BassB8Caster

Id take 6lbers anytime! I am going out both saturday and sunday. Tomorrow i was planning on fishing moose pond in west paris. I have been there once last year, i think it was. Didnt catch anything special. Was super windy that day. It's a pretty small pond (97 acres) that is shallow (10 feet max). Most of it is 8 to 10 deep. Obviously shallower at shoreline. I have heard there are decent fish in there. Im also considering Hutchinson pond in albany. Maps show some good humps and shallows with drop offs. May be decent. Also open to suggestion. Last place i went was bradley pond in stoneham. Caught a decent number. Nothing huge (3.5 biggest). Also caught a big brookie. Not sure if there are many big fish in there (i did lose one over 5 there earlier this summer). Suggestions would be greatly appreciated. Good luck to you! Any big ones this year?

When i used to fish frogs more i would get somr of those hits. I often would get too excited and set the hook before they had it. Reacting to sight rather than feel. I once had a bass hit my spook up into the air. Next cast i caught the fish. As far as the whopper plopper and bbz1 rat, those fish just come up and grab the bait. Have yet to have a big explosion on those 2 baits. Nothing like topwater fishing!

Hey guys, i havent been out fishing in a while. Plan on fishing saturday and sunday this weekend. Curious how the fishing is here in Maine. Im seeing threads about summer/fall transition lulls. Im hoping the bite hasnt slowed. I fish mainly small ponds, so im sure they have cooled down a bit. I see saturday is going to have a high of 61. Im thinking fish should be active. I plan to target any green vegetation/lillies i can find. One pond i plan to fish is very shallow. maybe a deep spot of 10 feet. I plan to target the shorline, especially vegetation and any other cover i can find. How is everyone else doing?

Good work! i have the WP 130 in loon. It took until the 4th outing to catch on on it. The fish were around 2-2.5lbs. I like it and agree it will be a big fish catcher. My first expensive lure before the WP (the WP is considered a more expensive lure to me) was the BBZ1 Rat @ $25. But man that thing works. I would say that will be the only thing keeping me from doing real well with the WP because i dont want to use anything else besides the Spro Rat. Interestingly, i have not had any big blow ups on the rat or WP. the fish just "grab" the lure. I love topwater and really look forward to fishing them this fall.

that is awesome! my daughter is 14 months and i cannot wait to introduce fishing to her. I plan on raising my fishing buddy as much as she wants to be involved.

I fish out of a kayak too. Its a luxury being able to get where the boats cant. I was stuck below the 5lb mark as well (i lost a few i knew were over, just couldnt land them). Then i landed a 6lber on a 10" worm just before dark in the shallows near pads. They are starting to roam. To touch on what wrb said regarding down hill vs uphill. I too like throwing swimbaits. I havent gotten into the real big ones as i need a swimbait set up. But i fish the 5.8 keitech. I try to read as much as i can on swimbait fishing for big bass. When targeting those big bass that are looking for trout for example, articles say the fish will set up looking out to deep water, where the trout come from. So if you cast from deep to shallow you may bri g it right by them and they wont see it until it passes.

good to hear! Maine definitely has some big fish!

sounds like you know the pond very well. I dont think you need to necessarily fish the deep spots. Knowing vegetation, channels, flats etc adjacent to those deep spots may be the key to the big girls. They will roam to feed. they have their specific areas of restaraunts they frequent. you just need to be there at the right place at the right time and present a bait they want that given instance. Ask any big fish fisherman and they will all tell you the same thing. you can go days without a bite. But when you get bit....hold on. So start picking apart that pond hitting the high percentage areas! 90% of the fish are in 10% of the water. find them. then catch them.

When we start changing up lures, especially once we get past 4 or 5 baits, we start to get anxious. Things start getting in our heads. Lots of times we then start speeding things up. A fast erratic retrieve may work great some days. That one day you were out may not have been that day. If you are going to fast, it doesnt matter what you throw. Some days you just chalk it up to the skunk master. If i find myself going a decent amount of time (say 2 hours) without a bite, i will force myself to slooooowwwww down. I may stop a few minutes and collect my thoughts. There will be times where we think we are going slow, when in fact we still need to slow down more. Like it was said above, you better get used to some skunk days. it happens. But learning from these poor days may be the biggest improvement to your future success. So what did you learn?

I have found through experience and reading articles, that big worms will only work on days that end in Y. other than that i would not bother fishing them. For me, a 10" Berkley Havoc federale worm is the go to bait when im not getting bit on other lures. I recently caught my PB of 6.01lbs at a pond i have fished a good handful of times. I have caught good fish here, but nothing over 5. I have hooked and lost 2 that jumped out of the water that i knew were over 5. So i knew they were in there. Just didnt know how big they were. Fished for around 2 hours with no bites. Threw the sink at them. Just as it started getting darker, i tied on a worm and targetted pockets inside lillies. Caught that 6lber. I fished this exact area several times before. Right place at the right time. Bass love the worms too. Remember, the bigger bass may have been deep all summer, but this is the time of year they may start coming in shallow. Target shallow in and near vegetation in that first hour of light and last hour of light. The best time of year a big bass wants a big bait is when the bass wants to eat the right big bait. Present it as a good meal that they dont have to expend a lot of energy and you will have an interested bass. High caloric intake with little cost. Be ready for the bite as it may be suttle. Make sure everything is in check from the hook to the reel. Nothing worse than losing a big bass to these things you can control. They are hard enough getting to bite. Good luck.

