Pat Brown

I'm partial to the smaller rat style wake baits!

I've had a lot of success during the colder months on the frittside! It almost suspends so you can pause it a lot without it instantly floating up and that plus it's ability to deflect pretty darn well and it's silent nature make it pretty great!

I mean long and fat is obviously what we all want but between the two? I am fine with either - I understand there are a variety of circumstances that lead to a huge range of fluctuation in size through out a year for a bass and unless I see some sign of serious problems - I'm happy! I like healthy looking bass (broad shouldered/thick tailed/smaller mouth/longer/taller). I'm less concerned with whether they are pre or post spawn 😉😉😉

I'm gonna go with neither - it's an addiction 😂😂😂

Here in NC - pretty much - when it gets below 50° on the surface - it's winter time.

Disadvantages? I think probably - my experience is a disadvantage sometimes. We often do what has worked or what should work and neglect our child like sense of wonder and curiosity - often times the child like sense of wonder and curiosity lead to much bigger fish. I think the size of the places I fish makes it tough sometimes. Small is fun sometimes - but it makes the fishing tough as nails when the fishing pressure is high or the weather is odd etc. I like to fish with my wife and son. I realize that this means some times I probably don't catch the big one or a lot. I would rather be out there with people I love and maybe get lucky than be all alone with the odds in my favor. Advantages? I think I understand the nuance of presenting baits in bass fishing better at this point than a lot of folks. There are so many little ways that we can make fish bite with a little creativity and practice - we tend to get locked into the extremes - mechanical is how a lot of anglers I see fish their lures. I am good at not being mechanical. I impart a lot of subtle nuanced variation to my baits that surely account for a lot of the bigger bites that I get every year. Less is more - but intentionally varying the intensity/distance/frequency/direction of my bait throughout the retrieve seems to be important. And CASTING ACCURATELY (and quietly when necessary)!!!! Focus - I pick my weapons - and then I learn them inside and out, backwards, forwards and sideways. I throw baits in places and times most people would laugh at because I know they can work and I want to figure out how for each one. You can gain HUGE advantages by fishing baits that nobody thinks to fish at times nobody thinks to fish them and they almost always work fine if you understand the where, when and why of the bait for each situation. I catch tons of big fish every year fishing the 'wrong' baits at the 'wrong' times knowing full well they're the right bait and the time is perfect. Don't follow rules in bass fishing. Follow your instinct and learn from experimenting with your fish and your baits of choice. Understanding the scientific side of forage/seasonal migration/bass behavior etc. Learning about bass, water, bugs, birds, baitfish, lowland reservoirs, highland reservoirs, spawn cycles, crayfish behavior, solunar cycles and how they move bait. Studying pond management, flood control, dam schedules, online topographical maps etc etc. This is the kind of stuff that every angler should spend the majority of their time doing when they aren't on the water learning their baits and their local bass population behaviors. Much more productive than watching bait reviews 😅

Generally - if you catch a bass - you're around a lot of bass. Probably just need to cover more water and find similar depth and cover to fish until they decide to move somewhere else on the lake - usually when temps get lower or with a big weather shift - fish will move. There are schools of bass often relating to every dock on a lake or pond that live under or around it all year long and where they are hanging out is usually dictated by water temps/sunlight angle and the location of their food. Whether they are actively biting is dictated by the presence of baitfish and then the present conditions like wind and cloud cover and whether the bait is also actively feeding around them. Laydowns are very similar but I find tend to be more 'ambush spots' that are used transiently rather than by resident fish - but not always - depends on how big the laydowns is and how close it is to important structure. On my lakes - even though there may be 20 bass on a point or a laydown or near a dock - it's rare to get bit by more than one off the school before they realize what's happening and lock their mouths shut. This is why catching a fish and then moving on and letting a spot rest can be very beneficial and oftentimes yield better numbers than 'working the school' which almost never works around here. The old wisdom 'don't leave fish to find fish' only seems to apply when they're spawning IMHO - a time when they will not move no matter how much you pester them.

That's lipless magic right there! Beautiful fishes! 🥵🥵🥵❤️❤️❤️

I spend a lot of time in the Marshallburg area close to Beaufort/ Morehead City in the summertimes. I fish a lot for drum and Spanish mackerel and Blue fish and speckled trout. We throw speck rigs a lot - little hair jigs with smaller hooks - usually two in tandem and clean up on schooling fish - pretty much anything predatory will hit these. Drum - basically all the bass lures can work but personally - I like to use a cast net to get some finger mullet - the abundant forage in the OBX - throw a nice fat one on a C - Rig and let a 40 lb bull drag me around in the weeds. Incredible! Not a lot of bass fishing in that area unfortunately but about an hour inland you can get into some good fishing and 2-3 hours inland you got Shearon-Harris/Falls/Jordan and many many more INCREDIBLE lakes. If you want to go bass fishing in the tri city area/Greensboro, let me know! Enjoy NC - it's a state with absolutely incredible wildlife. The bass fishing is underrated and I'm very very okay with that. 😉😉😉👍🏼👍🏼👍🏼

More fishes and more bigger fishes in 2025 is essentially the plan. Keep trying to get better at the stuff that I seem to excel at rather than expand all over the place - kinda done doing that. I got baits that work for all times and depths so it's all about continuing to deepen my understanding of presentation and timing for each bait category at this point!

