What are your successful actions for fishing in the heat? This is open to all tips, including but not limited to time of day, ways to stay cooler - heck any way to stay comfortable and enjoy some fishing.
We don’t start fishing until midnight w/ lanterns and headlights. By then, it’s a nice 63 or so. We still manage to catch our limits which is great. The only drawback is that it’s hard to get to work by 8 if you’re crawling in at 400 in the morning.
During extremely hot days, I usually find that I can catch a good number of fish under pretty much any sort of bridge. I’ve lit into a good number of crappie many times this summer by sidearming a few casts under a low bridge.
Wade wet
Sometimes all the way to my hat 
I don’t fish much in midday and I do fish in shady streams that get only a limited amount of direct sunlight throughout the day.
Most already know this, but I will post it anyway. When bass fishing in the heat, speed up your retrieve. Bass will hit a faster moving bait…I will just wildly jerk & burn Dahlberg Divers & Sneaky Petes during the dog days My best technique for Dahlberg Divers is to basically do a very aggressive “strip set” (as in setting the hook) followed by a short pause, then repeat. Sure does work for me!
Mike
DRINK!!! water so you don’t dehydrate. Something like gatorade is a good idea as well. Hat, sunscreen etc.
Fish the shady side of the water (if that exists). Look to get near some inlets as the water is often cooler there. Deep holes also are cooler.
jed
Well, its not getting any cooler and I need to go fishing in the worst sort of way (pun intended)
So I am going to have to break down and wake up at a wee hour and hit the water while its purple outside.
Robin there’s a house for rent right near where I live.
It was hot here also, mid 70’s slight breeze. Should be cool again tonight and more of the same tomorrow. I’ll get my digs in now, you can get back at me in December… January… February and March too.
jed
Soaking a bandana in the cool water and wrapping it around your neck will help to cool you down also.
While at the city library today I read an interesting article in Kansas Wildlife & Parks magazine, which said:
During hot weather, the best time to fish will generally be in the evening. This is because warmer water does not hold oxygen well. The oxygen level available to the fish will be more in the evening, because the aquatic plants have had all day to photosynthesize (and give off oxygen as a waste product). The sun sets, photosynthesis shuts down and everything starts going downhill.
During hot summer nights, overnight the water gives off its oxygen rather quickly to the atmosphere, and this hurts because there wasn’t much O2 to start with. So it’s best to go out right around sundown/dusk/early evening, while the fish are enjoying the highest oxygen concentration of that day. Windy days, you also gain the benefit of the water being oxygenated by wave action.
Lots more detail in the article, maybe it can be accessed on line?
Joe
“Better small than not at all.”
Robin, I feel your pain. Ah, the memories of 100+ days and sweltering humidity.
Just to rub it in, the closest fishing water to me is a lake at 9000+ feet. We were there a week ago and it was COLD in the mornings.
But to your question. Here are some things that helped me when I was in your boat.
Wear a ventilated, light weight shirt. Dampen a bandanna and slide it under your cap or hat. Wet wade spring fed creeks. Float tube ponds and small lakes in swim trunks.
Fish the last hour of daylight and the first hour of dusk/darkness. A second rod pre-rigged will provide more fishing when the leader on the one you are using gets hopelessly tangled and all light is gone.
Carry a frozen bottle of water and use it to cool your neck occasionally. Drink it as it melts. Avoid alcohol, at least until you are home and the 'gills are cleaned.
Jim
Now a reply from a fellow Texan…Double R do as I do and stay indoors near the air conditioner and watch the electric bill go up, and tie lots of flies. Shoot there ani’t no water left anyway due to this drought were having, heck I have grandchildren that are a couple years old and they believe that rain is a myth…
Hey hoboflyfisher,
You should check out the action an hour down the road in Austin. 
The area of town lake is doing okay even though it is a little low. I am one of the only flyfishers I know who hits this area. The rest of the town doesn’t fish very much and almost no one flyfishes. I have pulled out some nice bass and panfish resently. Maybe a road trip could be fun.
Sarge.
Fish flies very slowly and let them drop more than yu move them horizontally. Try to fish the breaklines, to let the flies drop along them.
Do a lift and drop etrieve as you bring the fly in.
I picked up 38 bluegills and about 20 bass this last Sunday afternoon.
Half on flies that dropped and the other half tossing a small black & yellow popper under any trees along the edge.
Only one or two fish to a place so it is better to be in a boat or something to move around easier.
Rick
Robin, I always wear a hat that can be dunked in the water,if it’s possible wade at least neck deep(can’t anymore,but…)occasionally. Dunno about the O2 thingie mentioned earlier, but for my sake I like mornings best. Even in the hottest of weather I usually find some willing gills, and poppers of all colors,shapes and types are my favorite weapons…even if I do catch a lot of dinks.