Pat Brown

I am a glutton for punishment in the hot months just like the cold months to be honest. Late Summer and Late Winter are my favorite fishing seasons for most of the same reasons. Nobody on the water. Easier to catch giants consistently. It's weird how similar they are. Dead of summer you sweat a lot and it is hard to stay conscious and dead of winter you shiver and fingers hurt and it's hard to tell if a fish is biting. Both suck at times but both can be fun when you get out on the right day. Both seasons seem to be easier to consistently find larger fish that are willing to bite. If you can find a way to comfortably endure the extremes, you will be greatly rewarded. Fall and Spring are great but it's way more of a numbers thing and EVERYONE is out fishing and fish get all pressured and tight lipped.

We got Northern and Florida! Depends on the lake but I have caught both strains! I think when stocking the DNR stocks a mixture of both so we have the lunkers and the fun aggressive fish. I think we naturally have produced some 'F1 hybrids' as a result in our home lakes. You definitely catch more of the northern strain when it gets cold and you catch more of the Florida strain in the dead of summer.

It is my belief that a lot of larger fish behave like ocean fish and they spend a lot of the hot day being lazy and then they move up onto the flats during opportunities that they perceive as viable. This could be a strong wind, clouds rolling in, pressure drop, temperature drop, rain, sunset, etc etc etc. These fish will eat during their dormant periods, but it does become a matter of eliciting some kind of reaction strike and I do think a deep diving crank is a great bait for those times when they're holding deep off structure waiting for the right time to move up. Of course you have the strictly pelagic offshore fish and the more solitary 'bully in an area' shallow fish and both are fun to catch also and I think operate under similar rule sets but on different scales.

Honestly, I try to constantly shake things up. It's often how I stumble on patterns, areas, baits and presentations that REALLY work well that I never thought of being something that would work. I was having this discussion with my 10 year old son about lure choices. He was pointing out that I rarely fish anything new or wild and I pointed out that the things that have worked forever will continue to work forever and they are the things worth our time in the end.

Try a Siebert Shot caller in 1/4 oz, 3/8 oz and 1/2 oz in your favorite white/green/black and blue variations and pair them with some sort of 3.5-4" paddle tail swim bait trailer and fish em up in the water column past and through the nasty stuff. Don't be afraid to hop and drag a swim jig real slow in an area you know they're eating. Sometimes the little pop pop bait fish feeding hop gets the biggest bites. Sometimes the bulkier profile and secondary action of the skirt get bigger bites than just a paddle tail swim bait on a hook will. In fact...often times in my experience.

I have learned something this year fishing with electronics in the dead of summer from my boat. If you are fortunate enough to have a lake where a thermocline sets up AND surface temps are uninhabitable.....all it does is position ALL of the fish on your lake in a painfully predictable manner. Every single fish in your lake should be holding to pieces of cover and hard spots on structure at the depth right above the thermocline. Catchable? Maybe at the right time with the right bait etc, but that's where the shad is and that's where they will be also. Got wind/current rolling past the spots you're targeting? Even better.

The pond I caught my PB and many many 8 lb class fish out of is what you are describing to a T. It's basically impossible to catch fish out of but when you get a nibble it's bound to be a doozy.

If you catch a few fish on a jig going through an area, go back through the area with a worm or creature bait and you'll often catch different fish. Same applies for reaction baits. I definitely start low and sneaky and then if they seem eager to play I work them harder with faster moving and more assertive baits further up in the water column. Different retrieves and casting angles are always a good idea if you've got the time to make it happen on visible cover and offshore structure.

Shhhhhhhhhh ???? (One of the best baits Zoom makes. Take the claws off and you've got a magnum trick worm take the front off and you've got a jig trailer whatever size you want and you can rig it horizontal or vertical for crawdad or bait fish presentations. It's just freaking awesome. I always have some in the boat.)

