This thread is for anyone who wants to share info on current fishing conditions on Grapevine lake.

4-14-21
Today was a good day, launched at Meadomere and stayed pretty close all day. You can go out in the morning and see birds working between Meadomere and Twin coves. The fish are pushing the shad up and you can catch some fish but they are quick. I did go work one school today, then dropped a jig and caught fish down in the 20 ft range. I am catching better fish on the bottom, or down below the schooling fish. Out in deep water there is a mass of fish.. If you are going to fish a jig, scale back to a medium size or just a tad smaller for better luck. I worked one set of birds and caught small fish. I went back towards the 17-20ft range up on the top of the Meadomere shelf. I can see a few fish on my graph, but I can work the jig and catch fish. I am using the redneck bluetooth thumper non-stop, it works. I specifically focused on larger fish today, so I worked a jigging spoon up on the top of the large shelf in front of Meadomere part all day. About 6pm I eased over to the windy point and threw a crankbait, big fish galore. Late afternoon bite is the big fish, didn't catch any 14+ inch fish until 6pm on. Sitting in 17-14ft of water casting towards the bank, bumping the bottom very slowly back to the boat. Did real well. Met a young man who was having trolling motor problems, with some redneck engineering we got him fishing for the rest of the day. Crossed paths with Jason from yesterday, and we caught fish on the jigging spoon for a while. Optimum setup for the jig is 6-10 pound mono (fluoro recomended), or 6-8lb braided. The braided casts farther, but you might have to deal with a wind knot every now and then.

Just look for birds working to fish fish on the move. For bigger fish focus on the bottom with a smaller to med size jigging spoon.
I have been graphing allot lately, you will see fish down in the 30 ft range below the drop. These are tougher to catch, move up top of the drop on the large shelf in front of Meadomere park in the 15-20 ft range. Just keep working the jigging spoon on the bottom. if you are fishing until sunset move up to the main point and keep the boat in the 13-15ft range and cast as far as you can with a crankbait. If you are not bumping the bottom, get a deeper running crankbait. If you do not make contact, you are spinning your wheels. ill add some video tomorrow, too late and sleepy. Caught Allot of fish today, and some really nice fish close to sunset. Take care all and God Bless.

You can check the last few days on the (Denton Creek 2021) thread for the last three days.

Prosise

Prosise!!!
Thanks again for the invite over. we were catching 6 inch fish till you waved us over. You have it dialed in for sure.
We experimented with different baits, but most all our good fish were on the MAL lure. A few caught on the little george"style" and 3/4oz slabs.

I am the young man with the trolling motor problems, or I was the one with the trolling motor problems. Now, thanks to Mr. Brent, I am the young man with a working trolling motor and a nice roughed up fish thumb. I couldn’t be more thankful, hope to see you on the water soon!

Sorry i missed you, we came later I guess. It was rough out there in the wind.

Prosise-your reports are VERY much appreciated. I'm stuck in the office all day thinking about fishing so it's been great living through you vicariously...whether it be the trips up the river in your canoe or the main lake white bass fishing. Bottles, old lures, even a random anchor.....all very cool to read about. When work calms down and I can get out on Grapevine, you and JWC have always helped me cut down on my limited time spent searching.

