Orlando Bass Fishing Report
Things have been very crazy to say the least. We have had several trips to Johns Lake, Butler Chain, Conway Chain and a private lake.
Johns Lake has seen some good action, with early morning action coming from the Deer Island cut area working SteelShads and trick worms. Once the action slows in this area, we have been going into the marsh area working trick worms and brush hogs, all junebug colors, which have been producing some quality bass. Most of the action has been coming in open waters, with the baits being crawled slowly across bottom around grass beds and hydrilla. Main lake areas that have been producing for us have been the scattered isolated grass beds, once again, a single blade of grass produces a good catch. Jigs and whacky rigged senko type baits also have been producing around docks and submerged structure.
Butler Chain has also been pretty steady for us. Drop offs have been a major focus for us, tossing trick worms, craws and brush hogs into 16 plus foot of water, and slowly crawling the baits up into the shallower waters has been the ticket, most bass we have seen and caught have been suspended in 12 foot of water on the drop offs. Lake Butler and Little Lake Down have been the best producers for us, with Lake Tibet and Lake Louise also producing some good numbers.
Conway Chain faired pretty well, with once again deep waters being the big key to catching bass. Offshore weed beds were holding bass with rattle traps, steel shads and 7 inch worms catching the bulk of the bass. Several docks held some quality bass, with a whacky rig doing all the catching, as the bass would hit on the fall. Bite was light, so watching the line was big key to getting them out from under the docks.
The private lake we have been fishing on occasion has been producing very well. This body of water has seen some limited shallow water action, sitting in the middle of the lakes has been really producing some good numbers of not only bass but some 2 pound crappie. Steel shads have been the main bait for catching bass out there, and if worked like slow rolling a spinner bait, the crappie will slam this bait. Best crappie fishing action has been from 6:30am up to about 8am, then they just seem to shut down only getting a few here and there, very scattered, but you can usually get the limit by 8am. Best fishing waters have been in 12 to 18 foot of water, with bass mostly suspended in 8 to 10 foot of water, go deeper and you can catch some very big catch fish here also.
When we have gotten a good shallow water bite going, it has been mostly on brush hogs and trick worms crawled very slowly on the bottom. Water temperatures have been holding pretty steady in the low to mid 60’s with schooling action going on most of the day as the bass are really starting to feed up good for the spawn. We have been seeing some scattered beds on Johns Lake, Butler Chain and the private waters so get ready for yet another great spawning season.
The first half of October has already seen some very good bass fishing action with some good catches. Most of our time has been spent on Butler Chain this month along with some scouting of other local lakes. For the most part bass have been tighter to cover on Butler Chain. We have caught a lot of bass working grass beds and docks with some bass coming from submerged structure in deeper waters.
There has been scattered schooling action out on several lakes on Butler Chain, with Lake Tibet and Lake Sheen being the top producers for us, with Steel Shads and 1 ounce spinner baits catching quality and numbers from these schools.
The month of September has seen some good bass fishing action, as well as some tough action. For the most part, the action has been pretty steady. Shiner bite has actually been very slow, but the artificial bite has been good. Johns Lake has been a good early morning bite using spinner baits and trick worms. Deer Island cut has produced some descent numbers, but the size has not been to my liking.
We did make a venture out to Lake Rosalie, one to check water levels after the tropical storm, and to alo see how the bite was doing out there. We started the day out with Rich tossing some shiners around, and not surprised, there was no action on the in the first hour, so we switched Rich to some trick worms. 
June and July have seen some good bass fishing action. Most of our time had been spent on Johns Lake, with a few scattered trips out on Butler Chain. This time of year is typically hot and usually with very little breeze to help keep things comfortable, so we have been doing a lot of 4 and 6 hour trips to beat the heat.
Once the schooling action stops, we have been hitting isolated grass beds as well as offshore hydrilla beds just below the surface. Seven inch junebug worms with a small bullet weight worked slowly has been the main producer once the air temperatures start cooking. We did have some limited success with drop shot in 12 to 16 foot water.
Several areas in mid lake with hydrilla have been producing some quality bass using 1 ounce Sugoi spinner baits, Steel Shads and 10 inch worms. Several days of higher winds than normal had us working docks that were wind blown, which had been holding bass, some docks producing as many as 3 bass, which makes for a very good day. 
My tournament partner and I did venture out to Harris Chain mid month to fish a Fishers Of Men Tournament, with no free time to practice out there, we went according to old notes from years past and they paid off pretty good. With some tough fishing, we did get into some schooling bass, but we could only get them to hit very small floating Ugly Duckling crank baits, once we had our limit, we switched up to one ounce spinner baits and covered a lot of water to cull some smaller bass, with a nice 5 and change bass slamming a spinner bait, landing us in 11th place, just 2 spots from the money, which equaled out to a pound, also missing second big bass by a matter of ounces.
The month of April has seen some great bass fishing action, as well as some tough action as the cold front came thru. This front grabbed a hold of us for a good two days, and after some very good bass fishing action, it really put a clamp on the action. Bass were still caught, but we did have to work harder for our catch. We had a few days of combo trips, working live and artificial baits, for the most part, the artificial baits we used were Gitem Warlocks and 7 inch ribbon tail worms, both worked with a 1/16th ounce bullet weight in and around grass beds.
Doug and Todd had two days with us on Johns Lake, the first day was once again very light hits on the baits, with winds still up and weather very cool to start the day, bass were scattered as we hit several areas to get our catch. Day two we had much better action with calmer winds and warmer weather. Big bass for them coming in at 5.13 pounds. 
The last half of April saw some good bass fishing on Johns Lake and Butler Chain. Schooling action on Johns had been very limited for us in the mornings, but always got the day off to a good start. For the most part on Johns Lake, our bass have been coming off some of our typical deeper water areas. Steel Shads and spinner baits being the best at catching the bass, a few have been caught on smaller series Ugly Duckling crank baits.
