Nice bass, havent seen one of them in months and not one of that size since the end of June. I do know if you wana catch bass in the winter High action curly tail jigs n crays, any soft plastic that gets alota movement when stationary, with a super super slow retrive on the bottom. Rubber worms set up on a carolina rig works good to. I have heard floating pink buuble gum colored trout worms riged the same way can produce good results of both trout and bass. I havent tried them pink worms yet, so I realy cant say for sure. For bass in winter best places are around big rock piles, and man made structures, with steep deep drop offs, on the north sides of lakes. North side gets the most sunlight and warms up the water. Some times dead or dying weed beds hold the bass, decomposing plant matter releases heat.
I dont know anything about trout fishing. Have been using power bait/eggs and worms with only one hooked and ZERO landed.Only cot one this year, and was throwing a castmaster in bass patterns, and in a spot I cought bass all summer. It was on the north side of the lake next to alot of rocks, and a big dead tree in the water.
Well maybe that might help in some bass catchin

Thanks for the tips. Since the trout are hanging over some prime bass areas right now I've been using drop-shot plastics or football heads if I see a promising area on the meter. But I haven't picked up a bass since Sept, and spent >90% of my time dragging for trout in the past 2 months. I'm looking forward to the spring warm up, when the trout head deep and the shallow bass action picks up. Trout can put on a show once in a while with their aerials, but nothing slams the rod tip down like bass. It's great we get both right here in our backyard.

Oh I hear ya. Early spring smallies are just STARVIN after the winter. I was hookn up on 3-4 pounders mid spring. Was hopin to get monsters in the summer, but that drought just killed all the action. Just pulled in babies all summer long. On the other hand the crappie, and rock bass over the summer wasnt to bad. Think we might have even cought state records. There were some biggins. Geting kinda tired of this freezin to death over a few nibbles. I just wounder how healty the SMB n LMB population is gona be this next spring, sure they will be hungry!

Nice job out there , you can expect more of the same through the rest of the winter season. Right now the lake has pretty much turned over and there isn't a thermocline to speak of. What this means is that the fish will be looking for areas of physical cover to ambush their prey from. Bass will be found from 25' down to around 70' and they are after just about anything that will get close to them. Bigger offerings seem to work for me as when I drag a mini cut plug I'll pick up more bass than with smaller lures. The bass I catch this time of year are almost always right on the bottom and if you bring them up too quickly they will need to be fizzed if you intend on letting them go. A good number of cutts will be found in the same areas as the smallmouth and the rest of the resident cutts spend time deep in the open waters of the lake feeding on the smelt and kokanee. The exceptions are the sea run fish that tend to hang in the upper section of the water column and can be caught surface trolling the southern end of the lake. These fish are generally smaller, brighter and less colored than their resident kin. If you are marking fish but not getting any action, change up the offering. There are times when going bigger or smaller sets them off. Also, remember with the water being so cold, their metabolism is way down to the point that they can't really feed but more that once per day. The bite on the lake typically doesn't start until after 10:00am for the cutts so keep that in mind as well. Good luck out there and be safe, this lake is deadly come wintertime.

G-Man your spot on as usual. I was out with a buddy today, he picked up 2 small cutts (14 to 15 inches) and I landed a 2 pound smallie. All the fish were in 25 to 35 feet of water, near structure with lots of bait on the meter. All were C&R today. The bass came up fine after a slow battle with no issues, but I pack a hypo-needle if I need to de-gas them. We were up in the north end today near Sand Point. We didn't get out until 1130 the rain and cold chased us off the water by 230. I'd like to try for some deep water cutts in the south end of the lake, but the timing and weather haven't worked out too well these past few weeks. It seems we get a few decent weather windows every winter and I'll be looking for them to get down toward south Mercer Island at some point. It's fairly slow fishing lately with lots of no-fish days in the past month, a 3 fish day is very rare. We got the fish today on fire-tiger jointed Rapala, a rainbow trout Rapala and jigging a rainbow trout spoon.