BassMaster

i don't believe i have either... i've caught several large crappies on minnows, but not big bass. big bass are after big baits. unless you're actually fishing with a crappie or a bream on a bass bed, i don't think you're going to catch very many big bass. big bass need big fish to meet their motabolizm needs.

i read something in this month's bassmaster magazine that big bass are like big women (this was coming from a woman, so ladies please don't take offense to this)... they don't want to have to go find their food, they wait till it comes to them. which is basically very true. if you want to catch big bass in the heat of the day, you gotta run your bait right in front of them really slow. i actually caught my biggest bass in the middle of july when it was about 95 degrees outside. fish are more active when it's a little cooler outside in the summer, but there is that oddball every once in a while. you just gotta fish the best you can and with all the confidence you have... confidence is what's gonna bring in the big mommas.

must have used a spoon or something... didn't know bass spawned in 63' of water ???

sounds about right... been a while since i've heard the real thing, and you know how you get stuff mixed up after hearing something that long ago

yup... and it's well worth the drive too if you just want to see some cool stuff. if you plan on shpping a whole lot, they have a thing called the internet and it's a great invention... i do all my shopping from BPS online now. and now that gas is so danged expensive, i can't afford to drive that far anymore just to see a d**n big store with a lot of cool stuff.

two 3/8 oz. white/chart. spinnerbaits, couple of 1/4 oz. bullet weights for your texas rig, which i would bring as many of my worms/lizards as i could... go out and buy you one of those worm notebooks and take all that you can fit in there. that's basically all i would take... and some hooks of course. you can always find them with your worm and catch them with your spinnerbait. but if you got room, i'd take a topwater of some sort, probably a buzzbait, i'd take a deep diving crankbait, a suspending crankbait/jerkbait, and a shallow diving suspending/floating jerkbait.

there was an unofficial 24 pounds i think a couple years ago... can't remember where, but he didn't have any whitnesses... all he had was a picture of it

20 lb bass? the larges bass ever caught was i believe 24 poungs... but to answer your question, find humps in the lake and fish them c-rig, crankbaits, drop shot, texas rig... find creeks that run into the channel and fish them the same way. find shallow cut-outs and fish them with jerkbaits, spinnerbaits, buzzbaits, any top water. usually if there's no vegetation or anything for the bass to take cover in, they'll usually go down deep where the sun can't hit them... where's it's cooler. so find the deep areas and fish them with everything you got. the best thing you can do is find out what you're most comfortable using that will produce fish for you. build up your confidence with your different lures. it's always good to have confidence with everything in your tackle box.

only fished at jordan lake a couple times, but i hear that the fishing was great in the late 80's early 90's, then people just kept keepin all the fish and the fishing has gone sorta down hill the past 10 years... i always liked falls and kerr lake better anyway

yeah man don't give up... i'm in a slump myself... the past 5 times i've gone fishing i've gone home with nothing to show for except some sun burn... sure i was questioning myself for a while there, but a good buddy of mine kept tellin me not to question what i know i'm good at. and if you know you're good at fishing, abelfisher, then you can't question it. you're time will come... plus, it's spawning season, and the fish just don't bite as much as they do when it's summer time. but just wait, and trust your instincts. something my dad would always ask me when i was younger and we came home from a fishing trip and we were around my mom is this: he'd ask me what my favorite thing in the world to do is... and i'd say fishing... then he'd ask what my second favorite thing to do is, and i said catching fish. and today if he were to ask me that, i'd tell him the exact same thing. so just let that be a lesson to you. it's not all about catching fish, it's about going out there doing something you love to do, especially with your kid(s). it's such an awesome thing to pass down an outdoor activity such as fishing to your son or daugter and know that they enjoy it just as much as you did when you were their age. then they'll do the same thing with their kids. it is something that you will enjoy all your life. i've been doing it all my life, only 20 years, and i still look forward to going fishing with my friends, myself, and my dad. there's just nothing else in this world quite like it...

i don't think i'd start off the day using a rat-l-trap. i would start off using either a buzzbait w/ a black skirt, or a dark colored pop-r. i also might use a spinnerbait if the bass aren't hitting topwater. i'd try and use a darker color, maybe black or pumpkinseed skirt. i would also look for heavy vegetation, in the morning and at night when the bass are feeding, they'll sit in the cover around shallow water and wait to ambush a school of baitfish. i would actually use a fluke too, maybe watermelonseed/chart. color, or even a trick worm.

first thing i'd throw out there is a texas rigged worm so i can see if there is any more structure under the water that cannot be seen above. once i find other structure, i may keep fishing with the worm or i'll throw a spinnerbait in there. water of that color, i'd throw out a white/red/brown spinnerbait with gold blades. for the worm i'd throw out a 7 inch curly tailed or u-tailed pumpkinseed worm. that would be the very first thing i would use in terms of color. since you said there are a lot of crawfish in there, i'd throw out either a blue/black jig with a blue craw trailer, or a pumpkinseed jig with a pumpkinseed craw trailer... i'd use anywhere from 1/4 oz. to 5/8 oz. jig.

they'll usually take cover in deeper water. i usually fish it with a crankbait, texas rig, or c-rig. sometimes i'll even use a drop shot or rat-l-trap.