Well it is time to take a some hours off in the afternoon and get some outside time. There is no guarantee, all I can go on is the last week. If you stay until sunset find a windy point and try and keep your boat in the 12 ft range, cast a crankbait as far up to the bank and try and bump it back to you. When the wind flips look for banks with a gradual taper, not a deep drop. When the wind flips and comes from the south it changes. Right now the mid like area is saturated, and you can catch fish if you are patient. If you have a thumper it is highly recommended, I can tell a big difference in qty with the thumping sound.. I have received many questions on the redneck bluetooth thumper setup.. The app is called "The metronome by soundbrenner" on google play. Just search metronome and you should see it. Here are the settings that I use.. Pretty simple, and if you have a bluetooth speaker just set it face down on the bottom of the boat. Doesn't have to be that loud, the deep sound will get out. It surprised me for sure. Couple of things to emphasize, sharp hooks. If you do not use a hook sharpener, just give it a try. Anything will work, everybody has a old wet stone they can bring along. Just check the tip of the hook on your fingernail, if it doesn't stick in your fingernail when you touch the nail it needs to be sharpened. It really picks the numbers up. Secondly, hook size. If you buy some of the larger jigging spoons the hooks are a little big. I swap them out with a smaller hook. Grapevine has some good fish but compared to other lakes they are typically smaller. Only fishing sun-tues, work the back end of the week.. Everybody be safe, and please share info. Get those kids out, the birds are fun to see and they will enjoy it more if they catch a fish..

Pretty basic, but the bass sound seems to get out better than my homemade hammer thumper. Also is a heck of a lot easier to use. The real deal thumpers out there prob are better than anything, but Im cheap and like to tinker so I build my own.









Here is a random clip which shows the way I was changing up the technique yesterday.. Some small changes would get them to bite. Also, I was using 6lb test fluro on the spinning reel with a crankbait. It really helps it get down quick. When I would feel it bump the bottom I would pause, this is working very very well. I Have been using the med size cordell spoon from walmart and getting some good results. The big spoons are not producing as much.. The crankbait is culling the smaller fish and has produced the biggest fish on every day I have used it. I love to sit in the chair and just chip away at them. You can see Meadomere in the background, prob 400 yards from the bank in about 14 ft of water.. I was about 100 yards from the drop, just pulled up and started fishing.. After about 5 minutes I was just picking them up steadily.

Very cool. I loaded tthe app and picked up a speaker today. Can't wait to try it out. Are you seeing fish on the graph and then stopping to fish or are you just stopping on the point and the thumper brings them in?

Give me some input if you can. Try a spot for 10 minutes, then turn on the speaker face down on the floor. Try this a couple of times and let me know what you see.

To be honest, I just look at the 2d sonar and the hummingbird will show shad as a blob, where the fish will show more like a line. I checked the drop at meadomere and right at the bottom of the drop there is shad "I think". I tried fishing it and had no luck. Up on the top I found that The bigger fish were coming from the center of the top area, the smaller fish were closer to the east (channel going back to the boat ramp). If I see any multiple signs of fish I will give it a try. For me the closer I am to the drop the less fish I was producing (which makes absolutely no sense).. Didn't do any good down below the drop. I checked about 5 spots, and the area during the day was the center. After 4pm I moved closer to main point east of the park or the main point of the park. This is when the wind is blowing into the point.
But I dont see schools on the graph in the 10-17ft range, more like a couple of arcs. Even with I am catching fish the sonar is pretty quiet with a line or arc every now and then.. The side image will show me that there are fish in an area when scanning, but I do not know what they are.. I know there is fish in the area, but I have to test each spot. If I catch 10 fish in the 4-5" range I will move and see what happens. But, with all this said. If you do not see bait in the area, there will be no fish (In my opinion).. There is a massive amount of shad balls up in the corner of meadomere near the swim area and to the right.
Below will help. This picture is from the lowrance app. which is free.

A : catching better fish during the day (Last 3 days).
B: smaller fish
AB: Mix between the two.



Pulled some screenshots from the week, forgot about these. When i see something different I take a screenshot.

Thought this might be a sandal.. But looks like a shoe.


This is what I typically see when there is a couple spots on the sonar. As long as I see something I will give it a try, but only in a area I know has fish.



This was in the "A" area when I was in the fish. This was yesterday.


When I went out into the main lake to fish the birds with Jason. Luke and his friend were out there with a rat-l-trap working them. I did pick up a few of these with a spoon at the top of the fish pile. This was out in front of the main point that is east of meadomere towards dove.

