I live about a mile from lake bellwood in Tyler, tx. If you pull it up on earth or Google maps, you'll see its not that big. The majority of the southeast side is surrounded by a golf course and million dollar homes (however, only few with good docks) and the northwest side has a spillway into a small creek. It has reeds that surround the majority of it. The water is extremely muddy and dirty due to the street runoff into the lake, even the deepest parts, and I lose sight of a big black Colorado blade spinnerbait after about 6 inches down. I've caught good bass before (prolly blind luck) but need more advice! Any and all are appreciated.

Muddy water = shallow fish. Id flip shallow cover and docks with a black and blue jig. If that didin't work Id go back through the docks with a square bill crank.

Thanks! Will do

There are some nice bass in that lake. Certain times of the year you can catch them pretty good pitching the reeds which at one time surrounded the lake. the docks are new and I haven't fished it since they were added. This time of year I would use a graph and fish some of the humps on the lake. There are very few spots deeper than 14'. Points are good to.

Jody

Thanks jody!

The great thing about a small lake like that is you can try a lot of different things quickly to determine the pattern...

The reeds are probably going to be the focal point for the fish. That's the available cover and the water is muddy so they're going to enjoy that shallow cover... jigs and brush hogs. If you can find a deeper point those can be great in small water. C-Rig it... sounds like a fun lake!

Even in murky water bass can see fine, they just can't see as far. A bass's visual world, becomes smaller but they maybe be quicker to bite when something does penetrate their area. Use dark colors and fish slowly. Also to get them detecting your baits through their other senses try ribbed plastics, jig rattles, noisy crank baits etc. Fish slowly.

If water is muddy i'd stray from soft plastics, unless you put a bead or two on your rig setup. Try dark cranks if to get their visuals going and attract noise. Personally i'd throw a char spinnerbait with a char blade. If you dont got char blades go with a colorado silver blade. Colorados give off more vibration and silver reflects light better than a gold willow will. Slow roll it whether it be a crank or spinnerbait cuz bass wont go after a blazin lure in muddy water.

Is Bellwood a public lake? Can u put a 19ft boat in there?

Yes its a public lake. Very quiet and peaceful. And yes you can put your 19 in , there's only one ramp at the end of CR 1138, and the lake level is full.

Thanks everyone! I'll try everything listed here, I'm ready for next week!

I would becareful and park your truck where you can see it out ther! A lot of theifs/crackheads do still go down there! Last year i had my truck in plain view and seen two guys pull up when i was just across the boat ramp! They were trying to open my truck door and looking in the bed! I hauled arse in my boat heading that way! I grabbed my pistol from my glove box in the boat and fired a shot into the water! Them dudes friggin white smoked there tires all the way to the curve in the road! I had heard a lot about things happening down there but chose to keep going! I still wont let the stories and the day i had out there stop me from going! Just wanted to give you a heads up! Ive had a couple altercations with arseholes out there!

Dang! That's crazy. Thanks for the heads up. I've luckily never experienced anything like that there. In fact, I see cops patroling the area quite frequently. But I usually go during the week