the Miss-Lou

November kicked off with extremely warm temperatures. It was so hot an occasional glance at the calendar was necessary to make sure that it was indeed mid-November.

The warm, humid weather came to an end with the passage of a cold front on Thursday.

High winds and cold nights will lower the water temps on our area lakes and rivers. The fish will adjust to the colder water and will be easier to pattern and catch.

The average water temperature was 68 degrees before the cold front, but expect 61 to 63 degree water today. Fish a little deeper and slower over the next few months, and you will catch more fish.

The Mississippi River is rising, which really messed up a good thing. The Old Rivers were producing limits of big bass and nice crappie when the level at Natchez was below 15 feet.

The stage today is 15.3, and by Tuesday the river stage will be around 17.5 feet. There is about five more feet of water coming down the Mississippi.

The good thing about being a fishermen and living in this area is the amount of productive lakes and rivers within an hours drive.

If the Old Rivers are messed up you can try Lakes Concordia, St. John, Bruin, Bayou Louie, Turkey Creek, the Black River Lake Complex, the Saline/Larto Complex or the Natchez State Park, just to name a few. One winter we fished three lakes in a single day and caught over 70 bass.

Lake St. John’s hybrid striper population will feed heavily over the next couple of months. Try Rat-L-Traps, spoons and tail spinners between the piers.

Watch for the herons sitting on the piers, and they’ll show you where the fish are. We’re catching a lot of 3- to 4-pound stripers on Lake St. John. The big hybrids, fish in the 8- to 11-pound range, will show up when water temps fall below 60 degrees.

The water levels on our lakes remain extremely low and will stay that way until we get some rain. Take advantage of the lower levels while you can.

You can visually locate cover that will be submerged when the lake levels return to normal.

You’ll be surprised at the number of logs, brush piles and other cover that you fish right by when you can’t see it.

I located some of my best, most productive areas during low water levels. The rest were found with electronics.

Eddie Roberts writes a weekly fishing column for The Natchez Democrat. You can reach him at

fishingwitheddie@highstream.net

.