Fish are some of the most interesting creatures on earth! They come in an amazing variety of species and sizes. They live in virtually all waters where their life basics are available to them. Some are predators; they feed on other fish and aquatic creatures. Others are prey species, spending their lives in danger of being gobbled by larger fish that share their waters.
The first step in learning to catch fish is learning about fish: which species are available, where they can be found, and what they eat. The more you know about your target species’ life habits, the more likely you are to catch them. Many expert anglers learn even the smallest details about the daily patterns of the fish they’re after. This helps them locate the fish and select just the right bait and technique to make them bite.
Following is a brief look at the freshwater fish species that are most popular with North American anglers. As your fishing skills grow and you become more specialized, you should add to this knowledge until you have a broad understanding of where to find individual species and what to do to catch them under varying conditions.
Many authorities consider black bass to be the most important fish in North America. Actually, this group (genus Micropterus) includes three popular species: largemouth bass, smallmouth bass and spotted bass. These fish are closely related genetically, but they differ in the waters they prefer, favorite foods, spawning habits and other life basics.
The largemouth is the most abundant bass, and it grows larger than smallmouth or spotted bass. Largemouth live in natural lakes, reservoirs, rivers, streams and ponds from Mexico to Canada and from the East Coast to the West Coast. These fish normally feed and rest in quiet, relatively shallow water, and they like to hold around such cover as vegetation, rocks, logs, stumps, brush, etc.
Largemouth Bass
Smallmouth Bass
As with many species, largemouth bass grow bigger in southern states where warmer weather provides a longer growing season. In Florida, Georgia, Texas, southern California, Mexico and other southern climes, largemouths over 15 pounds are occasionally boated. On the other hand, in northern states and Canadian provinces, largemouths over 7 pounds are rare. The world-record largemouth bass was caught in south Georgia in 1932. It weighed 22 pounds 4 ounces.
Largemouth bass are predators that eat a wide range of foods. Their primary diet consists of baitfish, crawfish, frogs and insects, but they will also strike baby ducks, mice, snakes and virtually any other living creature that it can swallow.
Smallmouth bass prefer clearer, cooler waters than largemouth. They like a rocky or sandy environment, and they adapt well to medium-strength currents. Because of these preferences, they thrive in streams, lakes and reservoirs of the Northeast, Midwest and southern Canadian provinces. Also, the Great Lakes support huge smallmouth populations. Smallmouth bass occur naturally as far south as north Alabama and Georgia, and they have been successfully stocked into lakes and rivers west of the Rockies. The world-record smallmouth was caught in Tennessee in 1969. It weighed 10 pounds 14 ounces.
Smallmouth bass are also feeding opportunists. Their favorite prey are minnows and crawfish, but they will also eat a wide variety of other foods when available.
Spotted bass (also called “Kentucky bass”) are the third common member of the black bass family. For years this fish was confused with both largemouth and smallmouth bass, but it was recognized as a distinct species in 1927.
The spotted bass is something of an intermediate species between the largemouth and smallmouth both in appearance and habits. Its name comes from rows of small, dark spots running from head to tail below a lateral band of dark-green, diamond-shaped blotches. Spotted bass occur naturally from Texas to Georgia and north up the Mississippi, Ohio and Missouri River drainages. These fish have also been stocked in several western states. In fact, the current world-record spotted bass (10 pounds 4 ounces) was caught in California in 2001.
Spotted bass like some current, but not too much. They like deep water, but not as deep as smallmouth prefer. They collect in large schools and chase baitfish in open water. They feed primarily on baitfish, crawfish and insects.
Some lakes contain all three of these black bass species. Largemouth will be back in the quiet coves. Smallmouth will hold along deep shorelines and main lake reefs; and spotted bass will roam through the open lake in search of prey. Sometimes these three bass species will mix to feed on the same food source. However, more often each species stays in areas where it feels most comfortable.
Spawning habits of black bass species are similar. When water temperature approaches the mid-50° F range, these fish all go on feeding binges to build up energy for the approaching egg-laying, and hatching process. Smallmouth and spotted bass begin nesting when the water temperature approaches 60°. These fish usually establish their nests on main-lake shorelines or flats, frequently next to a stump, rock, log, etc. that offers some shelter. Largemouth prefer 65° water before spawning, and they will fan their nests in wind-protected areas along the sides or back of lake embayments. Largemouth typically nest in shallower water (2–5 feet on average) than smallmouth or spotted bass.
—Wade Bourne
We’d fished Florida’s Lake Okeechobee hard that November day, and the bass didn’t hit well at all. We were trying to do a film segment for my TV fishing show, but the largemouths gave us very little cooperation. We’d thrown Johnson Spoons and plastic worms to the edges of the grass as well as back in the thick vegetation, and turned half a dozen fish. I was fishing with John Petre, who was my cameraman back then. His duties were to film, and if the fish were hitting and the sun was out bright, he didn’t have time to fish.
Feeding bass will strike just about anything.
John really enjoyed fishing, and he didn’t say much about not getting to cast, but when the sun finally started dipping down below the horizon, he let out a little warwhoop and said it was his turn to fish. He was a light-tackle enthusiast, and he picked up his favorite little spinning rod and started throwing a small Rapala to the edge of the grass. What he was trying seemed a little ridiculous to me, because I thought his tackle was too light for Florida bass.
We came up to a main lake point leading back into a cove, and John flipped out and let the Rapala lie there for several seconds. A slight sucking sound was audible, and he set the hook and a bass bored down and headed out deep, With his light tackle, I took it for granted that he’d hooked nothing more than a 2-pounder. Suddenly a 5-pounder blew out of the water. He battled it and finally landed it. That was the biggest one we’d caught all day.
Five or six casts later he repeated this episode and got another one about the same size. That one also hit at the edge of the grass. We continued back in the cove, and I was still throwing Johnson Spoons and worms to the thick grass. John spotted a patch of submerged milfoil, and he threw in there and on three consecutive casts he got sucking strikes. He hooked and landed the bass, all of which were in the 2-to-6-pound range. He had five bass and I hadn’t had a strike since he’d started fishing, and he’d got ten, all of ‘em in less than ten minutes.
He was using a No. 11 gold Rapala on 8-pound line and a spinning rod. I happened to have an identical rig in my rod-storage locker, so I got it out and tied it on. We stayed in the back of that cove and for the next forty-five minutes we really slaughtered the bass. Richard Stunkard was in my backup boat. This was his first filming trip with us, and we were using him as a bird dog. He was the world’s worst, most horrible fisherman, and he’d never caught any bass. All week long he was using a rod and reel I’d lent him, and I’d send him over to different points and tell him to cast a worm or a Johnson Spoon around, and if he got any sort of a strike he was to come back and report it. If he got one strike, it meant we could go to that spot and get probably thirty. Richard is a cousin to Jim Stunkard, my executive producer.
Anyhow, Richard put on a Rapala just before I did, and quickly he caught three bass. When I tried a Rapala I too started catching bass. I was getting them on an average of every other cast. I got to noticing there wasn’t any wind that night, and Okeechobee was mirror-calm. This was very unusual, because the lake is forty miles wide.
We ended up catching twenty-five bass from 2 to 8 pounds. John caught the eight-pounder, and I ended up catching one about 6½. I know bass sometimes go on heavy feeds during the evening, but this was twenty-five bass in an hour. We had another fifteen strikes we didn’t get. What we’d experienced was a feeding frenzy
Most fishermen think that most bass strike because they’re hungry. Actually I find that hunger accounts for maybe no more than a third of my strikes— but that third is a very important part of the bass I catch. Maybe 35 percent of the time early in the morning or late in the evening the bass are on the feed.
In major slow periods the bass will feed for a short period of time. Another condition that causes bass to feed quite often is a weather change, such as a barometric drop or an approaching storm or possibly some cloud cover which has moved in—all of which affect atmospheric pressure and temperature. Another thing that could influence bass to feed would be a warming trend after a cold front.
There are several reasons bass feed. Feeding bass are the easiest to catch. You can catch them on almost any lure in your tackle box, because basically all lures at one time or other will catch feeding fish.
A productive way to work the shallow feeding flats is quietly wading and using spinning tackle and a Rapala. Wading provides a low silhouette that is less likely to spook fish in shallow water.
My favorite, most basic pattern for catching feeding fish would be a dawn-and-dusk surface-plug pattern. I call this pattern—remember, I’m using the word “pattern” to mean the sum total of all the variables in the fishing situation—my topwater treat. It involves getting out before the sun rises or in the twilight hours of the morning or after the sun is setting in the evening and that magical hour begins, because there’s no direct sun on the water
It’s the time of day when generally the convection currents are low and there is very little sun to move the air around, producing almost a slick or mirror-calm surface. Another condition that is very important to this type of surface action is water temperature. You need warm water, in the 70-degree zone: 70 and up for your best surface-bait fishing.
The best depth would be the shallow depths less than 5 feet. The best cover would be any kind of an ambush point in the form of a stump or a rock or any type of a grass point. The best structure is a point—basically a main-lake point.
Reflex action is the second most important reason fish strike, particularly why bass strike, and it accounts for 20 to 25 percent of the bass I catch in a year’s time. A bass’s reflex action is like the behavior of any predator—like a cat pouncing on a mouse.
A lurking bass is seeking two things. He’s seeking shade for his non-eyelidded eyes. He can’t stand direct sunlight, at least not for very long, so he’s going to try to shade his eyes in the shadow of a boulder or a bush or a boat dock. Second, and probably more important, is that, being a predator, he is seeking concealment to hide or camouflage his body from the wary eyes of small baitfish of some description. So the bass is in the shadows of an object, in this case an ambush point.
Reflex action brought a strike from this 7-pounder, lurking in the shade of an old dock piling.
To get a reflex strike you need one of two types of lures; either a crank bait or a spinnerbait. They are fast-moving lures which come whipping through there. The concept of reflex-action fishing is to try to throw the lure right on the fish instead of just throwing past the bush, past the stump, or past the ambush point and quickly cranking the spinnerbait or crank bait right down to where you think he is. I think about which way the sun’s shining so I can fish on the shady side. I think about which way the wind is blowing, because the wind will automatically position the fish on these shallow cover areas. If the wind is blowing from the north, the fish will be facing the wind because of the current it creates. They can’t swim backward, and they face the current. I conjure up a mental image of exactly where that bass is positioned. Then I theoretically try to snag the fish—I’m trying to get right to his eyes. And really the lure is coming right at the fish, right at his eyes, and at the last second he can do one of two things. He can either move out of the way or he can strike it in self-defense, and quite often, since bass are fairly bold and pugnacious, they will strike at that lure simply out of reflex action. Taking advantage of the reflex action requires a very experienced fisherman with an eye or feel for the right kind of spot, and a little bit of analytical thought concerning the sun and which way the wind is blowing.
A fast moving spinnerbait or a crank bait is the best lure to coax a reflex strike.
Another condition which is better for reflex-action fishing is a cool water temperature, because that means the lure can get just a little bit closer to the bass before he knows it’s there. This is kind of an advantage. Water between 45 and 65 degrees is probably best for the spinnerbait and crank bait, because the fish does not detect the presence of the lure until it is pretty much right on top of him. Then he can see it and strike it.
When the water is muddy, it is the hotter water temperatures that are better for reflex-action strikes. When the water is below 50 degrees and muddy, you hardly ever get strikes on these kinds of lures. If the water temperature is from 60 to 90, and the water is real muddy, you’ll get a lot of good reflex strikes. Here the fish doesn’t see the lure well, but his lateral sensitivity is such that he detects its presence at the last second and he strikes it.
The pattern most representative of reflex-action strikes is bumping the stump with a crank bait. This is simply a great pattern because that’s just a natural feeding spot. The best cover might be a stump on an exposed point, where the wave action has eroded under the roots so that there are some areas beneath that stump which the fish can use as his lair.
The best depth probably is less than 6 feet, because, remember, you need to make visual contact with these ambush points. You need to be able to identify where they are, and the best way is to spot them with Polaroid sunglasses. So look for stumps in about two to six feet of water.
The third most important reason bass strike is out of anger. Quite often the first cast you make to a spot produces a reflex strike or a hunger strike. But if you just keep throwing into the same spot and the fish isn’t hungry, or the fish wasn’t quite close enough to the lure, maybe after six, eight, or even ten casts he just gets thoroughly upset at that lure swimming through there. Any lure can invoke an anger strike if it is fished persistently enough.
