with Will Ayres
Grass and bass go together in March like liver and onions on Lake Demopolis. Longer days and warming water both draw bass to the shallows to feed and get ready to spawn. They chase bait in the grass and you can catch them with a variety of baits.
Demopolis is a river lake with its dam just downstream of the junction of the Black Warrior and Tombigbee Rivers. It is the second largest lake in the Black Warrior-Tombigbee system and runs 48 miles upriver on the Black Warrior River and 53 miles up the Tombigee River. Both rivers have creeks, sloughs and ditches running out from them. These calm waters are where largemouth head to spawn so they can be found in or near the mouths of them this month.
There are spots in the rivers, too, and you can catch some big ones, but you need to have rocks for spots. So you have two good patterns in March, grass for largemouth and rocks for spots. Some baits are good for both and some are better for one or the other, but your bait choice is controlled more by the cover than the species you seek.
Will Ayres grew up in Demopolis and has lived there all his life. When he was 12 years old he got his first boat and his dad would pick him up from school towing the boat and take him to the river where he would fish until dark. He knows it well and fishes as many tournaments on Demopolis and Millers Ferry as he can.
When he was 16 Will joined the River City Bassmasters. He also fishes the McNider Marine trail, Bass Addiction team trail and other local and pot tournaments. Since he has a young son with a daughter on the way, Will sticks with his local area. When the kids are older he hopes to move up to bigger tournaments but last year, fishing just two lakes, he won $26,000!
“Baitfish are the key especially early in March,” Will said. Warmer days kick in the largemouth pre-spawn feeding spree and the bass want a lot of food. And they will be near the spawning areas. To catch them you need only a few baits. Will rigs a Rat-L-Trap, a spinnerbait, a jig and pig and a Texas rigged worm to cover all his fishing bases.
For spotted bass fishing Will with have a 5XD crankbait in sexy shad color and a Davis three eights ounce shaky head jig with a green pumpkin or Junebug Trick worm on it. He likes to dip his worms in clear JJs Magic to give them a strong garlic smell and sometimes dips the tails in chartreuse for a flash spots love.
Will took me out the first week of February. The weekend before we went, he and his partner landed a limit of bass weighing 17.6 with a 5.5 pound kicker. The fish were already on the pattern they will be on in March and were feeding when we went. We caught about 40 keeper bass on the following holes and the best five weighed about 16 pounds.
N. 32 32.081 – W 87 51.192 – Going upstream the Black Warrior River splits to the right and the Tombigee River goes straight ahead. Go into the Black Warrior and just a couple of hundred yards upstream on your left sawgrass starts lining the bank. In the middle of it a slough opens behind the grass. There are two ditches coming out of the slough with the one downstream much wider.
Stop just downstream of the lower opening and fish upstream. While fishing watch for birds feeding along the edge of the grass and baitfish action against it. If either are present it means bass are likely to be feeding or holding just off the bank waiting to feed.
The morning we fished there were a couple of birds on the bank and we saw baitfish dimpling the surface, and a few swirls as fish had breakfast. In the next hour we landed at least a dozen keeper largemouth. The fish were hitting a red Trap for Will but he said the weekend before his spinnerbait worked better here, so try both.
Throw your Trap and spinnerbait right against the edge of the grass as you fish to the first opening. At the opening throw into it across the points on both sides. Fish on up to the mouth of the second ditch and a little way past it. Some current moving here helps.
Watch back in the slough, too, for baitfish, birds and bass activity. The water is very shallow but it is the kind of place bass spawn so they will be back in here, especially later in March. Go into it and work all three of your baits in here, fishing the grass edges in the slough.
2. N 32 31.088 – W 87 48.981 – Running up the Black Warrior you will see a big cement plant on the right bank. It is on an outside bend of the river and there is a barge landing there. Downstream of the landing a tall bulkhead wall rises from the edge of the river. Just downstream of the bulkhead is a small ditch and on the right side of it you can see an old railroad causeway.
This is a good place to catch spots but some largemouth feed here, too. There are rocks on the bottom and current hits the bulkhead and old railroad causeway debris in the water, moving baitfish along the bank and drawing in bass.
Stop just downstream of the ditch and cast a crankbait or Trap right to the edge of the water around it. Work up to the bulkhead and get you boat in close to it and fish crankbait and jig head parallel along it. There are rocks and other cover along the base of the wall. Will stops when his boat gets to the upstream end of the wall, making a few casts to the bank past it.
3. N 32 31.430 – W 87 48.302 – Run upstream to French Creek on the right and go into it. It is a huge creek but the opening is very small with a no wake buoy in the mouth of the ditch and another one back where the ditch opens up. Idle past the second one then go to the point on the right side just downstream of where the houses on the bank start.
This point has grass along it near the bank and some stumps out on the flat bottom. Will says this is a good place to catch big largemouth and spots in March. They move in off the river and stop on this point as they work into the creek to spawn, holding here and filling up on baitfish.
Keep your boat out a long cast from the edge of the water and cast your Trap and spinnerbait close to the bank. Run both baits by any patches of grass out from the edge. Keep your bait moving slowly all the way to the boat since there are scattered stumps off the bank to hold fish. Fish all the way around the point to the bank of it near the fist house.
