Dogwoods and bass boats

Blooming dogwoods are dead giveaway to bedding bass on Lake of the Ozarks

OSAGE BEACH, Mo. – Upon first glance it looks as if the hillsides along Lake of the Ozarks have been dusted with snow. Brilliant white, blooming dogwoods paint the steep hollows and slopes leading down to the water’s edge.

For the 200 pros and 200 co-anglers fishing on Lake of the Ozarks in the EverStart Series Central Division event this week, blooming dogwoods mean bedding bass. The same warm spring temperatures that trigger dogwood blooms also send bass to the bank by the droves to spawn.

“Oh, there are fish on beds,” confirmed pro Dion Hibdon of nearby Stover, Mo. “But seeing them is going to be a little difficult. They were on beds real good last week, but the lake came up a foot or two this week and it has covered them up. Plus the water has gotten a little dingier. But I’m sure someone will do well by looking at them.”

The EverStart Series has not visited Lake of the Ozarks since March 1999 when pro Jim Tutt of Longview, Texas, won the event with a final-day weight of 15 pounds, 5 ounces.

Many, including Hibdon, believe that fishing on Lake of the Ozarks has gotten much better since then.

Hibdon also remarked that this event will be a catchfest when compared to the FLW Tour event held on Beaver Lake in Rogers, Ark., last week.

“This lake is slam full of largemouth,” Hibdon said. “Unlike Beaver, smallmouth are really rare here, and keeper Kentucky spotted bass have been hard to come by, but there are plenty of largemouth – it’s definitely going to be a largemouth tournament.”

Hibdon predicts it will take a two-day total of 32 pounds to make the top-10 cut and a two-day total of 34 to 36 pounds to win on Saturday.

Lake of the Ozarks features 1,200 miles of shoreline, which includes hundreds of huge floating docks, boat houses and marinas. And those boat houses are chock full of boats – big boats that might be roaring up and down the Ozarks impoundment this weekend.

“Guys that make the top 10 here will have to be very careful of boat traffic this weekend,” Hibdon cautioned. “The weather is warming up, and if it is nice, the pleasure boaters will be out in full force. The average boat length on this lake is 30 feet, and when thousands of them start plowing around out here, it turns this place into a miniature Lake Erie. A run that takes 30 minutes in the morning can easily take an hour and a half coming back in the afternoon.”

This is one lake where anglers actually want less-than-ideal weather because it is likely to keep the lake void of pleasure boaters.

In that regard, the weather might be in the favor of the anglers. There is a chance of strong thunderstorms over the next few days, with high winds and cooling temperatures in the forecast for the weekend.

The day-one weigh-in begins at 3 p.m. at Lake of the Ozarks State Park, Public Beach No. 2 (PBII).

Sunrise: 6:28 a.m.

Water temperature: 63 degrees

Air temperature: 65 degrees

Expected high: 82 degrees

Wind: forecasted from the SSE at 5 to 10 mph

Day’s outlook: warm, balmy, 30 percent chance of storms