There is a story I like to tell about when I really got onto the concept of anger fishing and started using it as a regular way to catch fish. This was in 1967 at Santee-Cooper Reservoir. I had just fished the evening before along this one grass point and had caught a couple of pretty good bass there, so early the next morning I told my guide party, a Mr. Smith, that I’d been catching a lot of fish on a Johnson Spoon by sweeping it across these grass points, particularly early in the morning.
This 10-pound, 2-ounce largemouth is a prime example of what can happen when you aggravate a bass into striking out of anger. it took 20 casts to anger this Santee-Cooper bass into striking back.
So on the very first cast Mr. Smith made on this point in the grass, a tremendous bass makes a big wave and sucks up that spoon. He halfway sets the hook and the fish wiggles and right away is gone. The fish really didn’t get a chance to feel the hook, so I said, “Throw back! Mr. Smith, he might hit again!”
Well, Mr. Smith threw back about three or four times, and I’m holding the boat with the trolling motor trying to keep him in good casting range. After six or seven casts he said, “Boy! That’s the biggest fish I’ve ever had strike in my life. I bet that fish went 8 to 10 pounds.”
I told him not to give up and that he might be able to catch him yet. He said, “No, after six or eight casts, he’s not hitting now.”
I suggested we anchor, and said I’d bet we could catch that fish if we just kept at it. He suggested we both cast. So I picked up my spoon. We had heavy 20-pound line and heavy casting rods. We made alternate casts to the grasspoint.
Finally, after about thirty casts, Mr. Smith began looking down the lake and he said, “What about those other grass points down there?” I said we’d go hit ‘em— they were good spots and I was confident we could catch a fish or two off them—but I knew that there was a monster right here. He reminded me we’d made forty casts, and he said the big one was not going to hit. So he actually started throwing the other way. He acted kind of disgusted waiting for me to get tired of fishing this part of the lake, because he wanted to go try to get another one.
When I started fishing, I started counting. On the seventy-sixth cast, a 9-pound, 6-ounce largemouth bass launched himself through the canopy of the thick grass and skyrocketed right through my Johnson Spoon, actually clearing the water.
I’ve had bass hit on repeated casts, but undoubtedly this one hit with the most vengeance, the most anger, and the most power that I’ve ever seen. This was undoubtedly the angriest fish in the whole lake.
Since then on many occasions when I’ve located a bass I’ve made repeated casts. Quite often I will pull up to a spot which looks good and has all the depth, all the cover, and all the structure that is perfect for fish, and I’ll tell my partner I know there’s got to be bass here. Quite often I’ll bet five dollars on it.
And sometimes the guy will say he’d bet a dollar against it. In a normal situation when I’m real positive, I’ll just stop and anchor and cast from ten to fifteen times. Maybe on the first cast he’ll hit, but after ten to fifteen casts in the same spot, I’ll make him mad.
Probably the best lure for this is a crank bait or a buzz bait, which enables you to make a lot of casts. It’s not the lure that’s important, but recognizing a situation that demands repeated casts.
Protective instinct involves the spawning season. Largemouth bass spawn when the water temperature reaches 62 degrees, and smallmouth bass spawn when it reaches 59 degrees. No matter where you live, this is true. Generally the majority of bass spawn at or near a full moon. So in the southern United States—say in Florida, Alabama, and Georgia—quite often that first full moon in February or even late January might be a good spawning moon. In North Carolina and Virginia quite often they will spawn on the full moon in March and April. Up in Pennsylvania and Ohio, they spawn in May, and in the southern part of Canada and in the northern part of the U.S., they spawn as late as June. Theoretically, if you travel the country as I do, you have a six-month spawning season.
Another characteristic of spawning fish is that they never all spawn at the same time. Maybe 60 percent of the bass will spawn on the first good moon. On Santee-Cooper I learned my ABC’s of bass fishing during seven years as guide, and every spring I would utilize my spawning patterns. Santee is a 171,000-acre reservoir, and you hit a lot of different water temperatures around the lake. In the warmer parts they spawn earlier than they do in the colder areas of Santee.
Bass often spawn for a six-week period on a large reservoir.
The best pattern and the best way to catch a spawning bass involves crawling a plastic worm through the spawning bed. People who catch spawning bass often are unaware that the fish are spawning. They’re throwing plastic worms by bushes and little stickups and in the backs of the coves. They’re not watching, and they don’t have Polaroid glasses. They’re not looking to see if there’s a spawning bed there. They just feel a strike, set the hook, and catch a bass.
I look for the north or northwest coves, and there’s a reason for this. On most lakes in the northern hemisphere, the cold winds come from the north. When the cold fronts come down from the north, they push cold water to the south side of the lake, so they are often 10 degrees colder in the spring than the north shores. Also, when a warm front hits, it blows generally from the south, and these are warm winds. Again, the warm winds push the water, so when they push from the south, warm water is piled up against the north bank.
There’s another reason I like to look for north banks. That is because of the southern sun exposure. The sun is still in the southern quadrant, and there’s less shade created on the northern bank. The southern banks have the tall pine trees and a lot of shade. Bass seek sunny places for spawning areas. Bass also seek a hard bottom—they’ll spawn on a mud bottom, too, but when they can find it, they will look for a sand bar. So quite often the pattern you are looking for involves finding a firm bottom on a north bank.
When they spawn they have a protective instinct. They hit not because of hunger or anger but merely because they’re trying to guard the bed. They try to kill the intruder.
The male is the more aggressive fish. He builds the nest and goes out and rounds up the female. She is on the bed usually for only seventy-two hours, and then stays around for another two or three days. So she’s there only for four or five days. The male guards the nest for an additional two to three weeks. He is there nearly a month. You’re going to catch a lot more bass at spawning time, since the female is there a much shorter period.
This 11-pounder bass was taken off of a spawning bed on Lake Okeechobee in 1987. But, realizing the importance of releasing such big spawners, it was quickly releasing unharmed.
When a male bass is caught, the biggest mistake many bass fishermen make is to move off the area and try somewhere else. Sure enough, they catch another male bass, but they don’t catch any female bass—the trophies—because they’re not fishing for them. They’re just fishing for the males that hit first. To catch the females, you have to stop and make repeated casts to the spot. Possibly you’re making them mad or angry. So maybe the big female doesn’t hit the first couple of casts. Maybe she gets mad as well as having the protective instinct.
While the fish are spawning they are also hungry in the early-morning hours, so your best time to catch a spawner would be at dawn with your very first cast, which might cause a reflex strike or provoke a protective instinct. If that doesn’t work, make a lot of repeated casts and provoke the anger.
A minor reason bass strike is out of curiosity. This amounts to only about 2 percent of the time, but it’s still worth considering. Occasionally you see fish cruising around in clear water, such as in a gravel pit or a small pond. I’ve caught these fish because they were curious. They’re not hungry. It’s the middle of the day and they’re out sunning themselves or just cruising around.
The largemouth is just crusing, not actively feeding—but don’t ignore it; maybe you can make it curious.
One of the best ways to catch them is by twitching a small surface plug. I take a small topwater bait and sneak up on them where the fish can’t see me. I don’t cast right on the top of the fish because that might scare them. I throw within 8 to 10 feet of them so I know they’ll see the lure floating there. When the bait splats down, instantly you’ll see the fins raise on the fish, and next you see him turn and look at the plug. Most of the time the fish is not going to do anything.
When he starts to turn away, I barely twitch that lure, and the little bit of movement gets him interested again. Invariably he moves in just a little bit closer. He’ll look at it and maybe half-circle it.
I spotted this bass crusing in clear water behind the reeds in Lake Okeechobee and coaxed it into hitting a small Rapala.
The plug lies there for ten to fifteen seconds, and again the fish turns to move away slightly. Then I twitch it again, and the bass circles right up beneath it. Again the plug is still, and he starts to sink or turn. I twitch it once more, and he’ll suck it in.
Many of these kinds of strikes are merely gentle sucking strikes with no more ripple than a popping bug makes when it’s taken by a bluegill. A plastic worm fished on the bottom can produce the same type of strike: it’s the same concept.
When you’re structure fishing in deep water, you’re fishing for bass schooled up in numbers. When they’re schooled up like this and one fish hits, other bass hit out of competition. When this creates a frenzy, quite often you’ll catch a limit in one spot. This is a condition which exists mostly in deep water structure on the creek channels and dropoffs. Occasionally the competition is so severe and so fierce you’ll see the fish breaking and surfacing as a school.
A lot of anglers have caught “doubles”—two at once—on a lure. Most of them think two bass just zoomed in and tried to get the lure, but that very seldom is the case. Those fish really got caught out of competition. What almost always happens is you throw out, and one of the fish is a little more eager and grabs the bait first. Fish are so competitive that they try to pull the lure out of the other fish’s mouth. Often bass actually tear a plastic worm like two dogs pulling on a towel or rug.
Often with a large topwater plug 4 to 6 inches long, enough of the lure is hanging out of the fish’s mouth that the second fish tries to grab it and gets caught. I’ve caught a tremendous number of doubles because I do a lot of structure fishing on points where there are concentrations of fish. I’ll throw most any type of lure and when I get a strike and hook the fish, many, many times on these structural places I’ll see other fish following the one I have on.
You have to capitalize quickly on this pattern, because they’re only going to stay in a frenzy a very short time. You need to have a second rod rigged up and just drop the rod and reel and fish that you’ve caught and then pick up a heavy, compact lure such as a spoon, Little George, or a grub and throw it. I also like a crank bait in this situation. In a tournament I’ve had many rods rigged up at the same time.
In 1970 I was at Toledo Bend in my very first bass tournament, and I was fishing with Joe Palermo on the first day. He said he knew I fished a lot of spoons, but why did I have five rods and five spoons? And I answered that in case we got into a big school, I wanted to be able to catch a lot of them real quick. He said he had a spoon on and could catch them real quick, too. We pulled up to the first point and we caught one apiece. There wasn’t much to it, because there wasn’t a big school there. At the second or third point we each caught a single. About nine o’clock we pulled up on the edge of a river bend and threw into about 20 feet of water right over the channel. Joe threw in first, and right away one thumped his spoon. As he was pulling the fish up to the boat, I saw a couple more bass following it. I made a cast and one hit me, and as I got mine up to the boat, a couple of bass were following it, and I told him we were into a school.
I dropped my spoon and bass in the bottom of the boat and picked up my second rod and threw it and caught a fish. Without taking time to unhook the bass, I picked up my third rod and threw it and caught another one. I repeated this with the fourth and fifth rods, and I finally looked around and saw I had five rods and five fish thumping around in the boat. One of the spoons had come out of a bass, and I picked it up and caught a sixth one.
Joe was still there with his first bass and a pair of pliers, because that fish had sucked in his spoon pretty good. It was halfway down his throat, and he was trying to pull the hook out.
A school of largemouths breaking the surface over a creek channel on Lake Bixoma, Okla.
Here I had six bass and he had one. To make a long story short, I didn’t win that tournament, but I came in second, and I sure had beaten my partners. One reason was I had multiple lures rigged up and ready. I was in a school situation, and when I caught one fish, I would get another one. We always found at least one school a day, and I’d catch a limit or close to a limit out of it. This is competitive fishing for competitive fish.
Occasionally I catch a bass that strikes out of territorial instinct, and this is a trophy-fish situation. Bass guard their territory just the way a big bear in the woods does; when other bears come around, he chases them off.
I kept an 11-pounder for a time at Santee-Cooper in a big tank. When any bass came his way, the 11-pounder would dart out and chase the other fish away. We’d sneak up to the tank and have a little popping bug on the line or a little minnow on a hook, and we’d throw in the tank and catch those bass. That 11-pounder I caught about fifteen times. But the other fish would hit the bug a lot quicker: the 3-and 4-pounders would eat it up right away. The 11-pounder was smart. He’d seen a lot more lures in his lifetime. It’s kind of the same way on a lake.
What does the territorial area look like?
As I stress in this book, the most important thing in bass fishing is to establish a pattern. That is, locate the depth, cover, and structure and couple it up with whatever water temperatures are productive and the water currents and wind conditions present. Then you know what to look for, and you’ve got plenty of places to try.
Suppose you establish a pattern, such as a point with big stickups, and you’ve hit the last three points with big stickups and have caught some fish on every one of them, and you come to the fourth point with big stickups and it looks even better. It has bigger stickups than the rest of them, and there’s deep water close b y. The wind is just right, and there’s some bait there. Everything looks absolutely perfect on that spot. And yet you don’t catch fish there.
I’ve hit places such as that fourth point, and I used to leave and run on down the lake. Then I got to thinking maybe the reason I didn’t catch one was that there was a smart old trophy bass lying on that point where he had everything he needed. He’d seen bass boats and he knew all about lures, and I’d probably made too much noise. The fact is there should have been some fish there, but maybe since I didn’t catch one, there were no small bass present.
