Widespread rains, and early-week flooding in the Phoenix areas, have generally helped drop water temperatures. Look for fish to possibly get more active. It can take a couple of days or more for the fish to get active again, but when they do you will likely see them enter more aggressive feeding patterns.


For starters, the top-water striper bite, especially at Lake Pleasant, should begin to pick up. Get there at first light or you might miss the boils. Cover lots of water and look for birds or surface activity. Try top-water lures, jerkbaits and flies. (Zara Spook Juniors and buzzbaits tend to be successful this time of the year.)


Lake levels at the Salt River chain lakes did not rise as much as some anglers might expect, but there was enough rain to cool the water temperatures. Many anglers are reporting the bite at desert lakes has been slowing considerably after the sun comes up -- get out early. If you do brave the high sun, find the depth the fish are at, then see what color is hot. Be persistent when finding the right color -- a simple change from a morning dawn Powerworm to a red crawler, for example, can make a big difference.


As water temperatures slowly drop during this fall transition, fish will move up in the water column, along with shad. Top-water options will improve. This is a good weekend to try surface plugs, especially at dusk and dawn.


And be sure to check out the Lake Powell information in the full report. You might run into some of the best fishing you'll find this year for striped bass, smallmouth bass and largemouth bass.


In the high country, the cool, refreshing rain might just be the ticket to lower water temperatues that get the bite going there as well, assuming that associated runoff doesn't make the water turbid. Trout don't always like cloudy water.


This might just be the event to bring the trout into the shallows at places like Big Lake, Woods Canyon, Willow Springs and the like. Already last week at Big Lake, some trout were busting surface bugs in the shallows at sunset.


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