Locating bass offshore on joe pool.

I recently bought a skeeter zx20 and now have decent equipment to start locating fish offshore and learning how to catch them. I spent a good bit of time idling around today but i never located anything but sand bass. Anyone have any tips for someone new to offshore fishing this lake? Thanks.

Steez Macqueen is the man on Joe Pool. Probably be around in awhile.

GA is right. Steez knows the deep secrets at JP. I was out there this morning and caught 2.. both in about 15' on a CRig. I was graphing fish all over the lake but those were the only 2 bites I got. JP is pretty tough right now I would say. Surface temp was around 86.. and there is just a ton of shad everywhere. I think you just about have to hit them in the head at this point to get them to bite something other than a live shad. My story anyway!

BD

I caught a decent one yesterday in 15-18 ft on a deep diver. I'll be back at it in the morning to try and figure it out.

When you can snatch the pebble from my hand, grasshopper, I'll spill the secrets.

Nah.....just look for 40-45 degree slopes with at least 35 ft at the end of it....and try it.

I went out with James Biggs and went from catching one bass on a long day to about 15 on a short one. He did a really good job teaching how to break it down. I took what I learned to lake Arlington this evening. I HATE that lake! I used what I learned and had more fish in the boat in 20 minutes than I have in a week out here.

Do what Steez said and throw a Carolina rig. They will bite. It's just getting the big ones to bite that is hard

To build confidence in fishing the offshore stuff on JP have a crig, dropshot, and shaky head on deck. This will give you the confidence that at least the fish are there. Then you can experiment around with different presentations to try to catch that big one.

^^^This
James will set you up with some pointers that will help you locate fish on just about every area lake and then some.

+1 on James Biggs

I just booked a day with him next month!! I can't wait.

Wind is key for a good offshore bite IMO. It sucks to get blown all over the place, but when it is calm like has been this week, the bite gets really tough

that's the truth! I've never been on JP as calm as it has been the last 2 trips for me. The South wind makes the lake fish pretty small but they do bite better from my limited experience.

BD

No joke.. I fished Monday and it was dead calm. Only caught one lonely crappie deep cranking LOL.

Just wait until you go with Biggs. You won't care if there is no wind. In fact every time that I go back I hope for bad conditions so that I can improve on what he taught. I'm starting to fish Arlington now, and I HATE Arlington because I will have more zero days than catching days. I don't want to fish known areas on Pool that I know that I can catch fish. I want to force myself to use what he showed and learn from it even more by finding new areas to catch fish.

You may be right, but I think the wind makes a difference especially for the bigger fish. Especially during the week because the water out there is always moving, typically the south wind is 10-15mph on average, if not then the weekends it gets packed with party boats and they stir it up. Monday it was dead calm, I only caught a few dinks in 20-25'. Yesterday was pretty calm, maybe 5 mph at times, I did more searching and exploring on Tuesday, I only went looking deep and in areas I never fish, I only caught a few and I was out there all day. Last week the wind was blowing and I did better on the overs.