>>1058440So go to the creeks, use smaller gear including smaller hooks and go deeper.
The sunfish are still hungry, I promise-they are not complicated creatures.
When I have problems catching sunnies, the issues I usually have are my bait is too far above them (water is hotter than they want and they're holding DEEP) or their mouths aren't big enough to get around the hooks; they'll just nibble the bait off the hook.
>High fishing pressure strategiesI primarily fish public parks in a city of 350,000 people, so I get it. They're overfished to hell and back just like your lakes.
My secret is to use ultralight, go where nobody else goes and use what nobody else uses.
Where I am, if people fish with worms they get a hook big enough to fit a whole worm onto it. If they don't they use Texas rigged plastics in June Bug. As a result, ANYTHING that would possibly take either of those things is out of the water already. It's long gone, kept and eaten the instant its mouth fit around the hook.
If you want to catch things in that situation you need to adapt. Worm hooks have to be half the size of everybody else's, and soft plastics don't catch shit here, so I use spinners. Again they can't be big-1/16oz rooster tails (white and black) are what I use, and they work well. Usually I'm the only one on the water who's caught anything, and often I can catch half a dozen gills and bass in an hour.
>inb4 dinksMost times yes, but such is life on a lake with high fishing pressure. And better dinks than nothing.
Get to where you're catching fish consistently-even if they're just dinks-and the big ones will come.
The other thing is to go farther afield. The small creeks you mention are worth checking out for the very reason you're dismissing them-people are thinking there's nothing in them. The farther away you are from a trail, fishing pier or boat ramp, the less fishing pressure, the better the fishing likely is.
