Hook2Jaw

When the going gets tough the finesse gets going; a shakyhead with a Z-Man Fattyz has caught me so many fish and so many good fish this year. Behind that, the Strike King 3XD has caught my biggest bass of the year and tons of them as well when conditions line up. When fish are hanging close to cover, a jig, finesse jig, and Texas rigged D-Bomb. If I've gotta catch one, it's the shakyhead.

I consider is a true fast. Upper third, maybe a little less bends under good pressure.

On one of my local lakes it seems there are two groups of bass. The first group, and the one most pressured by anglers, are the shallow bass that seem to stay shallow year round. They seem to chomp young and mature sunfish. The other group target the schools of shad that exist in deeper water. That's not saying a shallow fish won't eat a shad and a deep fish won't eat a bluegill, but I have more faith in imitating bluegill in the shallows and shad when I'm fishing deep.

A Daiwa Rebellion 7'3" MHF makes an awesome bottom contact rod for the baits you're looking to throw. I really like mine, it is a feather, an absolute cannon, and it looks great. You can get them on TW for two bills.

I've been beating bottom and catching suspending fish on the Strike King 3xd, catching more fish on a ³/¹⁶ ounce shakyhead with a Z-Man Fattyz, catching more fish with a Texas rigged D-Bomb, and then catching fish with a Berkley SPY in the middle of the day. It has been a grind.

@Catt, I needed to hear that. I've been fishing a small 100 acre public fishing area that is ringed with saplings that have died off.

Like @Bluebasser86, I believe your gear was up to the task. I do just fine using EWG worm hooks, and will continue to do just fine using them. As you just mentioned, you lost the fish on the second hookset. The fish was either skin hooked inside the mouth and you tore the hook free or it came free during the moment of slack. I very rarely double set, but when I do it's a 4/0+ jig hook and it's because I was out of position on the initial swing. The 3/0 Gamakatsu you're using will penetrate rather easily. If you're not confident in that statement, you can hook the worm in the side and leave it barely under the skin. Doing so will ruin a lot of plastic, but you'll completely free the hook shank from the worm on the swing. Good luck, I have a feeling you're going to land the next good one.

Focus on a few techniques at a time to narrow your bait selection. If you want to learn something new, first identify what variables are necessary for one to see success with that new bait. Otherwise, focus on your confidence baits. Some of those confidence baits for me are crankbaits in all portions of the water column in all but the coldest climates of the year when I've got prefrontal conditions that present a combination of wind and low light conditions. I find my best days of crankbait fishing combine those two factors. Presented with one of either wind or cloud cover, I will lock a casting jig and pitching jig in for the day and look for big bites around high percentage areas. Those two baits in addition to a senko styled worm fished weightless, a dropshot rig, and a shakyhead round out almost all of my fishing from the post spawn to the fall. As soon as fall rolls around, a lot of my crankbaits become jerkbaits and the three aforementioned finesse techniques accompany them through the colder months of the year until the cycle completes itself. Instead of devoting yourself to researching and throwing every single bait on the market, identify some standouts for yourself and understand their intricacies. In doing so, you'll cut down on the baits you carry. Fish the conditions, your available high percentage areas, and what you're confident in. You'll put more bass in the boat with fewer dollars spent and less pounds lugged.

I use fluorocarbon for cranking, after bouncing to Berkley Big Game for a short time. I noticed a terrible loss of sensitivity upon switching and I'm a contact cracker, though only with two seasons under my belt. I enjoy knowing exactly what my crankbait is doing, even to the point I've started feeling the rush of a fish behind the bait. To offset the cost of fluorocarbon, I use Yo-Zuri Top Knot Mainline Fluorocarbon on my cranking rigs. I get it for under ten dollars a spool, considerably cheaper than a lot of monofilaments some of you guys use. I also fill half my spool with cheap Kastking braid to lighten the spool and therefore, speed it up. That increased the distance of my casts and I'm only using 70 yards of fluorocarbon at a time. As far as the Topknot Mainline goes -- it's strong, I straightened a 2/0 Gamakatsu round bend worm hook with it the last time out with 10 pound test. It doesn't have as much memory as the Berkley Vanish and Berkley 100% Fluorocarbon that I used to throw. It's also much thinner than those lines in comparable pound tests. It isn't as abrasion resistant as Berkley Big Game was, but I was retying that often enough already. I'm running 14# Topknot on my deep cranking and squarebill setup and 12# on another setup for lighter cover. I landed a 25"(7 pound 10 ounce), 22"(I didn't weigh her), and a 21" largemouth last week while using the aforementioned line. It works for me and works very well. Count me in the camp that doesn't like monofilament for fishing my crankbaits.