Then I’ll go back and try for that big trophy fish. Often I will start with a different lure, such as a large plastic worm instead of the 6-inch worm which catchesmost of your bass I throw a 9-inch worm rigged up on heavy line with a big hook and put it right against the biggest stickup on the point and twitch it ever so slowly in that spot in hopes that the big trophy bass will be there.
A lone cypress tree is a likely place to hook a really big one— but there won’t be any smaller ones around, as the big one owns that tree.
This instinct has put a lot of fish in the boat for me. It also creates a lot of enjoyment. Always interesting to me is the fact that you can have a giant lure like a Musky Jitterbug or a huge propeller plug and consistently it will be the little tiny bass no longer than the plug itself that actually try to kill the big lure. That’s killer instinct. The bass has a mouth not much bigger than the plug. He can’t possibly be trying to eat it: all he can be doing is trying to kill it. Quite often you throw a large plug out and small bluegills will hit it.
Something else that intrigues me is that when I’m fishing a surface plug at a distance, some of the bigger fish will suck the plug in and look like a bluegill hitting it. I don’t know how many times I’ve been in an area working a surface plug really slow while hoping a big fish might be tricked any second, and out of killer instinct a little bluegill pops that plug. Since it might be a bass, occasionally I’ll pull back so hard I’ve fallen down with a pair of waders on or tripped backward over a stump while anticipating a 10-pounder.
This 8-inch bass was just trying to kill that 6-inch lure, since he could never have swallowed it.
When I think of ignorant fish, I think of the bass in some of the Canadian lakes I’ve fished. One time I flew in a float plane to this little body of water a few hundred acres in size. The pilot cut the engine and started drifting back over where he had first touched down. I asked where we would fish, and he said to just throw out there anywhere. And he said any lure in my tackle box was just perfect. I sat there on the right float of that airplane and in the first ten casts I had ten fish on. On my second cast over to a little boulder, there was this funny sucking strike. It sounded like a toilet flushing, and it was a 2-to-3-pound smallmouth inhaling my plug.
Those bass were eager, and they really were ignorant fish. They never had seen a man or a lure before. Over the past ten years I have occasionally found small farm ponds which were unfished and had many of these eager, stupid fish. Places in Mexico are almost the same too.
In Mexico I had the same bass strike six times in a row. I actually caught him three times. I was doing a film with Dino Economos and my wife, Mary Ann, and we were in the courtyard of Padilla City, which is now covered by Lake Guerrero. I had asked Dino to film me fishing a plastic worm, and on my first cast a 2-pounder swam over and grabbed the worm, and Dino got it on film. I released the bass, and we could see him swim right back over to a little corner. It wasn’t spawning season; the fish definitely wasn’t spawning. I didn’t think he would hit again, so Dino didn’t film it, but I threw back a second time and the same bass grabbed the worm and I caught him again.
Dino said he didn’t believe it. We were over a concrete patio and the water was only 2½ feet deep, and that was the only bass in sight. We could see the entire bottom. I released the bass again, and he went right back to the same corner. I asked Dino to film it in case he struck a third time. Sure enough, I caught that bass a third time and released him again.
Three more times that same bass struck the worm, but I didn’t set the hook. I was afraid I’d kill him if I kept hooking him. I just threw back and he grabbed the worm and shook it, and I kept pulling and finally was able to case it away from him. Each time he followed the lure all the way to the boat.
That fish would have to be classified as either mentally disturbed or else the dumbest, most ignorant, stupid fish that ever lived. I’m not saying this is not good; in fact, I would like to see a lot more of those fish, because that’s my kind of fish! The problem is that in heavily fished waters, we’ve caught out those stupid fish. They’re the first ones to hit a lure.
In hard-fished lakes, the ones that hit best are the ones that get caught, and the ones we keep are the big ones. What ends up in those lakes are small, smart fish, and a lot of them.
Dr. George Bennett, a leading biologist of the Illinois Natural History Survey, wrote a book on pond management back in the 1950s. He’s recognized as one of the leading ichthyologists in the country on pond management. Bennett conducted a survey years ago on a lake which was initially stocked with 500 bass. They opened it to fishing three or four years after it was stocked. It was controlled experimental fishing: everybody who caught a fish had to fill out a report which was monitored. All who went in or out had to check with a warden, and a complete tally of how many fish had been caught was carefully made.
At the end of three years of experimenting, they decided to drain the lake to see how many fish were left. The first year they had caught several hundred fish. About half as many were caught the second year, and the third year only forty or so were caught. But when they drained the lake, they found approximately 1,400 bass! No more bass had been added to the lake, and five or six years had passed since they had initially stocked it. Many bass had reproduced, and many of them were small.
Lots of fish biologists have concluded that the initial few hundred bass which were caught were the dummies. The ones that were left to reproduce passed on to their offspring the genetic capabilities they possessed—in this case, wariness, stealth, and caution. The 1,400 which were left in the lake were basically cautious, wary fish.
Probably some fishermen will question whether ignorance is truly a behavioral reason why a bass may strike. After all, if the smartest bass in the water may strike for any of the eight other behavioral reasons I’ve already listed, isn’t it obvious that an ignorant bass will strike for those same reasons? Sure, but the point is that a dumb one doesn’t hesitate, even under conditions that make a cautious bass refuse your bait. Where the fishing pressure is heavy, of course, the ignorant ones don’t last long, and a lake that’s supposed to be “fished out” may hold plenty of cautious bass but very few dummies. But this doesn’t mean our waters can’t be over-fished. On the contrary, that happens all too often.
This one is not is as ignorant as he was a moment ago. I release about 98 percent of the fish I catch.
I want to see bass fishing around for my son, Scott, to enjoy when he gets to be twenty-four years old, and that’s another twenty years from now. But the way it’s going—a daily limit of fifteen bass in some states, and hundreds of thousands of bass anglers in virtually every state—I wonder what the future of the sport will be. We have created more water by building 10 million acres of line reservoirs in the past thirty years, and this has created more habitat for bass. However, in building 10 million acres of water, we have created an additional 10 million fishermen we didn’t have thirty years ago. So we are overfishing our lakes.
Basically we have a good standard of living, and we don’t have to live off nature. Our 10 million acres of water can’t support all the fishermen if they want to eat all their bass. Lets have a comprehensive catch-and-release program. We don’t need to kill these fish, particularly those eager ignorant ones and those bigger ones we all prize as trophies. I would like to see quality fishing reinstated in the average reservoir and lake in the U.S. The only way it’s going to be done is to persuade the sportsmen—collectively and in clubs—to release their trophy fish.
It’s hard to understand why more bass aren’t released instead of killed. Maybe there’s nothing wrong with a bass dinner once in a while, but I’ve eaten a lot of fish that taste better. Probably the most tasty fish I’ve eaten is a walleye. Another tasty fish is snook. I’ve tasted probably seventy-five species of fish, because I’ve lived in Brazil and have traveled in Europe and Africa, and most of these fish are tastier than bass.
Our waters contain plenty of other sources of protein which aren’t being harvested. Ninety percent of the fishermen are harvesting the bass to eat, and 99 percent of the fish population is left unmolested. The latter could be utilized as a form of protein as well as delicious food. We just don’t have an excuse to keep many bass.
Like many other activities, casting is fairly easy to learn, it just takes practice. Denny Brauer, one of the top pro anglers in the country, learned his famous pitching and flipping tactic during the winter months several years ago.
“I placed a coffee cup under some houseplants overhanging a table near the television set,” he recalled impishly. “I’d stand in front of the couch, watch television and flip a lure at the cup. By the end of the winter I hit the coffee cup every time, but my wife’s houseplants were goners!”
Each type of equipment requires somewhat different tactics. In addition to the standard overhead casting techniques there are some more unusual methods that can be used to reach into those hard-to-get-to spots, or to use other muscles during long days.
When first learning to cast, use a casting weight, or old plug or lure without hooks. Find a place without overhead lines or obstacles and plenty of casting distance behind and in front of you. Make sure your line is wound on the reel properly, and let out enough line so the casting weight dangles about four inches below the rod tip.
1. Hold the rod tip at about 2:00, pointing at the target.
The rear button on the over-rod spincasting reel controls the line.
2. Press the button on the back of the reel spool and hold.
3. Bring the rod straight up and back over your shoulder to about 10:00.
4. Then with a smooth motion move the rod forward with a quick snap, releasing the button at about 2:00.
5. You can stop the line by pressing again on the button, however, in this case the line and lure are not feathered but stopped abruptly and lure entry is usually fairly loud. Quite often the lure will also hit the end of the line so abruptly it will be jerked backward causing you to miss the target. It’s best to cast directly to the target without stopping the line and lure.
6. Turning the reel handle forward re-engages the spool and begins the retrieve.
The most common problem is letting the line go too soon. In this case the lure will shoot upward, just behind or close to you and drop straight back down. Or the opposite happens, you don’t let the line go soon enough and the lure plops into the water at your feet. This is all solved with a little practice and remembering to release line at about 2:00.
The same basic casting technique is used with under-rod spinning reels, except they have a finger lever in front that is used to release and stop the line.
1. Depress and hold the line lever, disengaging the line.
2. While holding the line lever up, point the tip of the rod at the target, then swing it back over your head in a straight arc to about 10:00.
3. Still holding the line lever up, swing the rod back forward with a fast snap, releasing the lever at approximately 2:00.
4. To retrieve, turn crank handle forward.
1. Turn the reel handle until the line roller on the bail is at top center position, just below the rod and with the lure hanging just a few inches below the rod tip.
2. Grasp the line with the first joint of your first finger and pinch the line up against the rod handle.
3. Then use your other hand to pull the bail open until it locks in position. You’re now ready to make your cast.
4. Still holding the line in position, raise the rod to approximately 10:00.
5. Bring the rod forward and with a fast snapping action release the line from your finger at approximately 2:00.
6. Tapping or holding your finger lightly against the spool feathers the line or slows it down, providing a great deal of control. Some models also have a lever that can be used to open the bail as well as hold the line during the cast.
7. Turning the handle forward automatically closes the bail and begins the retrieve.
For your first few casts start with the magnetic braking knob set at maximum anti-backlash control. After you’ve become proficient at this setting you can lower the magnetic setting and achieve longer casts.
1. Press the freespool button down, or push the thumb bar down, holding the spool in place with your thumb at the same time.
2. Most people hold a baitcasting reel incorrectly when they make a cast, holding it in an upright position. Turn the rod sideways so the reel’s handle faces upward. The reel should stay this way throughout your cast.
Use your forefinger to feather the line and slow down the lure as needed for precise line control and a soft entry of the lure.
The baitcasting cast begins with the reel handles pointing up.
At the end of your cast, the reel handles should be pointing down.
3. Point the rod tip above the target.
4. Bring the rod backward over your shoulder to about 10:00, then swing it smoothly forward to about 2:00. The forward motion should be a quick accelerated forward motion with a snap of the wrist and forearm. Begin releasing thumb pressure about halfway through your forward casting motion to let line out. To prevent backlashes in the line, you must apply just enough pressure on the spool with your thumb as the lure flies through the air so that the rotating speed of the spool never exceeds the speed of the line coming off of it. The ability to apply the right amount of thumb pressure is primarily a matter of practice, but you can also reduce backlashes if the reel’s braking system is set properly.
Several special tactics can produce results when normal casting and retrieving just doesn’t work. These include flipping, pitching, skipping, side-casting, backhand casting, slingshotting and skittering. Several specific lures are also best used for some of these special tactics.
When bass move tight into cover such as standing timber, submerged trees, even under boat docks, flipping is a very popular and productive tactic. Profession-al anglers like Denny Brauer have made their reputation on their flipping expertise.
Flipping is best done with a rod specifically designed for the purpose. They are typically telescoping, 7-½ to 8 feet, fairly stiff-backed rods that have straight handles. Some rods utilize a combination of graphite and fiberglass to provide both sensitivity and strength. A baitcasting reel is most commonly mated to the rod, and many of these are also designed with a “flipping switch” that keeps the reel engaged except when the thumb bar is held down. This allows for an instant hookset when a big old bass inhales your lure as it drops down through the cover. The heavy cover dictates heavy line, and most pros fish with 25 to 30 pound test. Braided lines have become extremely popular due to their low stretch factor and strength.
Most common flipping lures are 
to 
ounce jig. Plastic of pork dressings are added to slow the fall of the jig and provide a “taste/smell” sensation as well as enticing movement. At times a plastic crawdad trailer on jigs is also hard to beat.
