Well, with the smallmouth pretty much in spawn mode everywhere, and as far as I'm concerned it taking zero 'skill' to catch bedded bass, I decided to turn my attention towards largemouth and hope to find some still "pre-spawn" minded largies. I started the day launching at 5:30am and fished topwater in the rain until about 7am. I used a black 3/8oz buzzbait, a Bog Frog, and a couple floating rapala"s. The buzz bait produced the largest fish of the day at 4.5lbs (photo) and man did he inhale it!! Ran good too, snapping pads off and trying to jump! I worked my way from about 6 feet deep into the shallows until I literally bottomed out my boat. The shallows were full of spawning bass...not bedded yet, but very shallow and very spooky and pretty much in the process of spawning. So I decided to leave them and focus on deeper water and points hoping to find fish that hadn't committed to the spawn yet. I used a chartruese/white 3/8oz spinnerbait, and a Fat Money Minnow swimbait to catch another five fish all 2.5 - 4lbs over the course of the morning / early afternoon. The rain let up and the wind picked up, and as my first trolling battery began to lose the fight between the weeds and wind, I headed for some lunch and a different lake at around 1-2pm. The warmest water I found was 62.5 degrees and the coldest was 58....

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