Photo by Ron Sinfelt.

Largemouth bass fishing is certainly a year-round sport in South Carolina. The bass-fishing fever may reach a peak in terms of numbers of anglers during the spring when largemouths are near the shoreline. As the weather warms and the fishing patterns change, the number of bass fishermen dwindles as shallow-water fishing slows. However, there are plenty of bass anglers who never give up the chase. Both tournament anglers and just plain ol' die-hard fishermen spend long hours on the water.

The key to success during hot weather is to change the way you fish based on the specific lake. Many fishermen figure the bass go very deep and become lethargic, but that's not true in some lakes. In fact, while the fish may retreat a bit from the shoreline during the summer, they do not necessarily go very deep.

While some anglers may be surprised to hear it, many fishermen not only catch bass, they catch plenty of quality fish throughout the heat of the summer. While the excellent fishing is available at several lakes in South Carolina, we're going to examine two lakes that offer outstanding summertime fishing: Greenwood and Wateree. Moreover, the majority of the largemouth bass action in both lakes is in relatively shallow water.

In fact, that's one reason many anglers at these lakes find them great fisheries in the summer: The fish do not go extremely deep as a rule.

The bass are not tremendously deep in these lakes because both lakes tend to stratify during the summer months. This stratification causes the dissolved oxygen to become too low for fish to thrive at deeper water depths for extended periods. Thus, these two lakes will often produce sensational fishing in relatively shallow water during this time of the year.

The lakes share several other similarities. Both lakes have ample underwater structure and cover combinations at depths just above the thermocline. These structures are typically found at very fishable depths.

The best news is that you don't have to be a professional fisherman to score excellent catches. You can target relatively shallow water and be effective with a variety of lures, which greatly increases the chances that one of the effective lures or presentations will be one of your "confidence" baits.

The key is to be willing to spend the time to find the hotspots that change from one day to the next.

Bass fishermen will not all key on the same structures; usually, the structure anglers pick here will be based on the lures they prefer to use. For example, on Lake Greenwood I learned several years ago from an angler that the numerous shallow-water hazard markers around the lake have more in common than simply marking hazards. He noted, and demonstrated to me, that these hazards are typically shallow areas in the lake surrounded by deeper water. Some marked hazards are quite small, others somewhat large in size.

The attractive aspect of these for the bass is the typical quick deep-to-shallow change in water depth. The local expert who pointed this out to me considers these places to be prime summertime largemouth bass targets. These are not the only spots he'll fish, but he seldom passes one without chunking a few casts. Over the course of a day of fishing, he'll expect a half-dozen or more bites just from these places. During July, that many extra bites can very easily turn a decent day into an excellent one.