Late August Fishing

Question
I'm thinking about making a trip to the Green Bay area for a mixed bag at the end of august.  I enjoy fishing for bass, pike and walleye.  Is this still a good time to fish for these species?  What would you recommend fishing with?  Or, would you recommend hitting a smaller lake or lakes?

Answer
Hello Brian, How's it going?! Thanks for your question, I hope I can help. So your a Wisconsin native? Planning a trip to the Green Bay area is a great idea for fishing for a mixed bag. The only thing is you have to know where each species will be located at that time of year. Northern pike will be out in deeper water, holding on some type of structure, and more likely they'll be feeding on alewives, ciscos, or other deep water forage. Look at your electronics and look for pods of baitfish down deep, and keep your eyes open for thick arches underneath them. When you see this, you've found pike! Pike are cool to cold water fish, meaning they avoid water warmer than 55 to 65 degrees, depending on what body of water your on. Little hammerhandle pike and pike less than 28 inches or so can be found in and around the same areas where bass will be, and they are catchable. Big pike prefer deep water, because it's much cooler than the shallows this time of year. Trolling or casting big deep diving baits will be the ticket here, just watch your graph to pinpoint pike, give it a try! Also I've been using fast sinking swimbaits lately to get to deepwater pike, and it's been working great, just use big swimbaits, or one that's been a killer for me is the koppers livetarget blueback herring swimbait in fast sink, it's a dead ringer for baitfish in Lake Michigan. Smallmouth bass will be in shallow to mid-depth ranges, and depending on their activity level you can catch them a variety of ways, if their not to active, try dropshotting or dragging a tube, if their in a neutral mood try soft jerkbaits like a fluke rigged texas style, add a little weight if their down deep, or fish a jig semi-fast, this will work good also if their shut-off. Walleye I'm not really sure, but I'm sure trolling or deepwater jigging will pay off. Now hitting smaller lakes would be a personal decision, if a big body of water is overwhelming for you, I would strongly recommend a smaller body of water, because you can cover it faster, and locate fish a little faster too! Hey give this stuff a try and I'm sure you'll be very happy with the results! If you need more help, send me another question, or just let me know if I was able to help, until next time GOOD FISHING!!