If you can sneak off to fish during the week, you have a lot less fishing pressure to contend with, Stephenson noted. You can just about count on several tournaments happening every Saturday at Logan Martin during the spring.

INLAND LAKE
At 1,557 acres, Inland Lake is considerably smaller than many of the other public impoundments in Alabama. Stephenson calls it a "mini Smith Lake" because of the deep, clear water and rocky bluffs.

The reservoir is off State Route 75, less than an hour's drive from Birmingham. It's on the Blackburn Fork of the Little Warrior River and was built by the City of Birmingham as a water supply lake back in 1939.

"It's one of the prettiest lakes you'll ever visit," Chris Stephenson said. "There is just a scattering of homes around this lake. It's very clear and very deep."

Because it is so small -- and because electrofishing techniques don't work very well on deep-water lakes -- state biologists don't sample the fish population on Inland on a regular basis.

"It's relatively infertile compared to some of the other lakes nearby," biologist Rob Andress said. While a Logan Martin bass looks nice and fat, an Inland bass will typically be thinner.

But Andress noted that the last sampling they did several springs ago turned up quite a few largemouths in the 15- to 20-inch range.

He said the fishermen they've talked to at Inland seem to be content with the lake, but he noted that it takes some specialized fishing to be successful here.

"The anglers we spoke to were catching fish in 15 to 30 feet of water at night and 30 to 40 feet during the day," the biologist explained.

The spotted bass shocked up during the last sampling were mostly in the 7- to 11-inch range.

"There are a lot of small spotted bass with some larger largemouths mixed in," Andress offered.

Chris Stephenson likes to fish plastic grubs when he visits Inland Lake. He generally uses smoke color on a 1/8-ounce leadhead.

"You go smaller because it is so clear," the angler emphasized. "Going smaller also makes your lure fall slower, and you want that."

You can back way off rocky points and bluffs and fish a topwater. Stephenson said that technique of making long casts is similar to how you might fish for smallmouths on more northerly waters.