Basically an underhanded type of flip, pitching is a more versatile method and can be used when more distance is required than can be achieved with flipping.
Pitching rod-and-reel combinations are similar to flipping, except they may be somewhat lighter and shorter, usually 6 to 7 foot rod and from 15 to 20 pound test line.
Pitching lures are basically the same as for flipping, except sometimes lighter in weight because the weight of the lure pulls the line from the reel, rather than using a set-line distance as in flipping. ¼ to 
ounce jigs combined with plastic trailers are extremely popular pitching lures. Another good choice is a plastic lizard with a small split shot about four inches above the lizard. Traditional plastic worms, rigged Texas style with the weight pegged in place to prevent hang-ups are also popular.
Over the years Denny Brauer has become so good at both flipping and pitching that he invented a tactic called “loop pitching” that adds even more momentum to the lure and increases the distance a lure can be pitched.
The decision of when to flip and when to pitch depends on water, weather and cover conditions. When fishing vertical cover, such as standing trees and stump beds, flipping is best. When fishing horizontal cover, such as laydowns, or under overhanging limbs, weeds and boat docks, pitching is sometimes the best choice. Flipping range for most anglers is around 16 feet. You can pitch further and this may be the best choice in water that is clear, where getting a boat close enough to cover for flipping may spook bass.
Side-casting is quite similar to skipping except it’s done with one hand, using either a baitcasting or spinning outfit, and a less forceful movement. This cast can be used for those longer-distance targets, and with more varied lure choices. With a little practice you can actually side-cast almost any lure, including spinnerbaits, pig-and-jig, plastic worms and crankbaits, although heavy lures such as large topwaters are somewhat awkward.
I first saw “skipping” tactics fishing with bass pro Guido Hibdon several years ago when he was developing his famous tube lures and tube lure tactics. Skipping can be done in several ways, but my favorite is much like skipping a flat rock. The rod is held sideways and a side-arm cast given with two hands. A final snap of the wrists propels the lure forward low and flat on the water surface. Skipping is not only an excellent way to present a lure back under overhanging trees and under floating docks, but the momentary “skips” of the lure on the water surface also resembles the jumping action of baitfish under stress, a sure dinner bell to a hungry bass waiting in ambush beneath the overhanging cover.
A good skipping rod and reel is a medium to heavy action 5-½ to 6 foot spinning rod with a medium spinning reel. This tactic is tough to do with a baitcasting rod. Best lures are the lightweight tube lures or soft jerkbaits. These are all lightweight and compact enough to “skip” on contact. Spinnerbaits, crankbaits and other lures tend to “catch” and immediately submerge on water contact.
Another of my favorites for alternating on long days is a backhand cast. The motion is quite similar to throwing a “Frisbee” and the resulting cast has a “soft” water entry that is excellent for casting short distances to spooky bass. This can be done with either a spinning or baitcasting outfit.
Short 5 to 5-½ foot rods are best for both side-arm and backhand casting tactics. Almost any type of lure can be used from spinnerbaits to crankbaits, jigs, even topwater.
When you simply can’t reach back in under an object, such as a long boathouse, pier, bridge or dock with other tactics, slingshotting can be used. It’s a great way to reach a long distance under an obstacle. Spinning tackle is the best choice. I’ve used the tactic in desperation with a baitcasting outfit, but it’s a bit awkward because you have to turn your hand outward so the reel faces out. Almost any type of lure can be used, but compact lures work best because the gravity on the horizontal position of the line drops the lures fairly fast, and long, floppy type of lures, such as long worms or big spinnerbaits, tend to tangle on the cast.
Also called “doodling,” “doodle-socking,” and a wide variety of other local names, this specialized technique is as old as bass fishing is popular. Invented in the cane-pole days, it still consists of a long pole, 12 foot or longer, however, these days it’s more often fiberglass than cane. Add a short, 2- to 3-foot length of heavy, 20- to 30-pound line dangling from the end and then fasten a lure to the end of the line. I’ve quite often used my flipping rod for the tactic. The lure choice is usually a noisy topwater lure with propellers fore and aft. In practice the long rod is used to poke the lure back into places you can’t reach with other types of casts. Allow the lure to settle on the water surface then “work in place” using sideways action with the rod tip to move the lure back and forth, yet hold it in the pocket under the cover. This is also an excellent tactic for fishing open pockets in weeds, lily pads and moss beds.
A similar tactic is “dunking” using a sinking lure such as a Texas-rigged plastic worm or lizard, or even pig-and-jig, dropping it in the open spots in cover, allowing it to drop slowly and jigging it up and down, but still keeping it fairly shallow. You can literally fish in, around and through an almost impenetrable brushpile with this tactic, or reach back behind a dock to an open water spot you can’t reach otherwise. When you get a big bass on the end of a 12-foot rod, however, the fun is just beginning.
Make it a practice to always check and set your drag before you fish. To do so properly, pull the line from the reel against a small hand scale such as a fish deliar. Adjust the drag tension, according to your reel manufacturer’s instructions to one-third to one-half the rated tensile strength of the line. This should be done when you install line on your reel. Once on the water you’ll probably need to readjust the drag according to conditions. When flipping and pitching into heavy cover or buzzbaiting heavy weeds and cover using fairly stout line, you will probably want to crank your drag down tight so there is no give of the line in order to horse fish out of the cover. If you’re fishing light line and finesse lures with spinning gear, however, you may wish to loosen the drag even more. Once you’ve experienced a few battles, you’ll know the best position for drag on your particular outfit. You can also change drag as needed while fighting a fish, but it’s sometimes quite difficult to do, especially for the inexperienced.
Lipping is a very common way of landing bass. Grasping the point of the lower jaw with the thumb inside the mouth and the fingers outside temporarily paralyzes the fish. Be extremely careful of plugs with numerous sharp hooks.
Once a bass is hooked there is only one key to remember – do not allow any slack line at any time. Keep your rod tip high and keep a good bend in it to allow the energy of the rod to battle the fish. When the fish surges, the drag should allow line out, if set properly, or not set tight for heavy cover and heavy line use. When the bass comes towards you, reel quickly and keep the rod tip high. When using ultralight reels and line, it’s also a good idea to backreel as the bass goes away from you, then reel forward as it moves toward you. This method works if there is no cover or obstacle for the bass to tangle in. Believe me, a bass can find a tangled hidey hole and wrap your line up tight quicker than you can bat an eyelash. Backcranking takes a bit of practice. You want to allow line out, but above all else follow with the rod and not allow any slack in the line.
Pumping the fish it also a good tactic. Lift the rod to pull the fish toward you, then reel quickly at the same time dropping the rod tip slightly. Repeat reeling between pumps. This technology prevents overusing your reel, cushions line against shock and uses your equipment to the best advantage. Once the bass is at boatside or near the bank, let it fight a little longer to assure there will be no sudden last-minute runs that can break your line.
Bass can be netted or lipped once worn out from the battle. If it’s a big bass, or you’re positioned too high over the water to reach, netting may be the best tactic. To net, place the net in the water and lower it below the bass, then lead the fish into the net and lift the net once the fish is in place. Too many folks made the mistake of swinging the net at the fish, which immediately causes them to dash away and often results in lost fish.
Bass can also be lipped if you can reach them easily. This takes a bit of practice and you can easily lose a fish, or abrade your fingers if not done correctly. Make sure the bass is played out, then holding the rod top high to keep pressure on the line, grasp the fish at the tip of the jaw with your thumb inside and your fingers outside. Lifting bass in this manner will slightly paralyze them.
If you’re releasing the fish, don’t touch it in any other place. Carefully remove the lure and gently slide the fish back into the water mouth first. If placing in a livewell for tournament fishing, carefully measure, then release gently into the livewell.
For many years bass anglers pounded the shores and shallows, quite successfully in fact. Then came Buck Perry and his structure tactics, followed by tournament angling, sonars and other technological gear such as pH monitors, color monitors and temperature gauges. Shallow water, pound-the-bank bassing is still successful in small waters and in some instances of larger waters. Consistently successful anglers these days, however, must be more versatile. To compete not only in tournaments but against the numbers of week-end anglers pounding the more popular bassing waters, versatility and adaptability is a must. This often means going “offshore” and looking for bass honey holes away from the crowds. These tactics require the use of electronic gear such as sonars, along with a basic understanding of structure, cover and other factors.
Understanding how bass relate to structure and cover as well as what techniques and lures to use in the various structures and cover is an important factor in consistent bass fishing success.
Structure is simply a change in elevation of a lake bottom. Structure may be natural such as a submerged ditch, creek or river channel, or consist of points, flats, humps, underwater islands, ledges, boulder fields and rock piles. Structure may be man-made such as the riprap lining dam faces and bridge causeways, or the piers supporting bridges, old roadbeds and their ditches, or remains of underwater bridges and structures submerged when lakes are filled.
Bass relate to structure in different ways, depending on season, water temperature, clarity and other factors. Bass migrate between deep water structures and shallow water structures, according to the seasons, water temperature and clarity and water conditions, as well as the subspecies. They use specific migration routes. For instance bass may utilize ditches and underwater creek channels to move from deep water up onto flats. Bass along bluffs migrate more vertically in the water column, but still use definite migration routes. Remember bass like “edge,” a term more often equated with hunting deer and birds. Edge consists of a place where one or more different types of structure, often combined with cover, merge together. For instance this might mean a transition zone where a bluff or chunk rock meets a gravel bank. Learning when and how bass use these various structures on your favorite bass lake is important.
Good topographical or contour maps are an invaluable source of information for a lake. Before putting a boat into a lake, study the map, pick out possible areas according to the time of the season, water and weather conditions. Don’t be afraid to mark up your maps and keep a diary with indications of best fishing locations according to your map. You’ll be mighty surprised at how effective years of information can be with a map and diary in hand.
Electronics are important in locating both bass and structure. Coupled with a good set of lake maps you can easily pinpoint best bass locations.
Today’s sonar units are a marvel of technology. A wide range of units are available from very expensive to fairly economical, depending on features. Portable units are available as well as clamp-on brackets so you can take your sonar along when you rent a boat, or even when cartopping small lakes. Even the most economical units can provide a great amount of detailed information. Choosing the type used, as well as transducer type and location is important for your particular bass fishing situation.
I run a Charger bass boat with three sonars to provide information when and how I need it. These include an in-dash digital, used only while running to constantly monitor water depth, a bow mounted LCD with transducer mounted on the trolling motor bottom for detailed information while fishing from the bow seat and a fairly sophisticated sonar located on the console for detailed “mapping” of structure areas. The latter is also coupled with Lowrance GPS enabling me to not only relocate prime fishing sorts away from the banks without having to refer to landmarks, but also provides for safer navigation in foggy and bad weather. Using these sonar units, I’ve often spent hours running back and forth over promising areas, locating underwater humps, bends in creek and river channels and many other “hotspots” to add details to my lake map.
Above all else bass relate to temperature. Knowing the temperature in a given area can indicate whether the area will or will not hold bass and, if it does, at what depth or location. Largemouth bass are most active at an ideal temperature of 65 to 75 degrees. This naturally doesn’t mean bass will not tolerate water warmer or colder, but will seek this temperature if it is available to them.
A temperature gauge can be one of your most valuable fishing tools in establishing seasonal locations of bass as well as lure choices. Any number of temperature gauges are available. I use two specific gauges on my bass boat, an Eagle in-dash digital temperature gauge that provides instant readings even while running from one location to another and a Combo-C-Lector which utilizes a probe on a reel and can provide water temperature at any depth. I also carry a small hand-held unit called Deptherm in my tacklebox which can be hand held for surface temperature or lowered on a string for depth readings.
Bass are also “cover” or object oriented. Unlike other fish that roam open waters chasing their prey, bass prefer to hide and ambush their food. They’re skulkers and anything that provides them an opportunity to hide will be utilized including stand timber, submerged timber and brush, overhanging trees, laydowns, log jams, stump beds, weeds, moss, bulrushes, even floating debris and man-made docks. Unfortunately bass anglers often look for cover first. Former pro bass fisherman Jimmy Crisp once gave me a great piece of advice. “Look for structure first, then if it has cover, all the better. Structure with cover can be a deadly combination.” A good example of this would be a long main point with underwater brush as opposed to a barren point, or a barren flat as opposed to one with a stump bed.
Once you’ve located good structure with your sonar, look for cover to pinpoint honey holes. This applies primarily to big waters, lake and reservoirs, but also to smaller lakes and to some degree ponds and rivers.
