Predictable fishing
At the risk of sounding like a broken record, fishing on Grand Lake gets very predictable when the water is clear, low and stable with very little generation or inflow. Once you learn how to capitalize on the fish from season to season under the same water conditions and temperatures, you can count on it. And the heavy winds of February, March and April are mostly behind us.
White Bass
Folks are trolling around Governor's Island, Patricia Island and Goat Island, and running jigging spoons on the hump on the east side of Shangri-La and over in the Bernice area. The White Bass have filtered back out into the lake, usually by Memorial Day weekend. Jigging spoons and small swimbaits are great on the humps where they school. A lot of people tie a white jig above the jigging spoon and sometimes catch doubles. Expect more surface action. Those schools can be hard to catch when they're feeding on tiny fry, which are just emerging as prey for the lake's predators, so a really small lure helps.
Mother Nature mixes it up
Many of the Crappie that ran up the rivers to spawn are moving back into the lake now. A lot of Crappie spawn in the lake, and only a percentage migrate upriver, just as not every Paddlefish or Catfish goes upriver every year. That keeps the gene pool mixed and the reservoir's biomass healthy.
Catfish
Catfishing is right where it should be. When they generate below the dam, it's hard to beat that area. A few people are setting jug lines. Jugging slows in June and picks back up in July and into fall. By the Fourth of July most Blue Cats and Channel Cats are off the spawn, while many Flatheads will still be on the nest because they spawn later, in warmer water.
Crappie / Williams Guide Service
Haydn believes the Crappie are pretty well done spawning all the way down the lake, and he's really been sacking up fish. Jeff calls him a "Crappie whisperer." He fished with Jeff for years growing up and has expanded tremendously on Jeff's Crappie knowledge. There may be more Crappie in the lake than Jeff has ever seen. For Haydn to catch so many limits every day, often with novice anglers, says a lot about his skill as a teacher and about how healthy and productive Grand Lake is.
Summer at the lake
Jeff enjoyed watching a grandfather pull his grandkids around on a tube behind a pontoon, with a couple of wipeouts. That's what summer at the lake is about: fishing, family and fun.