Rayburn Video Report

A bit of a fishing report from Rayburn for last Friday and Saturday.

Rayburn Video Fishing Report link

Thanks for sharing Mr. Smith. Good Video on a lot of different techniques.

Good video.

Good stuff Ken, thanks for posting, I haven't done much punching of grass at all. Been wanting to give it a whirl at some spots on Amistad, but haven't messed with it; this helps take the intimidation factor out.

Thanks Ken - good video.

Is it generally better to flip/pitch/punch grass beds along the edge of the grass lines or back in the bed/matt?

Generally the outside edge, especially if it is a clean outside edge. What I mean by that is there is a nice defined edge, you pitch 1 foot one way and there is not grass, another foot the other way and it's buried. However right now the only place I found that had that really hard edge was along some creeks where there is a really sharp drop, so you go from 8 foot deep to 15 in the creek kind of thing. I had been catching them in some of those places, but those fish have moved, actually interesting I had been catching them in the back of a creek like that just before Thanksgiving and went back to those fish during the Toy's for Tot's tournament and didn't get bit, but as I was coming out Nick LeBrun who just whacked them down there the week before was back out where the creek dropped into the main lake so I suspect he had tracked those fish as they came out. Opposite of what you would think this time of year, but those fish will move with the bait, and that creek had some flow and had gotten a lot of color, so if the bait backed out for some reason those schools will travel with them. As you can see the area I was in there was what I referred to as a "taper", so from the matted edge where it was 7-8 foot deep to the where there was no more grass which is about 14 feet in that area is probably 20 yards wide with grass scattered all across that 20 yards. I started flipping the outside edge and just keep flipping shallower and shallower until I get bit. I wish the fish read the flipping books because if they did there would be one way, based on water temp, time of year, clouds, wind, that you could catch them. But I've caught them way out on the outside edge and buried up one day to the next. Anybody works out that formula for when they are where will be hard to beat! Grass fishing really is a day-to-day experiment, generally they don't move far, but like all fish they will move to where they are comfortable and there is a food source.

Thanks for your comments Ken!

Excellent insight. Thanks for sharing.

Enjoyed the video and subscribed to you on youtube, you need to do them more often! Question, on your A-rig, that looks like a flash mob jr, do you have a preference on a-rig and also what hook or jig head are you using?

[u]Thanks Pie, and thanks for the subscribing on youtube, I will get more videos posted this year now that I have my place down there set up. Got similar question to yours in a pm, so yes, that is a flash mob jr, largely the only one I throw, I like the smaller blades so the bait stays down in the water column more, and they are quite a bit less expensive than most others in the market. Until someone kicks my tail with another it's my go to bait, only caution is after a few fish you are going to have some fish break wires on them, they are somewhat fragile. Funny both of you ask about the hook, as I think the hook is 90%+ of why I am successful with them. And ALL the credit for that goes to James Biggs, a fellow TFF'er and really good A-rig fisherman. By the way I know a lot of snarky stuff happens on here on occasion, but some really great info exchanges happen here and this was one of those times. I didn't know James at all and we connected and I knew he was really good with the A-rig so I started quizzing him like you are me. In talking with him he uses the "Bite-me Shakey Ballhead", which you can buy in 50 packs and save some dinero. The hook is a really thin wire hook, and what he told me was that using those hooks and 20# Seaguar if you got a hook hung up in a tree the vast majority of the time you could straighten one of those hook and get your bait back. After using A-rigs a few times I had hung up and lost a few baits, which is $20-$30 per according to what all you have on one. So I started fishing them too fast to keep them from getting hung up, or refraining from throwing them into cover. So I wasn't getting bit on them like I should have, since I have switched hooks I throw them everywhere, and when things are right I catch them on it. I still lose one on occasion, but it is really, really, rare (I'll lose 5 next time I'm out for saying that). One other great thing about that little thin wire hook, super sharp so its really common when fighting a fish to get another hook of two in them, which once that happens you will almost always catch that fish. So BIG THANKS to James for sharing that with me a couple years ago, I've won a few dollars since then because of that piece of advice and now I pass it forward.

Good video and nicely done.

Thanks all, going to try and get a new report up this week and also add some map tips above 147 bridge as well.

Merry Christmas to all.