Summer time lure selection

Lets talk about what lures im gonna throw during the summer time bite here in Arizona. I'm going to be targeting suspending fish that are keyed in on, off shore structure such as rocks, and brush/trees. One of the first things I do is check for the thermocline when I get to the lake. Once I find that depth. I know that I won't be fishing any deeper than that, so that will eliminate a lot of water. I then start off by finding creek channels, that come out to deeper water, normally these will have rock bottoms, or brush around the area. Next is lure choice, I will always start with moving baits, deep diving crankbaits, line through swimbaits, jerkbaits, and slow sinking swimbaits. If throwing a crankbait, you want to throw something that will get down to the cover you are throwing to, if you are in 30' of water, and the thermocline is at 27' you wanna throw something that will get you down to 20-25' if throwing to trees, you want to just scrape the tops of the trees, but you want to make contact with the cover, that is what will trigger the reaction strike. If throwing a jerkbait, throw something like the vision 110+1 or 110+2 that will get you down into the 10-12' range, and trust me jerkbaits will pull fish up from 25-30 feet. I was just at Roosevelt lake, fishing suspended bass over a tree in about 25' of water throwing a 110+1 jerkbait in my bleeding shad pattern. In about an hour I landed 11 fish off of that tree. Do not be afraid to work the jerkbait quickly, but let the fish tell you what they want. When I work a jerkbait, I use hard, fast pops, that bait dives irradically, but it doesnt move a lot from its location. If you can, get to some clear water make a cast, and watch the bait as you work it, know what your bait is doing and know what you have to do to change it, try longer pauses in between sets of jerks, switch cadences, 3 jerks, 1 jerk, 2 jerks, 3 jerks. Etc. A lot of people under estimate how fast bass are, and how fast bait fish are.

I hope this helps you decide what to throw your next trip to the lake. Tight lines.