Rayburn's water level has been holding pretty steady and stands at 161.30' msl with one unit running at the dam five hours per day with a release of 4990 cfs (cubic ft per second) while in operation. Up until a couple of days ago, we were enjoying slightly cooler temps and a lot of clouds and thunder showers which helped to lower surface water temperatures several degrees. The water temps were down from near 90 to the lower 80s over the weekend but have rebounded somewhat Monday/Tuesday to 85-86 degrees.
Cooler temperatures did improve the fishing activity as the fish seem to be more active, especially along the edge of the main grassline in 4 to 12 feet.
Stanley Ribbit frog action improved slightly, especially with the 2-3 pound bass. We have been doing well on pumpkin red pearl with feet dyed chartreuse but also caught fish on solid white. I am fishing the Ribbit on 50 lb Spider Easy Cast. We also continue to catch bass on Stanley's Wedge Plus double willow spinnerbaits and also on their Stanley Titanium buzz baits in white, black and chartreuse skirts.
Most of the time I am also running Spider Braid on my spinnerbaits as most quality bass get the spinnerbait and try to bury in the grass. I do use a soft tip on spinnerbait rod with braid just to slow down the hook-set a fraction of a second which seems to help me get more solid hook-ups. This is especially true with buzz baits.
We are also catching bass on the outside edge of the grass which runs from 7 to 12 feet with a few of the grass lines extending out to 14-16 feet but here the grass is scattered but will hold some nice fish which have been hitting a TX rigged Berkley Power Worm (7 and 10 inch) as well as a football jig with Stanley Bug Eye, Odam and Berkley Gripper series jigs all good choices. I like a black and blue as well as a green pumpkin colored jig. I also like George Jeane Lure's grass jig in half ounce.
Crankbaits are still catching bass on Rayburn from 8 to 25 feet with a Bumble Bee, Fire Tiger/w flakes and Sexy Shad patterns are all proven colors in Norman's Deep Little N (8 to 12 feet) as well as DD22s (in 12 to 25 feet) in same colors. Abu Garcia's Revo Winch new crank bait reel sure takes most of the work out of working those big DD22s. Ratio is 5.4 :1 and action is very smooth allowing for long cast and is almost impossible to back-lash. Have a great week fishing!