Well, I was getting sorta jealous of all the dang giant bass everyone was catching and had to go and get me one too ?????? Thanks to @ol'crickety for encouraging me to keep tossing topwater, my admitted kryptonite. I may have found a topwater bait I can fish at my pressured pond in the old hollow body frog! Set up: Right before going to the beach for the 4th of July I was getting out to the pond around sunset a lot and getting blow ups around the boat house consistently as the sun was setting and missing the hook sets every single time. I was sitting the hook instantly as soon as the frog went underneath the water and pulling it out of the fish's mouth every single time. I switched to a popper and a walking bait with treble hooks and actually had the same experience. I noticed that I got significantly less bites on those baits though, which made more noise and commotion in the water and projected themselves more. So I switched back to the frog when I got back from the beach and tonight was my first outing with the frog since giving the fish by the boathouse that were blowing up a little break. I actually fished for about 2 hours in other areas with no bite from 5:00 to about 7:00 p.m. and then made my move to the boat house at 7:00 p.m. and started fan casting around the vegetation. Out of the corner of my eye I saw a huge swirl on a very shallow sandy flat to the right of where I was fishing where a large fish was corralling small fish right up against the bank. The cast my frog to that area where the boil was and worked my frog through it with nothing. I went back to fan casting the area and started my fan casting efforts on top of the flat. I was doing a steady walking cadence with little brief pauses and I was trying to impart as little actual movement as possible to keep the bait in place as it was walking from side to side. The bite was very subtle. She slurped it and I could tell by the boil around the frog which was in no more than a foot of water. It was a giant fish. I remembered all those fish I missed last week and waited til I felt her pulling THEN I set the hook. My drag immediately started screaming out. She jumped probably nine times and about gave me a heart attack on the way in. I locked my drag down. Took a deep breath and winched her to the edge of the bank where it became very quickly apparent that flipping her was not an option. I put my pole down giving her the requisite slack for me to go in and get her and thankfully she was pegged deep in her throat and was not coming off. The hooks came right out though with no damage or bleeding and she swam away with fervor after a brief photo shoot. Biggest fish ever caught in the middle of the summer and by far my biggest fish on a frog or top water! Happy summer bass resource!!!

Throw them where everyone is throwing deep diving cranks and big worms and football jigs and show em something a little different. They get bit!

Casting accuracy is probably the single most important part of bass fishing but I would say second to that is how you work your bait and I remember when I first started bass fishing, I was utterly shocked at how little you should be doing to get those fish to bite down there.

New PB for the Mrs™ Meagan and I got home and unpacked and of course, we wanted to get back our beloved green grass donkey flock to see how they were fairing. We were greeted by an empty marina, slick calm green water with less than a foot of visibility and 91° surface temps with bluebirdish skies. We decided to fish out local grass lake for this occasion for some odd reason. I think Meagan just wanted to see how that lake was doing and suggested it. She tied on a fluke and a red Z Man Chatterbait I bought her for Christmas and said with authority, 'these are the right baits for this lake today ' We leave the marina and she loses a 4-5 lber right at the boat on her 3rd cast with the fluke. We work some drops and some grass edges and get nary even a whiff. I decided we need to make a move for possibly some of the only 'current' on the lake: the dam. We fish around the dam and don't see much and then we start to slowly work the adjacent bluff wall. I can see the bottom here and surface temps are 89°, a bit cooler. I start to see active bream beds all up and down the bluff bank and I know it's on. Meagan switches to the Chatterbait and starts working the 15-9 ft zone. Casting it out, letting it fall to the bottom, hopping it up, letting it fall, reeling up slack, letting it fall again etc. She felt a 'tap tap on the lift and stopped moving and then it went THUNK' and I tell you what her pole about got ripped out of her hand. The fish was peeling drag and I could sense it was a giant bass. The fish jumped twice and then went straight under the boat. Jake was quick with the net and landed this gorgeous 7 lb summer stunner! Got a great release on her and she swam back to the depths post haste and with gusto.

