Pat Brown

fall is a great time to lock it in your hands and go! It’ll stay good all winter and REALLY gets wild in the early spring!

Have you ever replaced all the hooks on your favorite jerk bait only to find that it no longer darts and suspends the way it once did? Crankbait won’t run correctly anymore? Same principle. Its just something where you can intentionally or unintentionally destroy the action of your bait before you make a cast with soft plastics. This is also more or less a nuanced micro view of the rate of fall thing. Just further extrapolation of why rate of fall matters and how hooks are part of that equation.

I try to think about what the hook is gonna be doing and what plastic it’s gonna be occupying and what I want the bait to be doing in the water etc etc It really distills down to you don’t bring a knife to a gun fight. I try to use thinner smaller lighter wire lower profile hooks for more open water applications where freedom of movement in the soft plastic is critical and cover is minimal and I want maximum hook penetration etc etc i tend to beef things up a good bit and de emphasize action and subtlety when my bait is going into heavy cover where I merely want to pull a large fish rapidly out of something treacherous. sometimes I will upsize hooks on weightless plastics to make them fall faster. I will downsize hooks to give my soft plastics more freedom and glide on the fall. sharpness is paramount for any hook and in any application and here’s the real kicker - I don’t care how much money you spend on your hooks or how nice they are out of the package - you cast it a couple times and retrieve it a couple times and before you know it, it needs new hooks or a little touch up. It can get very expensive very quickly if you replace your hooks every time they need to be replaced instead of touching up the tips with a sharpener. It can be very heartbreaking if you leave dull hooks on your bait. I maintain that a hook sharpener is a good investment for anyone who fishes a lot. I still believe wholeheartedly that using the right hook for the right job can mean the difference between getting all the bites while your buddy skunks using the same bait and the same weight - merely because his heavy wire EWG has killed the action of the plastic and my light wire offset worm hook is letting my plastic dance seductively.

My path to bass fishing started in my home state of NC with my dad taking me bass fishing on rental Jon boats at the local lake when I was barely able to hold a rod (I threw a few into the lake) and from there, life twisted and turned around with casual catfishing and salt water fishing with live bait and some small mouth fishing visiting family up north in Michigan and fishing charters in there but very little proper bass fishing. Life happened and I started a family and had a really cool son named Jacob and somewhere around 2018 my super cool wife decided we needed to do more fun stuff around the house outdoors in our own backyard and she suggested we go fishing at the local lakes which had rental Jon boats. I remembered fishing fondly and thought it a great idea and we bought 3 spinning rods and some crank baits and rented a jon boat. paddling proved difficult and we didn’t do much fishing and we went and bought a little trolling motor like I remembered my dad having and started trolling around our little crank baits on the little local lakes. We caught a few crappie and a couple small bass but mostly just had fun and didn’t have much success. COVID hit in 2020 and suddenly we all had a lot more free time and wanted to get out of our house and there bass fishing was waiting for us to get a little more serious and that’s what I did. i watched some YouTube videos and learned that we needed senkos! we went to Walmart and I bought some yum dingers which had to be just as good I figured. i also bought some 1$ spinnerbaits because Roland Martin told me on YouTube that spinnerbaits catch big bass. That spring I caught a single 2 lber on a black and blue senko on a main lake point and then another at the back of a pocket and I felt a fire that made me want to figure out how to catch a real big one. the sheer volume of what I didn’t understand or know was so exciting (still is) and I remember that feeling of walking up to a bank BELIEVING big ones were there for the first time. well one windy spring day in March - I was right. we took our rental Jon boat out into the wind and saw that a point that extended out into the main lake across from the marina was breaking the heavy march winds and I told Meagan and Jacob that’s where we would find them. i knew from Roland that the fish would be ‘prespawn’ and that with the murky water and heavy winds a spinnerbait was a good option for ‘searching’ for fish (all knew terms to me at the time - I really felt like I was starting to put it all together 😉) Well I remember bombing my 1$ spinnerbait up a point to bigger rocks that extended out into the main channel and slow rolling it back and feel like I was hung and then the snag pulling back and my drag slipping. fish on. Meagan and Jacob didn’t think it was a bass - catfish for sure they said as they readied our net. when that 6 lber came up all pale and round and big eyed - it changed everything for me. I wanted to know what it was like to catch another one bigger instantly and from there it got crazier and crazier and I have been consumed with the pursuit of large bass ever since- with what I consider - magnificent success for which I am dearly grateful. welcome aboard - let the fish teach you how to catch them and always be open minded and you will have lots of success!

