Fishing Report for October 22, 2009

• By JOE MACALUSO
• Advocate Outdoors writer
• Published: Oct 22, 2009 - Page: 10C

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Another dose of strong, shifting winds on another cold front will limit access to productive freshwater and inshore coastal areas. And you can cross offshore fishing off your list of options.

A second cold front in eight days will bring more dirty water — even more than anglers found after the seasons’ first major cold front.

Weather

Today’s thunderstorms will end Friday, but shifting winds and a higher barometer pose problems. Today’s 15-to-20-knot southeast winds will carry that strength to the south, then decrease with southwest winds early Friday. The wind shift to the north at a predicted 20-to-25- knots comes later that day and carries into Saturday. Look for a shift to the northeast then decreasing to 10 knots from the east Sunday. Nearshore 3-to-6-foot seas will settle to 3-footers Sunday with offshore seas building to 6-to-8 feet through Sunday.

Expect lows near 50 with highs in the mid-70s.

The Mississippi and Atchafalaya rivers will continue to climb — look for the water to blow out Saturday in the Atchafalaya — but are predicted to crest at 30.1 feet on the Mississippi at Baton Rouge over the weekend. Those are the highest readings for this time of year in more than a decade.

Freshwater

The best advice is to slow down. If larger lures aren’t producing — that goes for hard and soft plastics — then go to lighter line and smaller sizes. Work tight on heavy cover for the best bass and sac-a-lait action.

The marshes continue to produce bass on the outgoing tides. North winds helped push water out Friday and Saturday and working structure around run-outs with worms and slow-rolled spinnerbaits worked.

Action in the Atchafalaya Spillway was best on black/blue jigs with a blue trailer. Finding heavy structure is a must.

With the water change coming after strong north winds, then strong southerly winds, finding clearer water is a must.

Earlier this week, the best action was reported from areas with mixing water. Catches were best along the muddy water-clear water lines, especially in areas where canals and/or ponds were draining clearer water into muddy bayous.

The coast