Tremendous amounts of cover may also exist in some areas and then you have to define the most important cover and this can get a little tricky. I’ve discovered lakes where bass would prefer one particular species and standing timber over another. Also certain types of cover are better at different seasons or under different water and weather conditions. An example is shallow water grass is a prime spot on rising water conditions, but bass leave these flats quicker than you can believe with the first drop in water levels. Heavy brush and laydowns are best choices on cold-front days.
Aquatic vegetation is also bass cover and different types are best at certain times of the year. The different types also require different lures to be successful. For instance crankbaits are excellent for submerged weeds, especially early in the year before the weedbeds reach the water surface, but you couldn’t crank a crankbait through filamentous algae with a truck winch. Floating rat baits are best for those conditions. Laydowns and log jams are best with plastic worms, spinnerbaits and jigs.
We all like to fish during the warm, sunny days of spring, but unfortunately we often have to go bass fishing when we get the opportunity. I’ve had the opportunity and also misfortune to fish from one end of this country to the other. It seems like a front moves in as soon as I travel to a new spot. I’ve found, like the pro bass angler, when that happens you have to adjust to the changing conditions.
I’ve discovered that in addition to the major fronts announced by the weather forecasters, many “minor” fronts also pass through a fishing day. These are announced only by the slight rise and fall of air pressure and temperature. In a day of fishing these fronts produce some stressful bass fishing as well as some frustration.
As a major front moves across the country, a low pressure cell precedes it, barometric and water pressure rise and bass go on a feeding binge. Be on the water from 24 to 36 hours preceding a major front and you can literally load a boat with bass. Not only is the rising pressure a factor in the sudden bass activity, but also the temperature. Usually air temperature rises in the period preceding a front, and during some times of the year, especially in the spring, this warming trend can be extremely productive. Bass will usually move shallow during this period. The best tactic is to cover a lot of water fast with buzzbaits, topwater, spinnerbaits and crankbaits.
Then the storm moves in and with it varying amounts and types of precipitation depending on the time of the year and air temperature. During a warm spring rain is one of my favorite times to fish. My largest bass stringer occurred during such weather. During periods of warm air temperatures creating a warm rain, the inflowing water brings fresh food into the lake or foods new areas for foraging, the wind stirs up the bait fish and the rain brings fresh oxygen into the lake. On lakes with flats and old fields, the single best tactic is to crank spinnerbaits or buzzbaits through the grass and flooded weeds. On steep bank highland lakes, a pig-and-jig bounced down the trickle run-off spots of bluffs will produce.
If on the other hand the air temperature is cold, bass have a tendency to go deeper or suspend and move less during the storm, although they are still more active than they will be when the storm moves on. Prospecting with spinnerbaits and crankbaits is the best bet.
Then the storm front moves through and things really get tough. The pressure as well as temperature drops and so do the bass. This is often the time many of us are on a strange lake for our much valued vacation. Bass may go to deep water haunts, they may suspend on extremely deep lakes and in shallow lakes they go to “ground” or tuck tight into the thickest cover they can find. Best tactics depend on the type of lake and the time of year. Forget about fast-working exploring lures. You’re going to have to dig bass up or out.
Deep water lake fishing requires a good sonar. Look for bass on the points, breaklines of creek channels, or any other deep water migratory structure. Then it’s a matter of sitting over them and fishing vertically with a jig, spoon or small grub or worm. Bass in this situation are fairly dormant and don’t move around much. They have a tendency to school or group up during this period and when you find one you’ll usually find a bunch.
On the other hand, shallow water bass are scattered on a flat prior to the front and during the storm, and move horizontally rather than vertically. Look for them tight into cover. They’ll move into the brush-piles, log jams and heavy shoreline cover and about the only way you’re going to dig them out is flipping and pitching. A pig-and-jig, jig-and-worm or weedless grub worked in, around and through the tough stuff is your only hope for success. It’s slow going and a lot of patience is needed. Work every bit of thick cover as slowly and thoroughly as you can. Again, bass won’t be as active and you may have to literally bump them on the head to get a strike.
Fronts can also create dangerous moments. Don’t take chances with bad weather, get off the lake in high winds and during any type of lightening activity. Don’t stop fishing just because of a front, but do stop if weather is threatening. Fronts can provide some of the best bass fishing you’ll experience.
In addition to accumulating the gear and knowledge of its use, as well as the basic bassing knowledge, the next step is locating bassing waters and deciding where to fish. Due to intensive stocking and the popularity of black bass, bass fishing waters are available to bass anglers all over the country. Big lakes and reservoirs, small community lakes, strip pits, farm ponds, creeks and rivers can all offer good bass fishing.
Big waters often mean big bass—if you can find them.
You’ve read about, and drooled over, the fabled bass catches from a famous lake or reservoir and decide this year you’re going to spend your vacation traveling to the lake and get in on some of the hot action. In big waters, as opposed to smaller waters, the key to success is finding the fish. The single best tactic when visiting a lake for the first time is to hire a guide for a day or two. It’s money well spent and will give you a basis for fishing the lake. Otherwise you may fish for a week before you discover the bass locations, patterns, best lure choices, etc.
If you’re set on doing it yourself, first eliminate unproductive water and narrow down your fishing area. Otherwise, you’ll spend your entire vacation aimlessly prowling the lake hoping to luck into a bass. The simplest method is to talk to the locals, especially the folks running the marinas and resorts. They want anglers to be happy and will usually give good advice. Local anglers can also be a help. Several years ago a local bass club president was kind enough to reveal a “hot” pattern while I was visiting Lake Chickamauga in Tennessee. I caught bass my entire three days on the lake, instead of looking for bass.
One technique used by the pros fishing a lake for the first time is concentrating on one major creek arm or tributary. This may yet result in several thousand possible fishing acres and the map work is still invaluable to locate best spots. Young Oklahoma pro Gene Pearcy likes to fish the bridge piers on a lake he’s un-familiar with. “Simply start at the shallowest and work to the deepest until you find bass,” he states. “There’s always fish around them on any lake.”
The next step in locating bass is determining depth. Texas bass expert John Hope does radio tracking studies of bass and has come to the conclusion there are three distinct largemouth bass populations in most reservoirs – shallow water, deep water and mid-depth bass. Although the three may intermingle at specific times of the year, such as during spawning, they usually inhabit their preferred ranges the majority of the time. Sub-species also offer this same “stacking” of depths so it’s important to know what type of bass inhabit a lake. For instance largemouth will normally be found the most shallow, smallmouth shallow to deep while Kentuckies are often found the deepest.
Depth will also vary according to the lake and geography. As I discovered in the crystal clear water of Lake Mead in Nevada, bass can be extremely deep any time of the year, while the bass in the relatively shallow, turbid water of Truman Reservoir in Missouri are normally more shallow throughout the year.
Most anglers have the best success when the majority of the bass are relatively shallow. Two seasons offer the best opportunities for the optimum shallow water bass, early spring to spawn and mid to late fall. Actually, spawning bass can be difficult to catch and, if you hit the tail end of the spawn or the post-spawn period, you’ll have a tough time. The best bet is to fish for pre-spawn fish. These bass are moving, looking for places to spawn, feeding heavily before the spawn and are probably the single most “catchable” bass of the year. Timing of this period will vary from early March through May, and even into June, depending on the geographical location. Incidentally, if you’re looking for a real trophy bass, the single best time is late winter through the pre-spawn period when the old sows are feeing heavily and holding eggs. Some states don’t allow fishing during spawning season for spawning bass. It’s extremely important for anglers fishing that time of the year or specifically for spawning bass to practice catch-and-release.
The fall, when bass leave their lethargic summer pattern and begin to forage for the coming winter, also provides some extremely good shallow water action, often with a lot less competition from other anglers. I’ve fished the popular bass lake Bull Shoals in Arkansas during the deer season without seeing a handful of anglers. Early in the fall is a short spurt with the first cooling down weather, then a period of less activity as the reservoir or lake begins to turn over. Once the turnover period is complete a strong pattern begins again. For this reason a fall fishing vacation should be relegated to mid to late fall to add to your chances for hitting the best action. A call to marinas and tackle shops can reveal the best time to plan your vacation around either of these periods.
Don’t let the massive size of large lakes and reservoirs scare you off of some of the best bass fishing in the country. Narrow down your search, choose the most promising fishing spots, the best possible bait for the time and you’ll find you can catch big bass from big waters, even if you’ve never fished them before!
In these days of big reservoirs and fancy bass boats some of the best bass fishing in the world is overlooked. Farm ponds, small community lakes, backwater river sloughs and bayous, creeks, small rivers and strip pits can all offer excellent bass fishing with a small boat, float tube or even from the bank.
I grew up fishing the farm ponds and strip pits near my home and still like to fish small waters. Over the years I’ve settled on two important facts. First, the lures should be smaller than those commonly used for bigger waters and, second, match the lure to the forage. The forage type and color will usually be different than silver for shad, the main forage in many bigger waters. Good color choices, regardless of the lure, include black, brown, gold and naturalistic forage patterns such as perch, bass, crawfish and frog.
Once the water begins to warm in early spring many aquatic creatures hatch and rise from the bottom of a pond or small lake. The most productive lures for this very early period are dark and those that can be moved slowly in the cold water, yet still create fish-attracting action. My first choice is a Mepps No. 3 Black Fury in-line spinner. Because this can be a line twister, tie it on with a snap swivel. Other early top producers includes a ¼ ounce Johnson Fishing Beetle Spin in black with yellow strip, or ¼ ounce Blakemore Road Runner in black or crawdad brown.
If you’re fishing an area with rocks, such as a riprap pond dam, anything resembling crawfish can be extremely productive early in the year. Several years ago a friend and I caught a dozen bass over 8 pounds and one over 10 on a cold, rainy March night fishing pig’n jigs in the riprap lining a small community lake. A ¼ ounce Bass Pro Enticer Pro jig fitted with an Uncle John No. 11 Glitter Frog or Strike King Bo-Haw Frog is a good choice. Color should be brown or black/brown. Small crawfish crankbaits, like the Rebel Crawfish, Arbogast 1/8 ounce Mudbug and the Bass Hunter Lures Bass Magnet also produce.
For small waters, a quiet approach is often best.
One of my favorite small water lures is a ¼ ounce Mepps Bass Killer. I like to keep trailers short when pond bassing. The old-fashioned green-with-black-stripe Beetle Spin is also one of the top producing late spring, summer choices.
Small, shallow-running crankbaits are excellent for spring. Two of my favorites are the 
ounce Bill Lewis Tiny Trap in natural perch of black bass patterns and the Rebel Humpback in gold with black back. Topwater action begins in late spring and pond bass and topwater plugs, like the Arbogast Hula Popper, go together like strawberries and shortcake. I can’t remember all the bass I’ve caught on an ancient, wooden, frog-patterned Hula Popper. “Hula dancing” for bass will test even the most stout hearted. The biggest problem you’ll have is bluegills nipping at the bait, small bass hitting before a large one, or large bass may strike at it, but not take the lure. One solution is to snip off some of the skirt so the hook is more exposed. You’ll catch even the fastest short striker, whether bass or bluegill. Other great topwater lures for small waters include the old-time Arbogast Jitterbug, Sputterbuzz and Sputter Frog, Dalton Special, Nip-I-Diddee and Bass Oreno from Luhr-Jenson, Smithwick Devil’s Horse, Rapala original minnow and the Heddon Torpedo and Crazy Crawler.
Heavy vegetation is common on small waters. You’ll need some lures that can combat the weeds, moss, pads, filamentous algae and other “slop.” Frog baits are excellent for the floating stuff and include the Renosky Natural Frog, Harrison Hoge Frog, Burke Frogbait, Snag Proof Frog, Scum Frog, Strike King Grass Frog and Mann’s Swimmin’ Frog. Other unusual weed tamers include the Bagley’s Grass Rat, Bill Norman’s Weed Walker, Heddon’s Moss Boss and the Strike King Timber King Spoon. The Rebel Arrowhead Spoon and Johnson Silver Spoon can also be worked in, around and through weed and vegetation tangles to entice pond bass.
If the cover consists of submerged weeds or standing or fallen trees and brush, a small buzzbait, such as the 
ounce Jr. Buzz King from Strike King, can be a great pond lure from late spring through fall. In late summer things slow down and that’s when I switch to another small water bass exciter. Bass in small waters just can’t stand to see a Rebel Crickhopper without banging away at it. In clear water you’ll often see a mad rush for this tiny bait from all directions.