Fair enough - there are small ponds that I think are 'at risk' and I think the key is actually teaching people the value of respecting slot limits and size limits. Release the big ones relative to your body of water per your states regulations etc I was more just expressing a potential generic framework for this as applied to my paradigm - yes - but I hope each person can and will extrapolate the valuable information and scale the ideology to their unique circumstances - and always follow your states rules and regulations and laws for fishing!

That's exactly the term I was dancing around and forgetting 😂😂😂👍🏼👍🏼👍🏼 Basically you gotta make room once carrying capacity has been reached - which for lakes that are not new anymore is NOW! Your lake is at carrying capacity if you are reading this and live in the US in 2024. Nobody keeps ANYTHING compared to what is necessary to help bass grow bigger. Let's get to work folks.

I'm completely sold on selective harvest for trophy bass. Plenty of hours of very deep discussion with fisheries biologists and pond management experts and Texas parks and wild life and share lunker program scientists - it's much much better to keep small and unhealthy looking bass every so often than release every fish - plain and simple. Reduce competition - make the bigger ones bigger and healthier and give the genetically superior rising generation a chance to reach their potential. It's basic agricultural practices applied to small bodies of water. It's gardening. You have to remove weeds or you will choke the flowers. Keep every catfish/pike/sunfish/crappie you EVER catch also. Catch and release was a business move designed to improve the optics of BASS in the 70s during its infancy and ultimately has proven to be bad for fisherman and for fish. It's time to move on - practice catch and release of THE BIG ONES - and keep some small ones every year to build a better future for our kids!

I'm fixing to make some casts before heading to the in laws for Thanksgiving 2 - Black Friday Dinner. They live near the Yadkin River and I might ALSO make a pit stop to stretch my legs for a minute on the way there.....stretch my legs down the bank with a rod in my hand! 😂😂😂😎😎😎❤️❤️❤️

I rarely throw green pumpkin stock but it's a GREAT color because with some spike it - I can make it work for any jig color/water clarity. YMMV - but I think that's the appeal of GP overall. It can sorta be anything if you use dyes. Also - not the case with ribbon tail worms but with fat body worms (senko/mag speed worm etc) all my biggest fish come on green pumpkin and I throw other colors plenty with plenty of confidence. I generally prefer the same colors as Catt though and usually use something that contrasts the water or jig rather than completely blends in like GP - especially for jig trailers which to me are a different animal from just throwing soft plastics.

Yeah I'm a BIG fan of the translucent baitfish Spro frogs! And so are the giant bass.

Happy Thanksgiving bass heads! Get to filling those bellies and napping so we can do an after supper bass off and see who on here can catch the biggest Thanksgiving bass! 😂😂😂🦃🦃🦃🎣🎣🎣

Yeah this is a fun thread for sure! After some moons have passed - my take is essentially - you gotta try different stuff out with baits to make fish bite sometimes. 😂😂😂👍🏼👍🏼👍🏼

My son has been destroying cold water bass in NC on the old Johnson beetle spin 😉😉😉🤫🤫🤫

Ponchos are much dryer than other stuff in my experience! If you're serious about getting wet and fishing - get a poncho!

I don't get it - it drops 20 degrees and heavy 15 mph North winds blow across the 50° surface and all I can get them to eat is a topwater! 😂😂😂 Got a couple snags on the lipless and finally nailed my first colder water lipless bass day before yesterday: All the big ones that have hit have been basically silent/zero fan fare/zero blow up and that is TOUGH to detect on a windy day! We gonna get one though. Just a matter of time.

Looking forward to wetting a line with you again sir. Hopefully we can get into some really big old hogs out of some real cold water. 😎😎😎

I'm not saying don't dead stick it but I'm not saying don't don't dead stick it. 😉😉😉😉 You'd be surprised, especially if you've got some hard bottom to work with and it's cold. Carolina guide who did an article here on BR about winter time rattle trap fishing advocates letting it hit the bottom and then making it flip from side to side with the rod tip on a tight line like a minnow rummaging. I haven't done that one yet but I imagine its deadly.

I don't throw topwater at stuff like that. I throw topwater the same place people think 'that sure looks like a nice place to skip a senko!' etc Sometimes in spots like THAT - you skip 19 senkos and jigs and get zilch - skip a frog under there one single time and give it one helpless twitch and.....BOOM! 😉😉😉 Topwater success with buzzbaits and frogs for me has been 90% casting accuracy and 10% right time right place so I just try to throw that thing as many questionable places as I can in a day. You'd be amazed how many of these 'questionable' places I've cast to have produced frog or buzzbait fish this year where they'd bite nothing else. Heck - even this week right as temps dropped 20 degrees with hard freezing winds. This time of year think 'a worm or jig or shaking a minnow on the surface' and you'll do better than 'a weedless spook' in terms of presentation when it's super cold.

Hybrid Hunter and Hybrid Hunter Jr all the way! I love fishing that bait.