Was moving into my new house and celebrated my 13th wedding anniversary on the day of his passing and totally missed it. At a loss. Heartbroken. @Catt buddy, I’m gonna miss you but I know we will meet again someday. save me some big game and 10” worms up there and don’t go too hard on those heavenly 10 lbers I’m sure you’re catching. Catt was someone I really took to early on and I know I wouldn’t have caught the fish I caught without him specifically. He was a demystifier and a teacher and he always emphasized the importance of answering your own questions. I haven’t thrown a jig or worm or frog or lipless without hearing some of his words in the back of my mind and I often use the search function to learn something and Catt is almost always the information from way back when that settles in and sticks. He loved this place and he loved fishing and we all loved him. See ya later Tommy.

Long and short of it is learn to sharpen hooks and they’re all pretty good nowadays. I basically think hooks can make a huge difference in your success rate. More than color or profile or what brand of soft plastic and it’s not a brand thing for me - it’s about understanding how different hooks are optimized for different applications.

I fish lipless baits more than other crank baits. i like them when fish are on flats or for paralleling banks. i can sort of play with depth and speed and i like that I can let them fall and then rip or lift them back up mid retrieve. The old yo yo retrieve has caught my largest lipless bass at 9 lb 3 oz in January paralleling rip rap. I think they work better in more conditions and types of cover and they seem to be capable of a much less mechanical much more natural retrieve cadence like jig.

Got a new phone and a new house on a 15 acre pond and I’ve been figuring it out slowly and also figuring out the free rig. Been a lot of work but been fun fishing in my backyard between moving tasks!

I learned all the fancy casting techniques and I can tell you there’s only one you need to know. The one where you cast quietly and the bait lands quietly where you want it to land. Use whichever hands work best for that…

You can be trendy and fish it on a free rig and I guarantee it will work and also make you feel extremely cutting edge and hip.

Personally, I vastly prefer strike king for hard baits. I just do better with them when fish want a crank bait and if you keep them from being too hot or too cold and swap, the hardware and hooks every once in a while, they last pretty much forever or at least until you cast one time into a tree, lol

I don’t fish Florida, but I do fish for large pressured bass in clear water that is shallow and - whether they’re shy about the line AND whether they’re clear on what exactly the line is - I couldn’t tell you. But I can tell you is this: big bass get conditioned very easily, especially when they get fished for a lot. When it’s calm and the fish are near the bank, they can feel me gently clear my throat or rustle my jacket or snap a twig 200 feet away and they all swim away. They become very, very sensitive and attuned to their environment and any disturbance or anything that feels out of place can deactivate them extremely quickly. During these types of conditions, anything flying over their heads or landing on the water is a cause for alarm and not curiosity. They have learned not to even bother. Sometimes you can cast your bait out and drag it back to the area after letting it sit for a long time hoping that they reset and sometimes they do if it’s a long enough time, but without fail when your line gets to where it is interacting with them you can see them swirl and swim away just from the feeling of the water displacement and something touching them . Of course, once they start to spawn, it’s a totally different ball game and you can catch them on a pop lid if you make a good cast and twitch it around just right. BUT make no mistake bass feel your line and they can become conditioned to negatively react to a very quickly, especially big smart ones! Clearly there are times when it doesn’t matter or we would never catch fish, but they can definitely learn to be afraid of fishing line. To be honest, it has nothing to do with water clarity. I think it’s completely unique to each fishery and basically has a lot to do with fishing pressure. also worth pointing out: heavy line is not necessarily easier to detect and light line is not necessarily going to be sneakier. Sometimes heavier line floats on the surface longer, and therefore comes into contact with the fish less. There’s no hard fast rules, but they can definitely learn line = death.

Couple things worth pointing out with regards to the moon etc. I think moon phase matters - but not in a vacuum and not necessarily to the bass - more so to it’s food. The reproductive cycles of bugs, crayfish, amphibians and all manner of minnow based forage that bass relentlessly hound every day - ARE heavily influenced by the moon. You don’t need a good moon phase window thing to catch a fish but I can assure you it helps to be aware of what things are doing and when and why.

Absolutely gorgeous fish. Keep slamming them!

In the dead of summer and the frigid heart of the winter time especially - list #2 is on my mind! during spring and fall - not so much. They evuh-whirrrrrr.