The venerable plastic worm is just as effective from late spring throughout the fishing season on small waters as big. Because small waters often dictate small tackle boxes, I narrow my small water worm selection down to a Berkley 7-inch black/blue or finesse camo Power Worm Texas-style on a ¼ ounce weight, or a 6-inch Blakemore worm rig in purple or natural, or a 4-inch worm rig in natural or catalpa colors. These can be fished extremely slow without weight. If I don’t get strikes shallow, I place a single split shot a foot ahead of the rig to get deeper and then retrieve extra slow.
Regardless of the size of the lake or pond, however, bass fishing tactics are similar to those in fishing the big waters, with a few differences. The first step is to locate the fish. Although bass are a lot easier to locate because of the confines of the water, they can also be a bit spookier. This means a slow, quiet approach. Banging tackleboxes and oars, even loud talking can sometimes spook small-water bass from the shallows. The edges and shallows of these lakes are also the most often fished and as with the larger reservoirs, often the best fishing is “structure fishing,” especially on the medium to small size lakes of around 250 acres or so. Use a portable depth finder to locate structure and fish, and you’ll be ahead.
Seasonal bass patterns will be fairly identical to those on a larger reservoir, only on a smaller scale and usually with somewhat different timing. Early in the spring look for concentrations of bass to be on the breakline between deep and shallow water. Creek channel bends are excellent holding places. As the water warms bass move shallower and because the water warms faster in the smaller waters, bass usually move shallower earlier than in the larger lakes and reservoirs. In many parts of the country bass may start moving into the shallows in March in the smaller lakes and ponds. Smaller water also cool down quicker. Sudden cold spells will shut them down much quicker than larger reservoirs.
From tiny creeks to sprawling rivers you’ll find plenty of bassing action. “When rivers flood in the spring, bass move up out of the rivers into the tiny creeks to spawn and get out of the current,” says pro angler Jeff Magee. “I wade the creeks using a 1/8 ounce spinnerbait with double Colorado blades and fish water few, if any other, bass anglers see.”
Many bass tournaments are held on major rivers and they offer excellent bass fishing. Look for bass in out-of-current areas such as behind wing-dams, in the sloughs, oxbows and backwaters. In order to fish these off-the-river hotspots, you must know the river system since you can often only get into the lakes when the river is at a certain level. Many of these backwaters and sloughs may be so shallow you have to push-pole them. But shallow and difficult-to-fish lakes usually have plenty of bass that aren’t being pressured by anglers. Man-made duck ponds and beaver ponds off major river systems are other big bass hotspots and anglers rarely fish these areas.
Bank fishing can be tough, but the rewards are worth it.
Tailrace areas below dams can also be good. Eddies behind boulders and other current breaks will produce surprisingly well for both largemouth and smallmouth. Start in the tailrace water and work down-stream until you find suitable current breaks holding bass. Another excellent river area is an island with stumps or submerged timber on the down or off current side, an especially good spring and summer spot for largemouth.
Seasonally late spring through summer is usually the most productive for river bass. Many states prohibit taking bass from rivers until late spring, and late in the summer bass often move up out of reservoirs and lakes into the tributaries to find more oxygenated water.
Big water or small, lake or river, you don’t have to have a fancy boat, or any boat for that matter to enjoy bass fishing. In some instances you may be more successful fishing from the bank, wading or float tubing. Many farm ponds, creeks and other small waters are simply not suitable for boats.
I’ve also sometimes crawled out of my bass boat and scrambled over log jams and through heavy brush to some of the best back-of-the-cove fishing on big lakes. Several years ago while fishing on Choke Canyon Lake in Texas during a high-water situation we noted a fishermen in his bass boat with a tiny one-man boat stowed on the back deck. He tied the big boat up to what would have been the normal shoreline, which consisted of a solid ring of trees you couldn’t push a bass boat through, climbed into the tiny boat and paddled behind the “tree-line.” Back at the dock in the evening he admitted to taking a number of bass with his tactic.
Bank fishing does have drawbacks. You’re going to get hung-up, so choose lures with care. Pick weedless models if possible, but you’ll still lose a few. Actually wading or float tubing offers the best of both worlds to bank fishermen. Wading if the weather is warm and the water shallow and float tubing even with waders and cold weather gear in cooler and deeper water. There are several advantages to wading for bass. First, it’s quite often the only way to get to them. Big bass love cover, especially weeds and moss beds, during the hot summer months. Often the only way you can wangle them out of these shallow-water hidey-holes is to crawl in with them. Even if you fish the edges of such cover with a boat, you won’t be able to fish all the area. If you hook a big fish in a tangled patch of vegetation you won’t be able to pull him to you. Quite often you simply can’t get a boat to the fish.
Wear an approved flotation device for this type of fishing. A good PFD that fits properly and has pockets can not only be comfortable to fish in, but is handy for holding fishing lures and other goodies. If night wading, you should take along a small penlight to hold in your teeth when tying on lures. About the only other equipment needed is a stringer to loop to your belt and a small tacklebox to clip to a belt loop as well.
Another method quite popular with many anglers is “belly boating.” You can float and wade in areas you can’t reach with a boat and the float tube fits easily in or on your automobile. I’ll never forget one float tube experience several years ago with Toby Bridges, then Public Relations Director for Bass Pro Shops. We were fishing a strip-pit in late spring and the bass were jumping all over the plastic worms. Setting the hook with a plastic worm while in a float tube turned out to be a lesson in physics. I almost turned over backwards several times attempting a hard hookset on the big bass I saw below me in the clear water. It was wet, but a fun, exciting and most productive bass fishing experience.
Bass can be patterned to some degree based on annual seasonal habits. The exact dates will vary across the country, but the biological and seasonal patterns will remain the same. By the same token the difference in water clarity from lake to lake as well as forage base and structure can have a great deal of influence. The same general patterns still exist; however, it’s a matter of adapting them to the situation. Local lakes may also have “mini” patterns with specific lures that are hot on that particular lake, again due to forage base and structure possibilities.
The bass fishing year is broken down into eight specific seasonal classifications: early spring, pre-spawn, spawn, post-spawn, summer, early fall, late fall and winter. Again there will be a great deal of variance in the time frame of these patterns across the country. For instance some of these time frames may stretch for months in the warmer southern regions while being compressed into weeks in the northern largemouth range.
The illustration on shows a seasonal look at a typical “good” bass fishing lake found in the Midwest. Southern lakes will have more shallow water and usually less clarity. Highland lakes and many western reservoirs will be deeper and have more clarity. Not all features shown will be found in all lakes, but those shown indicate the best locations for bass throughout the various seasons. If you can get a topographical map of a lake you intend to fish, mark the location of some of these prime areas on your own map by season and you’ll be way ahead of the bass finding game this year.
1
Always match your hook size to the head diameter of the soft plastic bait you’re using. Example: On an 8-inch plastic worm use either a size 4/0 or 5/0 hook: On a 4-inch worm a size 1/0 to 2/0 hook.
Match hook size to bait.
2
When fishing summertime bass in a small body of water such as farm ponds or soil conservation and natural lakes, remember that in the heat of summer most mini-waters lack enough oxygen down below. Bass rely on the shallows where there is a small, narrow, oxygen-rich band of water. Most anglers fish below the bass in low-oxygen areas, mistakenly thinking summertime bass ought to always be deep.
Go shallow for summertime bass.
3
When fishing muddy or off-colored water, fish shallow, fish objects, fish slow, and make repeated casts.
Vibrating lures for murky conditions
4
During the cold winter months the key to success is to fish clear water with slow presentation-type lures, especially when water temps are in the mid-to-low 40 degree range.
Brush near dropoffs holds promise.
5
When fishing murky or muddy conditions, use lures that vibrate. Dark-colored, bulky, shallowrunning crankbaits or single, Colorado-blade spinnerbaits are good choices.
Crawfish create big bass.
6
Research has shown that mature bass show a decided preference for crawfish and, contrary to popular belief, the lowly crawfish is the most prevalent forage in our lakes, ponds, sloughs, creeks, and rivers. There are good reasons for the preference. Bass feeding on crawfish grow much faster than those who live where crawfish are not abundant. Crawfish also are much easier to catch, therefore bass expend less energy to gain the high protein nourishment that crawfish provide.
7
When shoreline fishing gets tough, make an about face. Why? Lakes change, fish change, and anglers must change as well. From the bass’s point of view the advantages of open water are strong and numerous: less pressure, more forage, better habitat as a rule, and there’s more comfort in the way of oxygen, safety, and temperature.
Don’t neglect open water.
8
It’s important to remember that fish feed heavily by sight in clear water, but in stained water, vision begins to lose its primary importance and fish use a mixture of sight, smell, and sound to locate their prey. In muddy water fish rely mostly on sound and smell.
Parallel casts keep lure in the strike zone.
9
A stump or a treetop, by itself, might hold a fish or two and so can a submerged point extending out toward deeper water. But a stump or treetop sitting right smack in the middle of this same point can really be a smokehouse! This is what we call multiple structure—a good fish holding spot located right on top of another.
Stay alert for multiple structures.
10
Taking springtime water surface temperatures is important because it gives you a starting point to consider, but bottom and mid-range temps are much more important, especially in shallow depths.
11
Never pass up fishing a boat-launch ramp. Most are made of concrete, stretch way out into the lake, and slope downward, thereby making a clear pathway from deeper to shallower water. Normally on a ramp you’ll find rip-rap rock stretching out along the edge of the concrete into deeper water. Algae will grow on these hard rough surfaces during the late spring, summer, and early fall months. This attracts some of the bass’ favorite food—shad, minnows and small bluegill—to feed on the algae. Bass then follow to feed on these baitfish.
Look for fish at launch ramps.
12
Two of the most important controls a fisherman has at his disposal are depth control and speed control. This is especially true with crankbaits. If the lure is not worked at the fish’s depth level, he may not hit it unless he’s extremely active, so getting the lure down to his depth level is just as important as making an accurate cast to him. Once the lure is down, always remember that your retrieve—whether fast or slow—should be erratic. The key word here is “control.”
Keep the lure in the strike zone.
Choose lure type carefully.
13
When you’re trying to catch bass in the wind, a few changes in tactics can make all the difference. First, cut back on the size of your line and increase the size of your weight. This will serve several purposes. It will allow you to gain depth quicker when you’re using lures like a jig-n-trailer, a slip sinker worm, a grub, or a Carolina rig. The longer you must wait for your lure to sink, the more your boat will drift under poor control. Seconds can make the difference in success or failure. The smaller diameter line and heavier weight will also help eliminate those dreaded backlashes, which can be much more prevalent on windy days.
Minimal shade can hold bass.
Light line and big baits beat windy days.
14
Rising water doesn’t present nearly the bass fishing challenge to me as falling water. When lake levels drop, bass begin to lose their habitat—when lake levels rise, their habitat is expanded. This is a time to look for new, rich areas where fish will move to feed. I usually begin by finding water about a foot or two deep that has flooded a very large area. Large schools of shad will often move into these areas searching for plankton—one of their favorite foods. And naturally, the bass will follow the shad to feed on them. Watch carefully for baitfish activity on the surface. During the warmer months, when water temperatures are above 70 degrees, a buzzbait can be fantastic in such situations. If the water is murky, a spinnerbait might be the best offering.
Electronics pinpoint suspended bass.
Rising water levels expands habitat.
15
One of the biggest mistakes topwater fisherman make is to fail to let the fish get a good hold on the lure before they set the hook. This is understandable, because nothing is more exciting than seeing bass explode on a topwater offering. Train yourself to wait before you set the hook. A good rule is to set the hook only after the lure has vanished from sight and you “feel” the fish.
Give ‘em time to grab it!
16
The single most important factor in fishing is finding the correct depth. If you’re not fishing the correct depth, you’re wasting time. The finest angler around can fish the best bait in the world, but if he’s fishing it at the wrong depth, he won’t do very well. Fishing at the correct depth, almost anyone can catch a few fish.
Correct depth is key to success.
17
Long, tapering points with bottoms of clay and gravel are great smallmouth spawning grounds. Some bigger females prefer points over other areas because they provide quicker access to deeper water. Look for isolated patches of weeds or stumps. You’ll probably find nests a few feet from these, instead of right next to them.
Points provide prime spawning for smallmouths.
18
When night fishing, look for shallow shoals adjacent to where you usually find bass during the day and try breaks that lead to deeper water. At first, try dark colored lures like topwaters or shallow runners that create a lot of vibration or noise to attract the attention of the most active feeders. Next, switch to deeper runners or big plastic worms and fish even deeper.
Use noise and vibration at night.
19
Generally speaking, the best largemouth streams will have slow to moderate current and warm water. The best streams for smallmouth will have cooler, clearer water. Excellent holding spots for both species include eddies, deeper pools, undercut banks and gravel bars.
Gravel bars and points offer cover in moving water.
