"You can catch some pretty good fish at Inland doing this," Stephenson added.

Crankbaits also work well, as do spinnerbaits. The crankbaits should match the color of baitfish, while solid chartreuse seems to be a good spinnerbait color.

Light spinning tackle is a good choice on Inland Lake because of the clarity of the water.

"There are a lot of spots in this lake," Stephenson said. "A lot of them are in the 10- to 15-inch range."

A creek feeding into the lower end of the lake is a good place to spend some time.

"You need to watch the water levels on this lake," the fisherman concluded. "There are times when the water is so low that you can't even launch a boat."

The lake's primary boat ramp is on the upper end; there is a nominal fee to launch.

BANKHEAD & HOLT LAKES
These lakes on the Black Warrior River west of Birmingham don't draw nearly the fishing pressure of Logan Martin to the east. But Chris Stephenson said they're great places to go to have a good time and load the boat with fish.

"You need to be fishing these lakes in the spring, especially Bankhead," he pointed out. "You can fish the weedbeds and the blown-down trees. It is close-contact fishing at its finest. You can catch 100 bass a day here in the spring."

Stephenson likes to look for downed trees in 5 to 10 feet of water. Then he works a jig-and-pig around those trees.

"You can pick up some nice fish doing this," he noted.

He also likes to jig around any weeds he can find.

"You might catch a 7-pounder on one cast and then the next fish you get is only 6 inches long and you snatch it clean out of the water," Stephenson said.

Holt covers some 3,296 acres, and Bankhead another 9,200 acres. There is a lot of structure in the water in terms of weeds and trees, and that makes both real bass havens.

The lakes are often thought of as sister lakes because the same fishing patterns work equally well on both.

District III fisheries biologist Jay Haffner said Bankhead is by far the better of the two lakes. Forestry and mining activities on surrounding lands have negatively impacted Holt.