I’m glad the fish are giving you some practice so you can catch your new PB in a month! 😎

Buzzing plastics and buzzing frogs work, but they are different action and Sound than a buzz bait and they’re less subtle.

I’d say there’s no perfect way to tune a Buzzbait for everyone and it’s each anglers job to learn how to tune a Buzzbait to their liking. Kinda like there’s no perfect jig weight or trailer. I think I’m beginning to see why this and the frog and the jig work so well! People just don’t even wanna mess with it! They’re fussy baits! But fussy baits catch fussy fish and those are usually the ones I am hoping to catch.

I take the drop shot sinkers and hang them off the hook like a trailer hook and they work still but I think I like @king fisher ‘s Texas rig spinnerbait deal even better!

Frog and buzz bait and floating/buzzing plastic are 99% of my top water game regardless of season or cover etc They work extremely well and catch giant bass that aren’t easy to catch on the surface. Buzzbait is my default top water of those three for covering water and saturating an area with casts quickly and then moving to another area. Buzzbait is hands-down my number one confidence top water technique and it has been a technique that has produced my big fish for the day or even all of the fish for the day on multiple occasions in multiple seasons.

Color has nothing to do with mimicking anything! I would throw them in dirty water or darker sky conditions or when fish are very active because pink is a color that stands out.

Forgetting to put the plug in.

Hey ya! Frogs are among my favorite way to fish. Like all baits - they are a tool and situational and there are times that the frog is the only rod you need to bring and times when it can help locate fish but won’t catch a ton and times when it doesn’t work - like all lures. Getting an idea of when these windows of opportunity occur on your body of water is going to be the first order of business since it sounds like you’ve found some bass - they’re just not committing (typical late summer bass). I don’t think color matters much in terms of matching forage but certain colors can work better than others at certain times and under certain conditions. I'm more apt to select a black frog on a super calm sunny sticky day where the water is clear because I just want high contrast and a silhouette that is easy for bass to find without any bold unnatural colors. Early in the morning or fishing during a new moon or on a cloudy drizzly fall day I’m more apt to select a white or yellow or frog so the fish can find that frog better in the darker conditions. a red or pink or fire tiger or black chartreuse lime green polka dot frog etc etc - those are for when fish are CLOBBERING top water OR when I’m fishing thick heavy dense mats or pads or wood or shade and can work in any conditions - it’s more so i can see that crazy weird little thing disappear. I agree that if you’re waiting to feel fish with a frog, you’re gonna have a long sad wait until you catch fish on a frog a lot. I’m at the point now when I fish a frog that I don’t even blink - if that frog is surrounded by churning froth and chaos and I can’t see it when it was just happily walking its way back to me - I’m swinging as soon as I *hear* anything happen to my frog. I’m swinging as soon as I see anything happen to my frog. In very clear water, I’ve had the privilege of watching huge bass come right up to my frog eat it and spit it out faster than I could even process it. Don’t wait for nothing. So, where does this leave us? Bass fishing boils down to the depth the bass are feeding at and the speed they want your bait at. Frog fishing boils down to putting your bait, quiet quietly and accurately in just the right spots consistently and frequently and being very prepared. Slack line management is critical to success so focusing on managing slack line while you’re retrieving the the bait is very very important. Very intentionally importing action and not just mechanically walking it or popping it in is very very important. Casting to target and saturating areas with casts is often wise with a frog, and I like to fish my cast all the way back to the boat or the bank with lots of nice long pauses. Popping frogs walk better than walking, frogs and walking frogs often splash and spit better than popping frogs so I would ignore the nomenclature and focus mostly on the profile and what you’re doing with the frog not the branding. I do think sometimes a really small frog can work a lot better and the end of the summer is often sometimes so I would definitely give smaller profile frogs a try! It sounds like you’re well on your way to having a lot of success based on what it sounds like the fish are doing to your bait you’re just gonna have to show up make the casts from far away be stealthier swing faster and keep the slack out of your line, etc., and you’ll start hooking into some of these fish that are biting! It’s a lot like big swimbait fishing or jig fishing. It’s not like fishing a popper or a spook. Once I got that figured out, I had a lot more success.

One thing is for sure, regardless of who is making the fishing rod or reel, I’m definitely gonna make a mess of it! 😂 Factories are labor contractors. The things they build are often still proprietary designs.

Same. They eat what colors you throw pretty much. Color only matters a tiny amount of the time and I think with topwater it's more about what it's doing and how big it is.