"One of the first places fish go when they're moving from deep water is riprap," Olive said. "Once they move to riprap, their next move is into the creeks. During the pre-spawn period, an angler can fish nothing but riprap and do very well at Falls and Jordan lakes."

Olive likes to parallel-fish riprap using long casts with lipless crankbaits and spinnerbaits. On his way to fish other places, he never passes under a bridge without casting one of these baits at the four riprap corners of the bridge, especially at Jordan Lake, where there are productive bridges at White Oak and Beaver creeks and at Farrington and at Highway 64, which bisects the main lake.

Dinterman and Cable said the riprap at both lakes is not as productive as it used to be because of heavy fishing pressure, though such places still yield good numbers of quality fish.

"I even hate to mention riprap when I speak of these lakes because these places can get overly crowded with fishermen," Dinterman said.

Otherwise, Dinterman said the key structure at both lakes is natural rock, wherever it's present along the bank in 4 to 6 feet of water.

"There's no offshore fishing in April or need to look for deep, rocky ledges or places like that," he said. "Just slow-roll a spinnerbait off the bank where there is rock or use small, shallow-running crankbaits."

Of the two lakes, Cable said Falls has better structure with plenty of rock. Subtle rocky and gravel places near spawning grounds at the backs of creeks shouldn't be overlooked. They can be fished with jigs, spinnerbaits and lipless crankbaits. In early April with cold water, jerkbaits may produce.

"You need to mix up your bait presentation at this time of year," Cable said. "Let the fish indicate which baits they prefer on a given day."

Dinterman employs a similar approach.

"You need to cover lots of water until you find the fish," he said. "Try shallow-running crankbaits and follow those up with jigs to get those extra bites once you've found the fish."

High Water Bush Pattern
If it rains heavily and the lakes are high and stained, Dinterman said there will be a good flipping bite with jigs and plastics at the backs of creeks at both lakes.