4. N 32 31.546 – W 87 48.097 – Across the creek one docks floats way off the bank. Go across just upstream of it. Be careful until you lean this creek, it is shallow. Just upstream of the dock a flat anvil shaped point runs out and has big oak trees on either end of it.
Start out from the upstream end and fish downstream around that end of the point. Throw your Trap and spinnerbait against the bank and run them past clumps of grass just like in Hole 3. Bass hold and feed along this bank, too, as they move in to spawn.
5. N 32 31.403 – W 87 47.725 – Carefully going up French Creek, you will come to where it splits into two arms. The left arm goes back under a powerline. Go into this small creek and stop on the outside of the first point in it on your left, before you get to the powerlines. It is covered with grass and is a good stopping point as the bass move into this creek to spawn. The point is fairly deep and has some rock on it, too.
This point is better from the middle of the month to the end. More and more fish will move back as the water warms and you can catch numbers of fish. But fish it early, too, since the bigger bass often move in to spawn earlier than the majority of bass. You may not get many bites on your Trap or Spinnerbait but could be grown one.
6. N 32 31.320 – W 87 47.720 – Go across the mouth of the small creek to the upstream point of it. This flat point runs out to a small island and has grass all along the point, gap between the bank and island, and the island itself. Fish the point and out to the island and around it with Trap and Spinnerbait.
Some wind blowing in on places like this helps move baitfish to the area and position bass to feed on them. A gentle wind will also move the warmer surface water to banks like this, warming them a little deeper than the main lake or points out of the wind. That can make them even more attractive to bass.
7. N 32 33.422 – W 87 47.580 – Go back out to the river and head upstream. You will go under a set of big powerlines over the river then a straight before it makes a right bend. While you are running up the straight stretch, when you see an orange roof house and dock ahead of you in the bend on the left bank, slow down and watch to your right. You will see a small ditch that leads back to a big oxbow lake just off the river. We had to go through the ditch with the trolling motor since the lake was down a little. Go through it and when it opens up the water will get deeper. This oxbow runs way back along the river and is a big spawning area.
Go in and ease to the point on the right where the oxbow bends to the right. A lot of standing timber starts at this turn and bass will hold in it. The point on the right is a prime feeding place for big fish and numbers of fish this month. We caught several keepers along this point and on the bank across from it, too.
Fish the whole area with all your baits. Work the grass as well as the stumps sticking out of the water. You can fish all the way to the back and Hole #8 or fish around the point, the key area, then idle through the stump field to the point in the back.
8. N 32 33.329 – W 87 47.542 – Almost in the very back, where the oxbow makes a left then right bend, there is another very good point on the left. It is one of the last feeding areas before the bass bed, and they will bed all over this area. Fish all around it on both sides and the outside bend across from it with all your baits.
I caught a couple of bass in here on a black and blue jig and pig. Will makes his own jigs that come through the grass and he gave me one. I put a blue Zoom Fat Albert twin tail on it but Will prefers a black or blue Little Critter Craw. He fishes the jig or a Texas rigged green pumpkin or June Bug Trick worm behind a three sixteenths ounce sinker
Both jig and pig and Texas rig are fished around the grass and wood cover, moving them slowly along the bottom until you hit cover, then shaking them before hopping the baits over the cover. Feeding bass will hit both as will bass already on the bad that you cannot see due to the stained water.
9. N 32 34.342 – W 87 47.004 – Run up the river and watch on your right for red channel marker 226.8. The numbers are on a small, faded sign near the red marker and hard to see. Upstream of the marker a ditch goes out on the right and opens up into creek that is an excellent spawning creek and fills with feeding bass in March. Will says it is a great place to catch numbers and size.
This creek is small enough to fish all the way around it, and we did. Start on the left at a cut going back – there is a matching ditch on the other side. Fish the grass all the way to the back and out the other side. You could stay in this protected creek all day.
Will picked up an individual fish as we worked around this creek on both Trap and spinnerbait, then we hit a small pocket behind a little point on the left going out. The wind was blowing into the creek and the calm area behind the point held a school of fish.
Will caught fish after fish on spinnerbait and I caught a couple on a Chatterbait. We would see baitfish dimpling regularly and a swirl of a feeding fish every so often. We sat in one place and caught at least a dozen keepers without moving. You can hit a school like that at any time on any of these places.
10. N 32 35.169 – W 87 46.844 – Way up the river the Alabama Power Green County Plant sits on the left side of the river. There is a canal going off the river on the left running up to the plant, and it has an outflow of warm water from the plant. The right side of the canal is natural rock and the left side is riprap up to the barge unloading piers. The plant changed from coal to gas so there are no longer lines of barges with coal waiting to unload along this side.
Start on the downstream point of the canal. Spots love this point and the canal itself. Will says so many tournaments were won with limits of big spots from this area the canal was put off limits by some groups.
Fish the point with Trap and crankbait if current is moving, then fish it with your shaky head. Work into the canal, fishing up all the way to the plant. Stay in near the bank and cast a crankbait up ahead of your boat to make it come back with the current as you go upstream. The current and warmer water both attract fish.
Will caught a couple of small spots here on a crankbait, but there was no current moving when we were there. If the current is not moving you can stay in the area and wait on a discharge to turn on the fish, then load the boat when it happens.
All these places were already holding bass a few weeks ago and will be better now, and get better and better as March progresses. Check them out and you can find many similar places on Demopolis to fish this month.