20
A rapid rise or fall in water level has a much greater impact on fish movement than a gradual change and it takes longer for water levels to change in lakes or reservoirs than it does in rivers and streams. When possible, plan your fishing trips accordingly.
21
Barometric pressure affects all living creatures. When the pressure changes rapidly, whether it’s rising or falling, fishing also changes, and sometimes drastically. Bass can start feeding in a frenzy when a storm front approaches and this is usually indicated by fast-falling pressure. The exact opposite usually occurs when the pressure starts back up—it’s almost impossible to get fish to hit until the barometer gets back to normal. When the mercury is on the rise, I usually direct my attention to bass in deeper water, or at least to fish that have quick access to deeper water. They simply aren’t affected as much by pressure changes as bass in shallow water.
22
When bass are not in a chasing mood, slow down and offer them a slow presentation-type lure like a plastic worm, lizard, tube, grub, or light weight jig-and-plastic combination.
23
Cold water is denser than warm water, therefore it’s reasonable to assume that your bait can achieve greater depths in 80 degree water than it can in 60 degree water. This 20 degrees of difference may allow your bait to reach another foot or so of depth, and at times, this can determine whether or not you catch fish!
Bridge pilings and crappie are a natural combination.
24
Some good places to look for bass in reservoirs during the summer months are: Points long the main channel; deeper sections of submerged creek channels; bends along the main river channels; riprap on an embankment; along stair-stepped bluffs; and in feeding areas such as brushy flats.
Hunt the drops and depths in summer and winter.
Probably the most successful bass lure currently known to fishermen is The Texan worm rig—a weighted soft plastic worm with the hook point imbedded. Until about 1964, most worms had hard bodies, and the traditional way to fish them was with a weedless hook. The hardness didn’t make any difference because the hook was exposed. But by the late 1960s, worms of much softer plastic were manufactured. I don’t know who gets credit, but some Texas fishermen were taking plain 5/0 and 6/0 Sproat hooks and imbedding the hook into the soft worm so that the point was concealed. There is no weed-guard, just the plastic itself; when the hook is set, the point and barb come through the soft plastic and hook the fish. At that time, this was a popular lure in lakes around the Dallas and San Antonio area.
The first time I tried the Texas rig was at Santee-Cooper. S.C, in about 1968. I’d heard about it from a guy I fished with named Mark Workman. Mark was a tremendously tall man—he had been an All-American basketball player—and his favorite way of bass fishing was wading. He’d had special waders made and could wade in 5 feet of water, where I’d be up to my nose. Two of our big tricks at Santee in the spring were wading the blackwater ponds for spawning bass and wading around the cypress trees. Wading, as you probably know, should be a very quiet approach.
Mark brought out some plain hooks and commented that he knew I’d heard of the Texas rig. I said I’d heard of it, but down here it didn’t work too well Back then I was pouring my own worms. I’d take used plastic worms fishermen would leave in the boat and melt them down, ending up with a glob of plastic which was sort of a brown-black-greenish-red, and I’d pour it into the molds. These worms were about 9 inches long, and they were stiff. I’d use them with a big weedless hook
Mark gave me one of his plain hooks and suggested I try the Texas rig because the boys in Texas were killing the bass with it. At that time I was fishing for trophy bass and was using 30-pound-test line with heavy 7/0 hook. The hook he gave me was a little ol’ 5/0 made of lighter wire. I buried it in one of my 9-inch worms and threw over near a spawning bed, and a 7- or 8-pound bass swirled up and grabbed the worm. I set the hook, but the fish got off. I reeled in and looked at my worm; the hook never had gotten through the plastic. Then I decided to work a hole in the plastic, so I wiggled the hook around until there was a little channel through the worm.
A few casts later, that bass hit again, and this time I set the hook real hard. The water was about to come in over the top of my waders as I was sloshing around after the fish, which was going through the lily pads. I was up to my chin in water, but Mark was only to his waist, so he said he’d go after the fish. He headed toward the lilies, but when he got there the bass made a sudden hinge and straightened out my hook.
Right then I told Mark the Texas worm was foolish. Worms were too stiff and you wouldn’t get the fish hooked, and anyway the hook was too light.
Obviously I hadn’t perfected my worm fishing. Now there are many plastic worm manufacturers who use softer plastics and also many hook manufacturers who make good plastic-worm hooks. (Plus it makes lots of difference if you sharpen the hooks and use a good stout line and a good stout worm rod and a good hook set.) Also, now we have graphite rods. They have much more impact, so you can set the hook pretty well through that plastic.
There are some advantages to the Texas worm rig over the old weedless-hook style of worm fishing. The biggest advantage is it’s more compact and streamlined. We’re using cone-shaped bullet worm weights instead of split shot or the old egg sinkers. The cone-shaped weights swim their way through grass and other cover much better. Also, the hook is less exposed. There’s more hook in the worm, and less body of hook exposed. With the weedless hook, you have one or two wires and the entire bend of the hook hanging out. There is more exposed metal to pick up trash.
Another advantage to the Texas rig is there’s no “sprong.’’ With the old weedguard hook, the weedguard is under tension, and quite often in the fish’s mouth, the weedguard will flip up and “sprong’’ ‘em. Many times this scares the fish, and it spits out the worm. This is particularly true on light strikes or with Kentucky bass, which normally are spookier than largemouths. When I fished worms on weedless hooks, I had a lot of fish drop the rig.
Another factor is that the Texas rig is a lot cheaper to fish. Standard worm hooks are two to three cents apiece, whereas the weedless hooks are fifteen to twenty-five cents apiece. The way we fish today, worms are expendable. We’re constantly throwing ‘em into heavy cover and constantly getting hung up. And we’re breaking them off. It’s cheaper to break off a twelve-cent lure than a thirty-five-cent lure.
The real advantage, though, with the Texas rig is the fact that it can be snaked, crawled, and jigged across almost any bottom surface. With plastic worms, you’re constantly looking for heavy cover. To me, worm fishing is mostly reserved for the ultra-thick cover, such as brush, stumps, and rocks. I very seldom throw plastic worms to a bare shoreline.
The Texas rig has a lot of different variations, starting with the weightless varieties and ending with ones for jigging on structure in deep water with as much as ½ ounce of lead ahead of the lure. They vary from 5-inch to 10-inch rigs. Some fishermen even rig with double hooks on the Texas rig. (Another advantage to the rig is that during spawning season, when bass often strike shorter, you can move the hook point farther down the worm to catch those short-strikers.)
The 6-inch dark-grape or purple worm rigged Texas-style is the most popular of all these rigs. A poll of plastic worm manufacturers revealed that of all their worms sold, nearly 40 percent are 6-inch purple or dark grape. The second choice is 6-inch black. Black is an extremely popular color during the spawning season. Third most pop ular size and color is the 6-inch blue worm. Blue seems to be a par ticularly good hot-weather color after the fish have spawned and moved to deeper water. Red and green colors also sell pretty well, as do multiple and spotted colors.
The standard way I fish the Texas worm rig is to try to find heavy cover in the form of brush. My first choice is a submerged brushpile, a tree, or some other type of wood cover. My second pick is some type of weedy cover, such as lily pads or grass, and my third favorite is boulders and rocks. One problem with the last is that worms do get caught in the crevices. Worms are not entirely snagless. When that slip weight lodges between two boulders or in rip-rap, you’re going to lose a lot of worms. You’ll also lose a lot of worms when you snake them through brush, because sometimes that weight catches and hangs in forks of limbs and the hook gets caught.
But worms are expendable. The average worm fisherman carries at least twenty-five different worms in the same color. He’ll likely have six different colors in the 6-inch size, six different colors in the 7-inch length, and so on. In all he has 200 to 300 worms with him. At ten to twelve cents apiece, counting hook and weight, plastic worms aren’t an extravagance. Probably he’ll lose a dozen or so worms a day, but compare that cost to the price of the gasoline and the meals on the trip. The trip might have cost him $20, and he’s lost $1.50 worth of worms.
The plastic worm is cheap and efficient, and it can be fished at all depths and during almost all seasons of the year. There are some criteria for worm fishing, particularly the Texas-style. Most important of these is water temperature. It’s been my experience and that of most bass fishermen I know that very few bass are caught on plastic worms in water cooler than 55 degrees. You’ll catch a few; in fact, I’ve caught a few when ice was forming around the edges of the lake.
Plastic worm fishing starts early in the year when the water temperature reaches 55, but better worm fishing comes when the water reaches 60 to 65 degrees. Probably the best time to fish a plastic worm is when smallmouth and largemouth bass are spawning. Water temperature then is 59 degrees for smallmouth spawning activity and 62 degrees for largemouth spawning. At this time, bass really are hitting the plastic worm because the worm is a snaky-looking creature. When it comes crawling through a spawning bed, it rouses the fish’s protective instinct; and he’s going to carry it out of there and try to kill it because he thinks it’s after the eggs.
What size of plastic worm is right? I’m asked that virtually every where I talk with fishermen. I’ve often said the size doesn’t make any difference as long as it’s 6 inches, because then it’ll work. But that’s really an oversimplification. In tournament competition or if I’m merely trying to catch a limit of bass, I prefer the 5-to-6-inch worms for catching small to medium-sized bass. I’ve caught a lot more bass—not the big ones, but just good keepers—on the 6-inch worm. However, if I’m after trophy fish, I go to 8, 9, and even 10 inches.
One of my favorite stories about big worms concerns a trip my wife, Mary Ann, and I made to Florida back in 1973. We were bass fishing at Lake Eloise at Cypress Gardens. At the time the 13-inch J&W Hawg Hunter worm was new on the market. It has two giant weedless hooks attached to about a 50-pound-test braided line buried inside it, and the thing looks like a tractor-tire retread. A stiff casting rod and both hands are needed to cast it. It’s the most horrible-looking worm you’ll ever see. However, some anglers reportedly had caught some big bass on it.
Mary Ann was after a trophy. I’d caught several big bass, including a few over 10, but she’d never got a 10-pounder, and she said her whole trip was devoted to catching a trophy bass. I agreed to try merely to catch a lot of bass, so I stayed with 6-inch worms. We fished mostly cypress trees and grass beds but also some 10-to-15-foot-deep potholes … all of this for five days.
How to make a texas rig in three sizes.
She stayed with the 13-inch Hawg Hunter and in five days she caught only nine bass. Out of those nine, her smallest was 6 pounds and the largest was a little over 9 pounds. She had a 7-pound average for her nine fish. If we’d been in tournament competition, my total weight would have beaten her solidly. During those five days I aver aged six to fifteen bass per day and totaled about fifty bass. But my fish were smaller. Most of them were 1 ½ to 2 ½ pounds, and maybe one out of ten was a 6-pounder.
So whether or not to use a large plastic worm, in my opinion, depends on whether you’re after a trophy largemouth or several bass. When I’m tournament fishing, I’ll start with the small, short worms in my quest for a limit. As soon as I catch that limit, I purposely go to a big worm. That was how I won the Bass Anglers Sportsman Society’s New York Invitational in June 1978.
People who have never attended a tournament may not realize that these contests are basically catch-and-release events, not wasteful affairs that can reduce our bass populations. A tournament fisherman takes pains to keep his catch alive. He earns extra points for bringing in live fish and he’s penalized for dead ones. When you compete in a tournament, it makes sense to try for a limit and then start culling—releasing a smaller fish from the live well each time you catch a bigger one so that the total weight increases while the number stays the same.
In the 1978 Invitational just mentioned, I caught a lot of small bass during the first round, although I had four pretty good ones in the 3-to-4-pound range. So I went to a 9-inch worm, and the first bass I caught on it weighed 5 ½ pounds.
I ran out of 9-inch worms, so I went to 8-inch worms. These are a lot bigger than a 6-inch worm; they have thicker bodies and weigh probably twice as much. I continued to catch some more 4-pound bass. I do think the huge worms discourage smaller bass from hitting them.
One thing about plastic worms which I think generally is over rated is the type of tail. I have seen few instances where the swimming type of tail, such as the beaver tail, twisted tail, and minnow-action tail, seemed to work better. Those occasions mostly have been when we were moving fast, such as on structure when we were working the worm fast or even trolling the worm. But 98 percent of the time you’re working the worm very slow, and the worm basically is crawling through the branches and over the rocks.
I don’t think the brand or shape of worm is particularly important as long as it’s a good soft plastic. When I poured worms years ago I combined the worms of a dozen different manufacturers and poured them all in the same mold, and I caught bass on them just as good as with any brand-name worm. But soft plastic is one of the keys. I believe bass will hold the softer plastic longer than a harder plastic. My experience has been that hard plastic worms aren’t nearly as effective.