My favorite moving bait right now is the Strike King 3XD. That will change in the fall to an H2O Xpress CRS Squarebill. In the winter my favorite will be a Jackall Rerange 110. It changes with the fish. If I had to pick one it would be the 3XD, but that's because it's a new love.

I love them on hard bottom with a ZOOM Z-Craw. I like to throw the Mustad Fastach Football Head in ½ and ¾. I use a half in anything less than 15', and the ¾ deeper than that. I just started using them after the spawn and they've been a producer.

The Strike King 3XD. I just ordered a Tatula XT MLR ¼-⅝ and new Tatula Elite 6.3:1 to cast it further. I hope it's not too lightly powered for the bait.

I think the Abu Garcia Black Max is the best reel under 50 bones.

Catt, I love you and I appreciate every bit of advice you've given me, and I am going off my own personal opinion. The Kurita fish, in my opinion, is the world record largemouth bass. It is the heaviest bass ever caught that was not foul hooked off a bed.

Foul hooked. I've foul hooked many a carp, it was pure chance. That's what I do with Dottie at 25. I don't much care for those IGFA rules, but I'm aware of the two ounce difference rule. I think an ounce is an ounce and Perry's record is, to me, obsolete. The Kurita fish is the world record in my eyes. I also don't think Georgia produced the world record at all, ever, because I've fished Oxbow lakes from time to time and I'll tell you they're poorly oxygenated mudholes full of gar and bowfin. It doesn't matter, George Perry lost any claim to the record years ago.

I don't believe the Perry bass is the world record. The fish caught in Japan, the one an ounce heavier, is the daggum world record. Where I come from the better number wins and the Kurita fish has the better number. It's pure ridiculousness. If I ever catch a fish an ounce heavier than the Kurita fish and they tell me it isn't the world record I'm gonna be mad as fire, and then you guys can discuss here about why or why it is not the world record.

Swim shake a Ned rig right by them and get ready to swing. Deadstick a finesse worm near them and get ready to swing. Deadstick a Missile Baits Bomb Shot near them and get ready to reeling sweep set. If they don't bite while you can see them, back off, come back later, and cast near their haunt.

The YUM Kill Shot. It does nothing but get bit.

Netbait T-Mac 6.5" is a good shakyhead worm. A YUM Money Craw also does well for me on it.

I use them for skipping weightless stick worms. It prevents them from balling up down the shank after they've been beat on for a bit. They collect a lot of trash when you're fishing around trash, though. That's one detriment to them. Will they work for what you're trying to do? Yes. I carry both screw locks and regular EWGs because the negatives outweigh the positives for me when it comes to bottom contact Texas rigging.

They have great action. I'm enjoying them.

Wind often makes me reach for a moving bait. The moving bait I choose varies according to other conditions as well as location and the stage the bass are in. The water clarity also plays a role as well. Preferably, I reach for a jerkbait from fall to the beginning of the spawn. Through the spawn and summer I've gained confidence with a 3.8" paddletail.

I try to keep things as cheap as possible, and my favorite jerkbait is the Jackall Rerange 110. They make them eat when they're closer to neutral, but when I find them crushing a jerkbait I switch to the Provoke 106x with those trebles. My hookup to land percentage goes nearly to 100%, I feel. Oh, and as for the hooks I asked the owner what brand they were a while back when they mailed me some replacement baits -- they're Mustad. I love a Mustad. They're just mean and the name sounds like it.

I have no idea how the Z-Man Razor Shadz and Goatz haven't been mentioned more. They have excellent action and even after quite a few good fish on the Project Z this year, I haven't needed to grab a new one unless I lost the entire chatterbait. Besides those, my paddletail of choice has strongly switched to the Lake Champlain Lures 3.8. It's a Keitech clone, but it's a good one and it's considerably cheaper.

Sometimes.