Where and How to Catch Bass in January and February
Denny Brauer’s Thoughts on the Midwest
 Editor’s Note: During January and February, big pre-spawn bass begin to move up to shallow water and start looking for a place to spawn. If you catch a warm front coming through any part of  the country, you can catch the bass of a lifetime. These bass-fishing pros from all points of the compass know how, where and when to catch big bass during the winter months in their sections of the country. Denny Brauer of Camdenton, Missouri, the 1987 B.A.S.S. Angler of the Year, the 1998 Bassmasters Classic winner, the 1998 FLW Angler of the Year and one of the top-10 all time money winners on the B.A.S.S. circuit, lives on the Lake of the Ozarks.
I really like to fish at this time of year for two reasons. This is the best time of year to catch big bass, and there’s usually no one on the lake but me. Since I live on the Lake of the Ozarks, that’s my primary fishing spot. The tactics I use here will also be effective on most highland reservoirs in the Midwest at this time of year. The lower half of the Lake of the Ozarks is definitely a highland-type reservoir. With steep, rocky banks and not much offshore structure. I’ll be fishing ends of bluffs, pea gravel, chunk rock, boat houses with brush under them, rock slides on bluffs and channel swings in major creeks.
My favorite lure at this time of year is a 1/2-ounce Strike King Premier Elite Pro-Model jig with a 3X chunk trailer behind it. The No. 1 color on my lake for catc hing bass in the winter is chameleon crawfish. I’ll usually use 12- to 14-pound-test Mustad Thor Line and be fishing the jig really slowly, crawling it on the bottom and dragging it over the rocks. Some of the biggest bass caught in the Lake of the Ozarks will be caught in January, February and March with this technique.
 When warming fronts come through at this time of the year, the ends of bluffs, the main channel points and even the secondary points in coves will produce big bass. You can catch bass in these areas fishing a suspended jerkbait, like the KVD Wild Shiner in the shad pattern, on 10-pound-test line. On a bright, sunny day, the chrome with the blue-black color can be deadly effective. If our region gets some rain and has run-off water coming into the lake, the clown pattern can be good because you’ll have bass that move up into the new water that’s coming into the lake.
If there’s a snowstorm and severe weather, you may only get six bites a day. But those bites will be big fish. If you get a good week of stable weather, you can catch and release 30 to 35 bass on the Lake of the Ozarks or any other highland reservoir using these tactics. You may not expect to catch large numbers of bass in January and February, but you will catch really-big fish. The largemouth can weigh 3- to 6-pounds each, and the spotted bass will weigh 2-1/2- to 4-pounds each. At the Lake of the Ozarks, I’ve caught several bass over 8 pounds and one bass over 9 pounds.
Tomorrow: Davy Hite’s Hints for the East Coast
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