Same colors as not blue water probably. Color is probably the single least important factor when selecting a bait. Try to think more about depth of the water, the type of cover you'll be fishing, the mood and personality of the fish and then lastly what are they feeding on? Take some time to observe your water. Wake up early and walk the bank without a pole and just observe. Do you see bass eating? Bugs on the surface? Chasing bluegill around? Busting on little schools? Things like this can clue you in on what types of things will work. All of this being said, you can't go wrong with Green Pumpkin, black and blue or white in most bodies of water! Good luck and let us know what worked for you!

I've watched your YouTube channel and I can confirm this. ????

Slaunch Donkey, Grass Pig, Hawg, Sow Belly, bucket mouth, ole big.

Been busy with work lately and catching a lot of 1-3 lbers when I make it out but managed to get my wife on a gorgeous 5 lber and my dad on a beautiful 6 lber in the past two weeks! Caught a nice 4.5 on a jig on a brief solo trip out before a rain. Just getting ready to head home from a 4th of July trip to the outer banks where we stuffed ourselves with fresh caught redfish and stingray and fished off of kayaks til we were very tired and ready to get back to our beloved lakes and bass! It was epic!

Siebert dock rocker skips very well and comes through cover nicely so that's what I'd be using if my lake had lots of boat docks and I wanted to get up under them.

Here I was expecting to see a 10 lber hooked on a whopper plopper at a small public pond after sundown. Sorry to see the damage and destruction. Glad you're okay!

Black and Blue 1/2 oz Jig and Craw and Junebug 10-12" ribbon tail worms with 1/4 oz unpegged slip sinker. Literally can't go wrong with these techniques anywhere there are large bass in the summer.

Your history is probably as close as you're gonna get to an advantage so ignore that 'wisdom'. I think that people who say don't fish history are people who struggle to remain open minded and as a result, don't catch as many fish as they once did and for them, 'dont fish history ' is kind of a reminder to stay open minded. I think 'dont fish history' also is applicable advice when beginners are excited they're finally catching fish on a summer bait in a summer area and then they feel like quitting when it all dies as the seasons change and the bait/bass start moving and biting different things. It's clunky non specific advice that over corrects errors that need to be addressed one at a time.

Glad to hear you are back on the water with friends Tom! Thanks for all you do to educate us up and coming bassin' whipper snappers. I've learned a lot of juice from your wisdom over the past couple years!

I reckon they work cuz we throw em. ? Bass probably bite most lures out of something other than hunger. Fish on. Hope I catch a giant on the buzzbait this summer!

You can do anything with anything, but you can't go wrong with the shot caller for a do anything jig! The dock rocker/brush/G2 and shot caller could all be great do anything jigs IMHO but the dock rocker is probably the most capable of 'doing it all' without being a master of any one thing except maybe skipping! I find that as a jig fisherman, I lean into the strengths of each jig in context and have great success doing so. Might be worth getting a small handful of each type for different scenarios! I'd just get black and blue and a bluegill/green pumpkin variant in probably the 3/8, 1/2 and 3/4 oz sizes for each type and just learn where and when to throw them.

Well how do ya do, that's often describing me exactly when I bank fish! I usually bring two rods and a medium size fanny pack full of supplies, so let's get down to brass tacks. Usually a 7'6 medium heavy moderate veritas rod w 20 lb fluorocarbon for jigs/t-rigs/spinnerbait/buzzbait/chatterbait and a 7' medium moderate power veritas with 12 lb big game for lipless/topwater/squarebills/jerkbaits etc. In the fanny pack I bring hooks weights, plastics that I can use as either trailers or as t rigs, a small assortment of whatever they're biting/is in season. Lately mostly a backup popper and some jigs and plastics are all I have in there but earlier in the spring I packed lipless and jerkbaits In some plastic containers. I can swap things in and out as conditions inspire me etc but 99% of what I use it for is jigs and t rigs because when I'm bank fishing that's what I'm throwing 99% of the time.