Guide Talks Fall Truman Lake Bass Fishing
Eric Prey has been guiding for bass on Table Rock Lake for 24 years and competing in tournaments even longer. He has fished just about every lake in Missouri and beyond into Kansas, Arkansas, and Oklahoma. Needless to say, he knows how to find the bass when he gets on the water, especially when it comes to Truman Lake bass fishing. Recently, he took his years of knowledge and compiled it all into tablerockfishingintel.com.
Like trumanlakefishingintel.com, tablerockfishingintel.com is a subscription website that gives you in-depth information on the fishing conditions and patterns each week.
I recently had a chance to chat with Eric about his experiences on Truman Lake over the years and he had some great insight for the fall.
When we start seeing water temps drop, he loves to focus on the buzzbait and squarebill bite. He always has a jig tied on, too, for fishing around steeper, rocky structure.
“For the topwater, I usually look for rock to gravel transitions whether it be in a major creek arm or up one of the rivers,” he said.
“In the fall, I like the Pomme a lot, but you do have to watch out if you were to run up there.”
He does fish the Tebo in the fall as well, but is mainly concerned with the limited water. If there gets to be many other people up there during practice, he goes somewhere else.
“It can start to fish really small where you may only have 1 or 2 spots to hit that haven’t been pressured,” he stated. “I’ll just head somewhere else if I notice the traffic picking up during practice.”
On the Pomme, he focuses on channel swings. Specifically, he looks for the end of the channel swing where it transitions i.e. changes from rock to more gravel or from rock to mud. You do get into a lot of mud bottom as you move further up in the arm.
“Looking for those transition areas where fish can move up out of the deeper water and move up to the shallow flats quickly and feed is the key.”
He also fishes a lot of pockets up there too, a lot of channel swing pockets. There’s always wood, debris, or laydowns in the backs of them to throw a squarebill or buzzbait around and draw a bite.
“Personally, I like the Luckycraft RC series squarebill,” Prey said. “I throw more of a chartreuse with a black back when the water is dirty. When it’s more clear I’ll throw a sexy shad.”
On the buzzbaits, the only color he throws is black. It may have a black skirt with a black horny toad or just a black skirt. His line selection consists of 30-pound braid.
“I used to be a mono guy, but the problem with mono is the stretch,” Prey added.
Sometimes a fish comes up from behind the bait and pushes it forward on the strike. You’ve got extra line recovery time involved there where you wouldn’t with braid.
In conclusion, Eric Prey is a wealth of knowledge all over Missouri lakes when it comes to bass fishing. With that many years of experience, it’s definitely worth considering if you plan to do any Truman Lake bass fishing in the coming weeks.
You can find Eric at the following places. Use coupon code truman10 for $10 off a subscription to tablerockfishingintel.com.
Social Media
Table Rock Fishing Intel Youtube Channel
Focused Fishing Youtube Channel