Downrigging catches fish, but not so well as does the use of live bait. The top summer pattern for fishing live shad involves finding stripers staging, a striper behavior in which, as Parramore describes it, the fish position themselves on a stretch of river channel or gravel bar waiting for the bait to come to them. They may remain in the same area for a month.

"When they are staging," the guide remarked, "sonar may show a very loose group of fish. They may be on the bottom, or 10 feet off the bottom. Mark them with a buoy and then put out live bait on downlines. You can return day after day and hammer them."

FALL
"I love fall fishing," Parramore stated, "because it's like a spring pattern." He went on to say that the cooler water in the backs of the creeks attracts big loners, so when you troll a jumbo shad over the shallows, the fish jump all over it.

From late October to mid-December, Parramore reverts to fishing side planer boards in the same places that he worked in the spring. While he's sure that all creeks potentially hold striped bass, the guide advises starting with the Tallapoosa River or Elkahatchee Creek.

If you tire of the hunt for plus-sized specimens, Parramore recommended, take a break by moving back to the lake. In the fall, the Kowaliga and Blue creek arms yield substantial numbers of fish to anglers using downlines.

"With planer boards," the guide noted, "we may go four hours before a blowup from a big striper. So if a client gets bored, we'll go catch some 8- to 12-pound fish on downlines to break the monotony. We fish the downlines just like in summer."

LIVE BAIT
Fishing pressure is greatest at Martin in winter, and the use of downriggers is on the rise there in summer, in great part because of a dearth of baitfish. The lake's infertile water doesn't sustain high numbers of shad, which makes it difficult to catch enough bait for a day's fishing. So angler participation increases when striped bass respond to artificial lures.

For year-round fishing, Parramore catches gizzard shad from the Coosa River, usually in a tailrace below one of the reservoirs. Having a lively shad on the end of your line is the key to success, he said.

"Keeping shad alive is an art form," he noted. "For years, we did everything to keep them alive; nothing worked. Shad caught from the lake would have 100 percent morality within three days. Then a marine biologist at Dauphin Island researching baitfish and their immune system discovered a bacterium that becomes active within the shad when stressed.