a bed as late as May!
This is our major spawn, as bass beds will be scattered all over our lakes in waters ranging from as shallow as a foot deep to sometimes twelve feet deep depending on the body of water you may be fishing on.Johns lake bass
Johns Lake Trophy Bass

Wild shiners are usually the bait of choice, as bass will attack them if they get anywhere near the beds. Although wild shiners are not always required to catch these trophy bass, they can at times make things easier. Creature baits worked on beds holding bass can and will produce vicious strikes from big females, as they protect the nest. Numbers of bass caught will remain steady, but size will increase, as it is not uncommon to consistently catch bass from five to seven pounds on a daily basis, and here in Florida, especially during the spawn, any given cast can result in that trophy bass of ten pounds or more.

Lake Toho and Johns Lake are very well known for producing some amazing catches during the spawn, with five bass limits easily approaching 30 pounds during tournaments. This is probably one of our best and without a doubt one of the busiest months for bass fishing. So if your looking to fish, you may want to consider booking soon.

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