Headwaters Lake- Speck report

[Panfish Nation]

Had a buddy in town and decided to poke out to the new Headwaters Lake in Indian River County. This lake has really been touted as a trophy bass fishery, and rightly so. It has amazing habitat and I think they have done a great job...but the past few trips I've been focusing on Crappie.

Water temperature is quite warm already, it was 76 degrees when we got on the water at 7:00AM. Heavy fog in the morning kept conditions slick calm and sheltered us from the bright sun. We ended up finding some specks in about 5-9 feet of water and got about 15 total; 12 keepers. All were caught on jigs, most under a small cork. I have been using the Crappie Magnet and really like them. Also picked up 4 nice bluegill, a handful of small bass and one very large mudfish.

This particular lake does not have much for submerged timber, or thick lily pad fields. But, it has abundant hydrilla and cattails and I believe the fish are holding on the shallow edges of these areas. We tried punching a few holes in some thick hyacinth, but no luck. The bright overhead sun seemed to shut the speck bite down so we netted some threadfin shad and tried for bass. To my surprise, I got a nice speck. I know they eat shad, but I've never caught a speck on one- especially with a large kahle hook while slow trolling for bass.

A great day on a really cool lake. Cheers!