Per the thumper comments, I can remember several years ago when the guides on Texoma first started "thumping". They used an old wooden broom stick/handle and would just bounce the broom off the bottom of their boat. They would vary the cadence while watching their graphs to see how the fish would react. Probably wouldn't work as well (or at all) if you have a carpeted floor in your boat. It's an affordable substitute!!

Starter at 6am, worked a few areas for bass before looking around the Meadomere area. Caught some fish, but is wasn't very productive. About 10am I went looking, I hit every main lake point down to the island. Birds are out in full force, but for me all I caught was fish in the 4-6" range. It may look like fun, but the birds are a trap if you ask me. Stay on the bottom and you will catch more quality fish. I fished two schools and gave both a chance before going back to the bottom. Moved to the north side of the lake and from Rock Ledge I fished all the main lake points back to Murrell park. Went out on the end of the main point at Murrell and in 26ft of water started fishing. Pretty much stayed within 30 yards of that spot until about 630'ish. Using the med cordell spoon, I caught fish steadily for over three hours. Saw a center console that was out of the drop, waved him over and it was a guide. We were able to get the boys on some fish. Met a TFF'r "Miles" and his crew, we caught some fish towards the end of my stay at the point. It started to slow down, so I went back to the main point at Meadomere to see if the big females would hit the crankbait. That was a bust, as they were not to be found. Tried both main points at Meadomere with no big girls. With the rain, the water has a slight stained color. Bait has moved down the lake a bit, and the fish have followed. You will be seeing the birds, but I really think you will do better fishing down deeper. Caught a ton of fish, and really have no idea of the numbers. Working the med jigging spoon on the bottom, shaking the jig right off the bottom. Fish are off the drop, and if you are patient can really catch allot of fish. No Video, basically a repeat of me catching 7-10 inch fish with an occasional 11 incher. Going to look at a few new spots tomorrow, wind will change so will be interesting.

Note: the med cordell spoon comes with a really big silver hook, take this off and put on a smaller hook. You will increase your numbers. Towards the 5:00pm time I scaled back to a smaller jig and it continued to produce..

I fished many points, and out into the 25 ft range on the north side of the lake. Most of them were holding small fish, and not very consistent. Humps, and long points that are in the 22-26ft range are holding better fish for me.

Fished 10-830pm with my good buddy Ronnie. Short story version: fishing was slow. We went to the bridge near the island, but couldn't get any takers. Headed over to Murrel point and caught allot of fish but they were in the 7-10" range. Ran into a a man that I have seen for many years out on the lake, I will call him "Mr. R". He was looking for some fish and keeping over 11" fish. We helped him with his limit "i hope" , one escaped on the transfer so he had to pick up a few more. Met a TFF'r Mr. White and we looked around Murrell some. Fishing was off today, we could catch fish but it was every now and then after 2pm. Me and Ronnie worked our way closer to the point and caught bigger fish on crankbaits earlie in the day. You can see fish in the 10-15ft range, and we caught some good fish. However, it was a little bit of work catching fish over 11" at murrell. We did catch a few on jigging spoons, but a majority were small. "Mr.R", and "Mr. White" caught a good catfish on a spoon which is cool. About 5'ish I side scanned the whole point at murrell and it was pretty quite. Moved east and we caught a few big oned on a crankbait. Fish/bait are out in deep water but couldn't get them to cooperate. Was a beautiful day, and a nice sunset. We ran down to the main point for the last 20 minutes of sun at Meadomere and I caught about 5 fish before we called it. Was a great day with an old Buddy, and yes He got the big fish today.. Was a blessed day out on the water.

Me and the wife we also out fishing around you . We were in the white skeeter. Glad to finally meet you . I have been following your post for the past year. Your tips and lure presentation are spot on. Fishing was slow at best but we had a great time. Birds did get going at the last part of the evening near the island and we caught a few there. Overall we picked up around 20 sandies . Most of them keepers. But no big fatties. Thanks again for all the post keep them coming .

Always such informative post!