Thank you very much. Greatly appreciate it

to add on to this "first find the fish, then figure out how to catch them" point. I saw a video where Glenn of Bassresource talked about this. His recommendation was to go buy the biggest swimbait you can find (10, 12") and cover water with it. He said this will reveal where the bass are, as naturally they will be tempted to check out the bait. They may bite it, they may not and just follow it in. But that atleast will let you know where they are at and which direction they are coming from. You can mark this on a gps and return and fish the area.

Some great advice above. Warmer months tend to favor slow presentations. I have learned to never go a fishing trip skunked without trying a worm. ESPECIALLY if there is some vegetation. Often times bigger bass will go deep, especially under sun conditions. Remember there are always exceptions to rules with bass. I went out tuesday afternoon. Overcast cool conditions. Perfect. Fish should be active. I tried topwayer, swimbaits, swim jig, chatterbait, etc. Tried deeper areas to target the bigger fish. Nothing. As it was starting to get dark something told me to target pockets in vegetation with a worm. Within 15 minutes i landed a new pb. 6.01lbs 22" on a 10" blue flake worm. Wasnt expecting that to be in there.

Good advice. Ill give it a try

Opposite for me. Im in maine and for some reason white lures do not do very well.

for those of you that fish the morning dawn color, they come with a yellow tail out of the package. I had great success when i got it (i think it was around June). I have caught many good fish on it. But it got beat up and the tail broke. I now have one of the extra tails that come with it, which is purple. I have since had no bites with the rat with a purple tail. Anyone seeing anything like this? We are having cool nights here in Maine, so water temps should be coming down a bit. The rat should still do well. Could a yellow vs purple tail make all the difference?

I have a 130 in loon color. Dont have any problem with it operating correctly. Only issue i have is i have yet to catch a fish, or get a bite for that matter.

I have as well. There was one pond i fished that when i hooked up and started bringing them in, they just gave up and let you drag them across the water. They were some very healthy beautiful looking largemouth too. Nothing wrong with them. Almost like they knew and were saying "you got me, bring me in and let me go". I would say you can tell the difference between a smallie and largemouth eventually. Maybe not at first in the hookup, as i have caught some very aggressive and active largemouth. The smallmouth obviously love to jump, especially the smaller ones. For largemouth, it seems they are all different. sometimes they are fighters, sometimes not and then those in between. Pickerel dont have much fight to them. Sometimes they do at first, then they just get pulled in.

Morning dawn size 40!

Are you bank fishing? Kayak? Canoe? Boat? Sebago is a huge lake btw.

I cannot believe they did not release these early summer. Sure down south they can fish year round, they are missing out on a huge market (the northern half of the country that freezes over in winyer). Don't get me wrong, I'll purchase them anyway, but I would love to use them this summer (up here in Maine). Came across big hammer brand swimbaits that have a 7" and 9". Very interested in trying those on a weighted jig head. But I do love the action of the keitech impact fats.

I fished the 130 for about 20 minutes again Saturday morning and no action on it. I'm not giving up on it though. That morning the 10.5" work was the ticket around weed and grasslines. I typically hit up the top water lures in the early am and gave had great success with the spro rat . Possibly (where I fish anyway) the 130 wp may be better midday or evenings. I'll have to experiment with it. As I recall, both mornings I fished the 130 were really calm. Maybe with the big splash it may do better with some surface disturbance. Time will tell.

I have not. But i have only fished it for about 20 minutes one morning. The fish were very finicky that morning. I was able to catch a few on the spro 40 rat but not much else. I bought the loon color because from my research it seemed most people recommended that color. In theory it sounds like it should work (could be a bird, bat, or any other small animal flailing away on the surface). Im hoping to get out this weekend and give it another try. Maybe i should leave the rat at home and dedicate some time to the 130. Ill use the suggestions on here of a slow retrieve, just gettng it to plop. I just may have to buy one in bone color as well if this one doesnt work. I think bringing it along cover (lilies, grasslines, docks, etc) just as it starts to get light out should work perfectly.

YouTube Mike iaconelli swim jig. Pretty good basics

I agree that the line was most to blame. The rod was a Abu Garcia vendetta mh rod. Nothing special. My first combo baitcaster I purchased (black max reel). It has performed pretty well for me, that's why I don't necessarily blame it. It could have some give. Add a few small weaknesses and that's plenty for a big bass to shake loose. My kayak is a light sit in (maybe 45 50lbs). I weigh 165 (so maybe 185 with all my gear). It doesn't take a lot to move this kayak on the water. I also cannot say I had the best hookset possible either. I was slow rolling the bait, felt the weight and set the hook (while reeling to help keep tension). I felt weight until I saw her jump and spit the lure. One of many lessons for me to learn. At least I'm finding good fish.