By Ted Peck

Serious bassin' for largemouths heats up with warming waters this month in northern reaches of the Prairie State. A number of public waters upstate offer good to outstanding angling for our most populous game fish, with private lakes a popular option for rabid bass chasers north of Bloomington.

Bass will always be bass, no matter where they swim. But fish location and presentation changes drastically between now and when these waters are covered with ice again.

Here's a look at some hotspots with terrific potential for getting your string stretched as spring slides into summer.

Bass tourneys may originate below the Fulton Dam on Pool 14 or above the dam at Bellevue up on Pool 12. But most of the very expensive rigs that seem out of place on the easy-living river spend a great deal of time flying up and down the channel of Pool 13.

The waters west of Savanna are nearly ideal for bass - a lot of shallow water with wood and deep channels nearby, rocky wing dams, closing dams and riprapped shoreline, islands with deep side channels running close against the shore and a potpourri of food for bass to chase.

Photo by Ron Sinfelt

At first glance the 30,000 acres of Pool 13 are intimidating. But when you return to the natural truth that bass will always be bass, the fishing focus narrows considerably. The most important consideration in getting hooked up - beyond always thinking safety - lies in understanding the predator-prey relationship.

Right now bass are generally hanging in backwater areas away from the main channel of the Mississippi, which is likely high and turbid. These backwaters warm quickly, with largemouths in less than 2 feet of water close to wood but near deeper water escape cover right now.

In a month or so when spring flooding recedes, look for fish to locate next to developing weeds. An ideal ambush area is new greenery in shallow water with a good 6 to 8 feet of depth just outside the weed edge. Find a weedy point with a little current and deeper water breaking both ways and you had better get the net ready before casting.

Once shad and other minnows start to appear, watch for largemouths crowding the forage base and busting baitfish on the surface. This is a major key to bass location and noting hotspots for future reference. Always have a spinnerbait or topwater lure close at hand to take advantage of bass that are aggressively feeding.

Woody structure next to moving water is always a good bet. Throw a spinnerbait and follow up with a plastic presentation. Isolated deadfalls are fish magnets. Not all of them hold fish, but find one that does and you'll want to beat the water to a froth before moving on, and then return a couple hours later for more serious flailing.

By late summer, river pools are typically low, with largemouths moving out to main-channel structures like wing dams that were better suited for smallies in July. At low summer pool don't overlook the channel ends of wing dams and the steep riprapped shoreline along the railroad bed that follows both sides of the river.

Bluegills tend to relate to this kind of structure later in the summer, with bass dogging their every move. One of the best days on the river last summer came while guiding two clients who were throwing Timber Tiger DC-8 crankbaits in bluegill pattern. The duo averaged a bass every three minutes for three hours, with one guy's excitement meter pegging off the charts when he tangled with a fat 15-incher and had an even fatter 19-incher grab the back treble of his crankbait at boatside.

Autumn presentation is driven by river level. Sometimes you are still out on the main channel, but with high water it's time to retreat to the sloughs. Cooling waters mean its time to probe with spinnerbaits and follow up with dead-sticking tubes and similar plastics.

Contact: Big River Bait & Taxidermy, (815) 244-3155.

George, Carlton, Le-Aqua-Na and Pierce lakes in north-central Illinois near Rockford all contain good populations of largemouth bass - along with motor restrictions and other baggage that comes with fishing in a state park.

Lake George and Carlton have 10-horsepower limits, 43-acre Le-Aqua-Na is electric-motor-only and Pierce is no-wake for motors larger than 10-horsepower. Several years ago an article in Illinois Game & Fish prompted the Department of Natural Resources to open up Pierce to boats with larger motors - a definite step in the right direction. This spring I plan on giving park personnel a little demonstration with my big deep-V walleye boat, using the big motor to idle down the lake in one direction, then dropping the 8-horse "kicker" and plowing a nice, legal furrow in the water on the way back. It seems that "no wake" rules for everybody make more sense, with the potential to open more waters up to more people.

At only 160 acres and in the shadow of Rockford, scenic Pierce Lake gets plenty of fishing pressure. The key for consistently getting hooked up here lies in a finesse presentation, using primarily soft plastics and light tackle. Although probing isolated structure around the lake is certainly worthwhile, a major component of the bass population here spends a great deal of time near the dam and island at the lake's deeper west end.

By midsummer there is little oxygen below 12 feet in Pierce, which concentrates the bass population even more. Try pitching a Chompers Skirted Grub, Salty Sinker or using a drop-shot presentation along the dam and steep break off of the lake's lone island. Also try twitching a clear Heddon Tiny Torpedo when the sun goes down.

Lake George is a metro lake nestled near the Quad Cities at Rock Island that is slightly bigger than Pierce and shaped like a T-bone steak. Right now is the best time to tangle with a wallhanger bass here, especially out from the Big Branch Creek feeder stream in the lake's east arm when water temperatures are between 43 and 47 degrees.

Try a crawdad-patterned floating Rat-L-Trap or slow-rolling a spinnerbait here, repeating the presentation elsewhere in the lake as waters warm to that magic 43 to 47 degrees. Once waters warm and weeds appear, soft plastics are the way to go. Slug-Gos, Jo-Jerk Minnows and similar baits rigged weedless with a fluorescent line to help indicate subtle strikes may yield a fish big enough to get your picture in the local paper.

Lake Carlton in Whiteside County is better known for producing muskies than bass. At just 77 acres you can fish it effectively in just a couple of hours, with the cove by the dam and shoreline wood the obvious places to target.

This rural lake and Le-Aqua-Na to the north are essentially family camping getaways that offer fishing as something to do while waiting for the hotdogs to cook. But there are bass in both these lakes, and the best way to catch 'em is with a raspberry-scented purple plastic worm with an orange firetail.

Rockford's Chuck Mercaitis designed Chuck's Worm over 30 years ago. It still catches fish - although most who consider themselves serious bassers don't like to be seen using this bait because a 10-year-old can catch as many bass as a pro angler. Fishing pre-rigged worms with a snap swivel minimizes line twist. Don't forget to target offshore floating duckweed when summer arrives. Water temperatures are cooler under this cover, and the bass are there!

Concession stands at all four of these state park lakes offer advice, bait and boat rental. The Illinois DNR Web site, www.dnr.state.il.us, is a great planning aid for the traveling angler.

Shabbona holds state-record-class muskies and walleyes, and both size and numbers of bass - with larger specimens learning the wisdom of being primarily nocturnal feeders. I'm convinced the 14-pound state-record walleye on the books since 1961 would fall on Shabbona next winter if DNR personnel collected a small user fee to pay for night supervision and allow fishing.

Bass action starts heating up right at dusk on Shabbona all summer long, especially on the shoreline by the lake's feeder stream when using topwater baits. If "catching" is more important than "fishing" on these waters, use live bait to target bass on Shabbona's considerable offshore structure.

There is plenty of flooded timber, roadbeds, fish cribs and the foundations of an entire farm on the bottom of Shabbona Lake, with larger predators hanging close to optimum habitat most of the time. The difference between hooking up and not hooking up can be less than a foot.

Fishing Shabbona is like having a frontline goose pit at Grassy Lake Hunt Club in southern Illinois, just outside the refuge boundary: even with 10,000 decoys your quarry knows when and where its safe to feed. Location and presentation are the keys. Don't give up, and fish hard at prime times of dawn, dusk and with inclement weather approaching. Even big fish make an occasional mistake.

Check the DNR Web site or www.shabbonalake.com to put you in touch with Denny Sands, the concessionaire and most knowledgeable angler on these waters. Sands' phone number is (815) 824-2581.