Ok, I have read dozens of magazine and website articles, watched a few shows on TV about this subject, and noticed some basic similarities like how the fish tend to bunch up in deep water and that you should retrieve your lure slower. Some had pretty good advice, but lacked explanation. Others were a bit silly by comparing the level of comfort in cold weather of humans to fish. Most of them were still pretty good and made some sense, but I think what I was looking for were a few facts, so I could decide what might work best in the lakes that I fish. So, what are some facts about bass fishing in Georgia lakes during the winter? For starters it is important to keep in mind that the water doesn’t change temperature as rapidly as the air, it is a slow gradually change, so when it is 50 degrees one day and 30 the next the fish can’t tell it. It seems that the thermacline (distinct layer of water between the warmer surface zone and the colder deep zone) disappears and the water is mostly the same temperature throughout most of the lake. That being said, I got to thinking, why would the fish stay bunched up in a deep hole? Do they see each other as cover? After considering that the temperature in the lake is nearly constant throughout, I thought what else is important about the water, to a fish? You need to know what part of the water holds the most oxygen during the winter to figure out where the fish are. With the thermacline gone, the oxygen also seems to be spread pretty evenly throughout the lake. This is where, the need to know the facts, comes in to play. Unless you are fishing a small bowl shaped pond with only a small steam feeding it, the water temperature and the amount of dissolved oxygen can vary. What you need to know is what causes those variations. That is why many of the articles I read say that you can catch fish in many of the same places using the same tactics (slowed down) throughout the entire year; it depends on the lake you are fishing. In a lake like the one described above there isn’t much difference from one spot to the next to attract the fish to one particular spot, except that maybe one side (usually northeast side) of the lake may get more sun than another, which warms the water and makes photo synthesis in plankton possible, which creates oxygen. So, the fish will bunch up in lakes that have places where there is more oxygen, like near creek channels, where oxygen is brought in from the creek and spots that are exposed to more sunlight keeping the water warmer and more plankton alive creating more oxygen. Now, why do we need to slow our retrieve? Well, that is simple, compared to the later, bass and nearly everything else in the water are cold blooded, meaning their body temperature will be the same as the water temperature. Since everything in their body is tuned to its circulatory system temperature when they get cold, their metabolism, all the other chemicals in their bodies and even their brain slows down. Everything happens much slower in cold water, from the animals movements to their digestive systems. Bass usually require at least 12 hours to digest their food under the best conditions. Since digestion is a chemical process, the rate of the process is subject to body temperature. Normally, when the water temperatures range from 70-80 degrees, bass digest the food in their stomach in about 18 hours. But in winter, the same bass would take four days or longer to digest their food. Another important thing to consider is forage, what do the bass in your lake eat during the winter. Through the spring summer and fall they have a multitude of things to feast upon like insects, frogs, worms, turtles, mice, birds, snakes, crawfish, and other fish. Consider for a moment what happens to some of them in the winter. Since the insects are all but gone, birds only come by for water. With seeds from the plants around the lake being scarce, mice and rats only visit for water. Frogs and turtles lay at the bottom of the lake motionless hidden under something. Snakes hardly venture out from the log they are hidden under. That leaves 3 main sources of food, worms, crawdads and other fish. Considering that minnows and small fish are in need of the same thing as the bass, oxygen and food, like plankton, that puts them closer to the bass than the rest of the forage, and that is why I believe that they feed mostly on minnows during the winter. So, for me I think the best bait would be jerk or suspending crank bait on the sunniest side of the lake or at the back of the lake near a creek channel. Hopefully I have given you enough information for you to decide what is best for you.