what i'll usually do to find fish if they're not biting anything is throw out a texas rig worm of some sort, and small at that. also, look for baitfish, if there are baitfish around, chances are there's a bass around waiting to ambush. when the water temp rises during postspawn, look for any kind of cover, i.e. fallen timber, standing timber, weeds, lilly pads, docks, things like that. once the water temp warms up to the upper 70's, the bass will move down deep where the water is cooler. in terms of colors, any natural looking colors will work great. pay attention to the color of the water, color of the lake floor and the color of any type of vegetation around, and match your worm to that color. in most cases, pumpkinseed/charteuse works well, watermelon seed, basically any natural looking color will work very well.

or just throw the bait a good ways past the fish and work in back slow.

what i would do is throw a texas rig with a very light weight on it, maybe 3/16 oz. and put a double ringer, finnesse worm, centipede, french fry, or something short with a straight tail and fish it SLOW. spawning season is usually when bass are very easily scared. haven't quite figured out why, but they do scare easily. at this time of year, you don't want to throw topwater. they're not looking to really ambush anything on the top yet. down here in NC, i'd give to the end of the week and they will most likely start hitting topwater. it'll be in the 80's all week, thus raising the water temp to the mid to upper 70's... great temp for bass to start hitting top water. but try a texas rig with a small weight, maybe even a split shot with an even lighter weight... hell, you may even wanna try going weightless. they may take a very slow rolling spinnerbait, just barely fast enough to keep the blades turning... so you're less likely to spook the fish, use gold blades instead of silver. the silver may be too bright of a flash if they're easily scared, but the gold blades should work.

me and bassin4life actually just beer baddered a couple bass tonight ;D and i must say, that was some gooooooood eatin... but to me, nothing is better than frying 15 crappie after a long hard day at the lake

oh i know what it's like to lose your baits... i think anybody knows... i just lost 5 really nice spinnerbaits last week fishing... but i also landed 10 bass, one was 4 1/2 pounds... so it's not all that bad... sometimes you gain something after losing, and sometimes you lose something after gaining something big... if that makes no sense, i'm sorry, i'm a wee bit tired :-/... but yeah, confidence with a bait is what's gonna make you catch fish.

man, watermelon seed is one of my hottest bass producers in the pond i go fishing at a lot. it's good for the worm/lizard to dissapear... it's camouflaged like most animals are in their environment. i always use Gamakatsu 4/0 G-Lock Worm Hooks, when i texas rig them, i use anywhere from 3/16 to 3/4 oz bullet weights. but for the most part, when the bass are aggressive i'll use it weightless. the action of those trick worms are SICK!!! sometimes i'll even split shot them with 2 3/16 oz splitshots or sometimes just one.

powerbait... you know, Berkley powerbaits... and those zoom trick worms are the shiz. i've caught several on the mean green red trick worm. i only have 2 kinds, and they both work very nicely the mean green red and the red pumpkinseed green. i would like to know what other colors have been producing fish for other people, too. i'm always willing to learn something else from other people's experiences.

well said skeeter... most of the time they'll go down to the deeper part of the lake where it's cooler. but sometimes they'll also hang out around the mouth of a cove where the creek runs into the main channel... that's usually an excellent place to fish c-rig and/or crankbaits and rat-l-traps. but if those don't work, try using 10" worms on a 5/8 oz. or 1/2 oz. texas rig. most of the time you can never go wrong with a texas rig. they'll also go back in the shallow coves and find structure there to hang out at... lilly pads provide and excellent cover for bass to hide... it's so much fun fishing lilly pads with a frog... you can always tell you're about to get a hit when you see the lilly pads moving around when they were sitting still. also look for falling timber in those coves or even standing timber in the main part of the lake. also you can find sholes, see where it runs off into the channel and fish that with a crankbait, rat-l-trap, c-rig, drop shot, texas rig, or even spinnerbaits.

glad to see you're on the same page as me... and the odds of that happening are actually fairly high... like i said in the last post, if the fish is really aggressive, he will strike again. sounds like you were using a powerbait worm ... those bass loooove those powerbait worms... ain't nothin with a stronger scent than those... too bad they cost you an arm and a leg at the store.

if the fish is really aggressive and you didn't hook it at all when it hit, just let the bait sit there and chances are the fish will go after it again. as for the whole follow up bait, just keep what you have on there, it's not really necessary to change when you've missed a fish. if it bit that particular bait, it will probably bite it again.

it's about 15 feet at the deepest in this pond. and there were plenty of better spots to hang around rather than in open water 3 feet off the shore. there is fallen timber all on the northern side of the pond, about 15 feet deep at the dam with trees overhanging the water. and in the summer time, since this pond is right off a golf course, there is grass all over the pond to about 15 feet off the shore line. i caught the bass on the east side of the pond where the grass isn't quite as thick, but there is still grass.

slow roll a spinnerbait along the riprap... is there a creek that runs throught the middle of the pond? if so, try fishing that if you can with a spinnerbait or a texas rig... since the water is that cold, all you want is something like a 4 inch yum dinger or a zoom centipede, french fry, double ringer, finnesse worm, basically anything short without the curly tails. also try fishing the grassy area with a texas rig or a spinnerbait. those two baits are going to be your main bass producers... pond or lake