The scene was Pymatuning Lake, late last week, during a perfect morning, fishing-wise. The mild south wind rippled the surface; slightly overcast skies defused the morning sun.

I stopped the boat on the south side of a small, submerged hump that topped off in 14 feet of water, positioning things so the crest of the structure was a cast away. I cast a 5/8-ounce Acme Hyper Rattle about 50 feet, allowing the heavy lure to rocket to the bottom. The retrieve that followed was a series of aggressive snaps of the rod and then several turns of the reel to take in the resulting slack.

The first cast didn’t result in a strike, but the third one did. Before I left the small structure, and a similar one nearby, I’d taken eight nice walleyes and two channel cats.

Large lakes such as Pymatuning often offer extensive underwater structure, places with the potential to hold fish. And many times, they do. But fish using large flats, points, submerged flats are often roaming fish, ones moving about rather than staying put. Smaller structures offer the advantage that if fish are present, you’ll be putting your lure in front of them. Typically, you’ll know in a few casts whether to stay put (because you made fish contact) or move on to the next spot.

Smaller targets also tend to be overlooked by other anglers. With the accurate cartography presently available on many lakes – and electronic chartplotters that allow anglers to create their own maps -- there aren’t many “secret spots” left. A tiny structure might not hold many fish, but the ones there might not see a host of lures.

That said, the biggest structures in a lake certainly are worth fishing, even if they can be termed community holes, referring to the consistent fishing pressure they experience. One of the keys to working major structural elements is to find the spot-on-the-stop. Often this exists in cover that holds fish – a few stumps, a submerged branch embedded in the bottom, a scattering of rock or boulders. Rather than pounding the water, trying to fish the whole thing, it’s often better to zero in on the prime potential fish holding areas. These are the kinds of places one learns from fishing a lake or river consistently. Paying attention to what’s different about a spot that regularly produces fish can easily equate into future success.

I can think of a couple examples that bear this out. Roughly 20 years ago, when I first started fishing the free-flowing section of the Allegheny River, I went through a progression of learning how fish use the various types of habitat. It’s still an ongoing, and I must say enjoyable, process. But in doing so I came to find that the biggest smallmouth bass are often found in unlikely looking places.

One that comes to mind is a wide, relatively shallow flat. At first glance, it seems devoid of habitat. In reality, though, it’s seasoned with slightly deeper troughs, a scattering of submerged boulders, and eelgrass beds. Over the years we’ve caught and released dozens of 18-to-21-inch bass from the area, so many that my regular clients call it the “pig pen.”

Another example is the end of a long, extended point on nearby Keystone Lake. While the entire point can be productive for bass, often it’s the end of the point, located near the junction of secondary and primary creek channel, that’s best. The point drops off quickly from 12 to nearly 30 feet of water and is riddled with stumps. It’s an excellent area for the drop shot rig.

In many situations, thinking small and keeping an eye on details can work out in a big way.

Jeff Knapp is an outdoors columnist for the Butler Eagle