Catching fish this week at the Bass Pro Shops Bassmaster Eastern Open on Lake Norman is not really the problem. There are a lot of fish in this lake, and this time of year they like to eat. I’m sure all of us are excited about the tournament and hoping that maybe this event is the one we’re supposed to excel at. This is my third event of a four-week stretch, and I would love to have a good event. I was fortunate enough to finish second in the first Eastern Open of the season and have been fishing well this year.
I said catching fish is not really the problem and that’s true … but size is proving hard to come by, at least for me. Most of the fish are postspawn and are not fattened back up from their annual reproduction ritual. The result is that the solid keepers are weighing pretty light. There are still some bass spawning. and you also have the shad spawn going on. On top of all that there are bream beds as a possibility. So what we are seeing out there are lots of options and ways to catch them.
The water is super clear for the most part so I look for a lot of guys to catch them finesse fishing with drop-shots and shakey heads.
Of course this lake boasts thousands of boat docks so they’ll be caught off docks as well. It seems like the key is just to cover water and hope you put it in front of a big one or two each day. Who knows, maybe even a topwater bite will materialize.
One way I know I can get some bites is on a wacky worm. I’ve been catching some on the X Zone True Center Stick wacky rigged with a Mustad TitanX Wacky Neko hook. It is the same setup I used at Grand Lake (see my video on Facebook). I fish it on an MHX NEPS81MXF with 10-pound Vicious braid and a 10-pound Pro Elite fluorocarbon leader.
Y’all stay tuned to Bassmaster.com and see how it plays out. I anticipate a long weigh-in today with a lot of fish brought to the scales.