Today you can buy both different worm weights and six basic worm-hook sizes. In Fishing Facts magazine, a hook chart I formulated was printed with one of my stories on plastic worm fishing. That chart basically stated that I prefer a 3/0 hook with a 6-inch plastic worm, a 4/0 for a 7-inch worm, a 5/0 for an 8-inch worm, and a 6/0 for a 9-inch worm. For worm weights, I like a 
-ounce lead for 8-to-10-pound-test line. However, with light line in ultra-clear water, I might go up to a 
-ounce slip sinker if I’m fishing 30 feet deep. With heavier lines, you need heavier worm weights.
I use a -ounce weight for worm fishing at 4-to-5-foot depths. Out on structure 25 feet deep, I might use a ½-ounce lead. Wind plays a big factor in choosing a suitable worm weight. If the wind’s blowing ten to fifteen miles per hour, you might have to increase the weight one size. If it’s blowing twenty to twenty-five miles per hour, you might have to go two sizes. If the wind is blowing thirty-five miles per hour, you ought to get the hell out of there!
A 10-pound, 8-ounce bass that I caught on a Texas rig on Lake Okeechobee in January.
One of the first tournament pros ever to use the Texas worm rig was Bill Dance of Memphis. Bill started his tournament career before I did, and this likable guy has a super track record with the worm. He even wrote a book on plastic worm fishing, called There He Is!
I was late getting started using the Texas rig because, as I’ve said, for several years I was hung up using worms on weedless hooks. The old weedless hook is fairly effective, and even today several guys still use them. One pro who does is Johnny Morris of Bass Pro Shops. This is merely an idiosyncrasy of his. I don’t consider the weedless-hook worm rig as good as the Texas rig.
I sometimes use a 4-inch worm Texas-style for light-line fishing in clear water. The 4-inch rig is merely a stepping down in worm length and line size. It’s good for very clear water where you can see rocks on the bottom 20 feet deep. Lakes like this usually contain good populations of smallmouth bass as well as largemouths. and smallmouth generally prefer smaller baits. Kentucky or spotted bass also likely are present.
In Alabama’s Lake Martin, which I fished frequently in 1971 when I lived in Montgomery, Ala., you get far more strikes with a 4-inch worm than you can with a 6-inch worm on Kentucky bass. The smaller worm simply is what they prefer in that lake. A typical productive worm pattern in lakes like this is large, shaded boulders. Boulders, ledges, and cliffs usually are numerous in smallmouth bass and Kentucky bass lakes where I use the 4-ineh worm mostly.
Boulders 2 to 6 feet in diameter in 5 to 15 feet of water and close to deep water tend to hold good smallmouth and spotted bass. When fishing this type of pattern I usually stand up in the boat and utilize the Polaroid sunglasses to see the obstructions. I’m conscious of the sun angle and am trying to spot the shady nooks and crevices in the boulders, rocks, and cliffs. I throw the 4-inch worm 5 to 10 feet beyond these ambush points and allow it to settle, then slowly hop it into the shadows of the rocks and boulders. In this type of fishing I hold the rod a little lower than normal, at approximately a 40-degree angle, so that I’m ready for the quick strike of a smallmouth or a spotted bass. I also try to set the hook very quickly, because they’re apt to drop the worm very quickly. I try to set the hook within two seconds of the strike. Spotted bass often will rattle the worm. There are two ways to set the hook on a rattling strike. Sometimes the initial set will do it, but usually when you feel the rattle, the spotted bass has the tail or lower portion of the worm loosely in his lips and he’s shaking it. At times I put a little bit of pressure on the fish. The worm partly slips out of his mouth, and he thinks it’s getting away and he’ll grab it better. Then I let him pull down before I set the hook. Sometimes this latter trick is about the only way to catch a spot on a worm.
Also, for this method I prefer a 5-foot graphite spinning rod and a medium-sized spinning reel. I don’t like the ultralight spinning reels; I like a fairly good-sized reel, because when it’s loaded with 6-or-8 longer cast, it has a larger spool diameter and I can make a longer cast. Also, the slightly larger reels have smoother, more efficient drag. I set the drag for a pound or two less pressure than my line test. With 6-pound line, I set the drag for about 4 pounds. How the hook is set is important, and I want the drag to be able to slip. With 6-pound line, it is very, very difficult to set a worm hook, because you have to drive the hook point through the worm as well as through the fish’s mouth. With the drag just below the breaking point, I pretend I’m using 20-pound line when I set the hook. Every time I overset the hook—which is constantly—the drag slips and the line doesn’t break. I also use the multiple hook set—I just repeat setting the hook five to ten times as the fish is running away.
One factor which is important in worm fishing, particularly with the Texas rig, is to avoid if possible setting the hook when the bass is running directly toward you. This is especially important during the spawning season because the spawners so often have the worm only in the lips. If the fish is facing you and headed right at you, you’re apt to pull the worm out of his lips when you set the hook. If he’s turned the other way, the hook sort of catches him in the corner of his mouth even if he had it only in his lips.
When they run directly at me, I try to put just a little pressure and hope they’ll turn. I don’t mind setting the hook when he’s straight under the boat because I’m pulling straight up on him.
A lot of people ask me, “When do you set the hook with a worm?’’ Three of four variables determine this. For example, if I’m stickup fishing in Toledo Bend Reservoir or Ross Barnett Reservoir—some place like that with a lot of stickups—and throw in next to a shady stickup and a fish sucks it up instantly as they often do, I’m going to set the hook within a second or two. If he heads toward the obstruction, I don’t want him to go in there, so I’m going to set almost instantly.
But suppose I throw in by that same stickup and the bass hits and starts moving away from the stickup. I might wait an additional two or three seconds. I want him to move away from it, because this is to my advantage, especially if I’m using fairly light line. Again, if this is the spawning season, I’ll strike back within three seconds, but if it’s early summer and he’s just trying to eat the worm as they often do, then with the Texas rig, I’ll let him go a few feet as long as he’s moving away from the heavy cover.
If the water’s fairly clear and I see an exceptionally big bass hit the worm or see the boil of a lunker grabbing the worm, I try to give her a little more time if she’s away from the cover. I’ve found that some of the larger bass don’t always suck the worm into their mouths when they first hit. Quite often that first tap is the fish grabbing the worm with his lips, and that second tug you feel is the worm being sucked in. I’ve watched this happen in my 7,000-gallon aquarium and also while diving with outdoor photographer Glen Lau in Salt Springs and Silver Springs, Fla. When they’ve finally got the worm inside their mouths is the perfect time to set the hook. As a general rule when the water temperature is over 75 degrees, most bass inhale the worm on the initial strike as they hit it. When the water’s cooler, such as during the spawning season, they often grab it with their lips and you’ve got to wait a little bit until they get it inside their mouths.
An experience I had several years ago really taught me to set the hook hard with a worm. I didn’t realize a big bass has such tremendous jaw pressure until an incident in 1967. I had caught an 11-pound, 2-ounce largemouth one day at Santee-Cooper. I was guiding at Bill Jones’ Landing on Santee’s Diversion Canal. The shiner and herring season was over, and I put the bass in one of Bill’s live-bait tanks. Of course, every time a new prospective customer came around and asked about fishing, I’d take him down to the tank and show him the 11-pounder along with some four-to-eight-pounders I had in there too. Naturally, this always whetted his enthusiasm for going fishing and hiring me as a guide. It helped his confidence.
Quickly I noticed that this 11-pounder took up a territory in the tank. He stayed in one corner and acted like he owned it. But he was shy and wouldn’t eat for a long time. I’d throw in a handfull of minnows, and the smaller bass would feed on them right away. So I started holding minnows in front of the big one’s face. When he’d look half interested, I’d let the minnows go and he’d suck them up as they swam by him.
Finally he grew a little bolder, and when I’d hold the minnows down in the water, he’d come up within a couple inches of them. After a couple weeks of this, he’d come up to my hand and actually suck the minnow out of my fingers. He’d simply fare his gills and open his mouth, and this created a suction which pulled the minnow 3 or 4 inches. This is much like the way they hit a plastic worm in the summertime. I’ve watched them, and a big one can be 4 or 5 inches away from the worm and suck it into his mouth.
Anyhow, one day my 11-pounder was just a little too hungry. He came up to the minnow, and instead of sucking it in as he’d been doing, he just crunched down on my hand. Believe it or not, the pain was excruciating! I estimated that he put at least 150 pounds of pressure per square inch on my fingers, and he almost broke them! Instead of letting go, he held on for three or four scconds and crunched and ground his jaws on my fingers, and I couldn’t pull loose. Finally he let go and swam away.
I got to thinking about that. After all, it was the first time I had ever had a trophy bass actually bite me. This led me to realize, that with the tackle we use for bass, if a big fish is crunching down on a crank bait, worm, or spinner bait with all that jaw pressure, there is no way to move the hook into any flesh. It would stay right where it was in his grasp. You’d be trying to set the hook, but actually you wouldn’t be moving it at all! After a couple seconds, the fish would release the pressure and spit the whole lure out.
Quite often during those early years at Santee, I had that very thing happen. I used up to a 40-pound-test line and would set the hook like a madman, but nothing would happen and the bass would spit the worm out. Some giant bass—10-pounders and bigger—did that after I’d set the hook awfully hard.
I figured the secret would be to set the hook when the fish isn’t exerting that tremendous jaw pressure. So I started setting the hook with a plastic worm after two or three seconds. After that hard first set, I don’t know how much jaw pressure he’s exerting, so I quickly reel in all the slack and set the hook again two seconds later. I keep the pressure on, and set it a third time two seconds after that. Then after that, I keep on setting the hook every two or three seconds, and I know that at some point, he’s released the jaw pressure and the hook is penetrating his mouth. When I started using the multiple hook set, immediately I started hooking a much higher percentage of my strikes with a plastic worm.
That 11-pounder which bit the hand that fed him turned out to be a blessing for me, since from that experience I learned about the great jaw pressure and developed my practice of multiple hook setting. This has helped me boat many more bass and undoubtedly has helped my tournament success. I believe lots of bass fishermen lose many trophy bass on plastic worms because they don’t use the multiple hook set and therefore don’t get the hook to penetrate the bass’s jaws. However, I don’t think 1 ½-pound bass exert this kind of jaw pressure. I think the smaller ones hit the worm and can be hooked usually with the initial hard hook set.
Another important thing about worm fishing— something we discovered about twenty years ago—is to have a suitable rod to set the hook. We learned that ideal rods, which today the manufacturers call worm rods, are heavy-butted rods with a lot of backbone in the lower half of the rod. They have fairly light tips for good casting, but you’re driving the hook with that butt section.
Regardless of the kind of worm rig I’m using, I like to position the rod at a 45-degree angle or higher. The main reason for this is I have far more feel of the bottom. The rod is about 90 degrees from the bass, and I have the maximum feel of the tip of the rod. The maximum sensitivity with a worm rod comes with the tip high in the air, and I’m working the worm from a 45-degree to a 90-degree or greater angle. Then the second I feel the strike or detect line movement and determine I have a fish, I drop the rod tip and reel up all the slack line except for the last 2 or 3 inches, and then I set the hook on a slack line. Before I set it, I’m watching that little bit of slack line to see what way he’s moving. When I finally set the hook, my arms are extended and I’m pulling the reel and the butt of the rod back toward me instead of merely jerking the tip upward. I’m actually setting the hook with my arms and wrist. My arms are in close to my body, and I bring my wrists up toward my face. Instantly I start reeling as fast as I can, and again I set the hook, reel fast, and repeat this procedure.
At seminars, I’m often asked how I work the worm. I fish it about three different ways. With the Texas rig, most of my fishing is done in fairly shallow water. Since the worm is a great ambush-point lure, I’m seeking out some type of cover. When I’m fishing heavy cover, I’m thinking to myself that the bass is right there by the stump or bush. So I’m either going to throw right to the obstruction or a couple feet past it. As I crawl the worm past the cover, I prefer for it to be falling straight down off of things such as off a root. About 90 percent of my strikes on a worm come as the worm is coming off of something, such as off a boulder, stump, grass, or creek channel ledge. At this time, the worm usually is sinking or falling. Very seldom does the strike occur when I’m pulling the worm up on something.
Usually with a plastic worm I set the hook quickly, before the bass drops it. But sometimes, especially in cooler water, that first tap, which I’m feeling in the first photo, just means the fish has grabbed the worm with its lips; if you strike then you won’t hook it. I give the fish slack, with the rod low, for a few seconds, then set the hook hard—and more than once.