7 hours ago, ol'crickety said:

Wow, Alex. Just wow. You and Pat achieve the same feat, which is catching big bass in the middle of bustle and buildings. Whatever compliments you pay to Pat apply to you too, Alex. And vice-versa. I'm so excited to go strolling this spring. 

 

 

Bama strolling right 😉😉😉?  I can't wait for your fish to fire back up and a vintage lure trip sounds incredibly fun!  I wanna do more fun trips like that this summer when they're biting really well!

 

Thanks for the kind words.  Can I wear the headset and cast to a see through swimming pool from 5 ft above it to show everybody what I'm doing???? 

 

I've always wanted to do that!  😆 

 

@AlabamaSpothunter maybe you can cut those straight tails with some scissors and salvage the bags!

@Pat Brown  

@AlabamaSpothunter                                                                                                                                                                                                                  All I can say is "Sweet".

3 hours ago, Pat Brown said:

Can I wear the headset and cast to a see through swimming pool from 5 ft above it to show everybody what I'm doing???? 

 

Yes, please. I always loved those pools. Wonderful teaching tools.

 

3 hours ago, Pat Brown said:

I can't wait for your fish to fire back up and a vintage lure trip sounds incredibly fun! 

 

Heck, yeah! Several of the lures are wood with chipped paint from bass caught 55 years ago. I'll go chip them some more! What's weird is how I struggle to remember the makers of the modern lures I use, but not the old ones. I remember their makers and names after more than a half century. 

 

9 hours ago, AlabamaSpothunter said:

You're too kind Katie, and I'd love to see you do an article about the vintage lure fishing trip.   That would be an amazing piece based on the writer and subject matter.  

 

I didn't think about ^this^ possibility. Great idea! I'll do it. 

I was shaking a jig under the surface on some nondescript banks and some GIANT bass were waking on it but I instinctively slow down and they swerved.

 

I adjusted my presentation and *sped up* after seeing the wakes and got these bass.

 

1/4 oz @Siebert Outdoors shot caller in 'Pats Gizzard' with an Arkansas glow largo shad on the back.

First trip to a bigger body of water (non pond) of the year over lunch and took a skunking. 

 

Going to blame not catching a DD on not having FFS from the bank and not being on a lake named after a utensil.

 

Excited for day light savings time to able to take the boat out after work.  10 day is showing 50/60's here in PA which should make for a fishy March.

My first fish in 2024. I haven’t been on the site in a while, 2023 wasn’t too good for me health wise . I just found out I got carpal tunnel in my right hand to go along with my partially disabled left. I’m trying to kayak fish as much as I can while I still can. Managed three around the same size pictured.

Achievement Unlocked:  On the board for 2024, with my earliest ever bass of the season (by 4 days, apparently).

 

Finally getting a chance to escape a crushing work schedule, I spent a couple hours bank-hopping some river spots.  My stream thermometer consistently said the water was still only about 38 degrees, but these brown bass showed up (along with a few escape artists).  They were small but still satisfying ( biggest two went about 13").

 

 3" Kalin Sizmic Grub

 

 

Pictured above are the fish I caught yesterday.

 

 

Put kayak in on a lake that has always been very good for me.  48 degree surface temps, beautiful day, between slick and light breeze; cloud cover in morning, clear in afternoon. Post frontal - 24 hours after moderate rains - lake level up considerably in recent weeks.   Five hours and change with only two missed bites...not one fish.  I'm flummoxed.   Lake is under 600 acres; I didn't get in all the creeks, but I was pretty thorough on main stem, pockets and a couple creeks.  I marked most fish in schools at 14-21, usually related to bottom, but not always.  

  Two behavior observations that I couldn't turn into bites:

1.  Marked fish generally were not stationary...at all...I would move off them, work that spot for a while, go back over to recalibrate...and nothing...they were moving

2.  I found myself in a smallish bay, maybe 75 yards point to point with average depths about 6-12 FOW, full of mostly submerged brush/stickups.  This place exploded with a school of no less than ten huge bass herding and annihilating bait.  I could disturb them and agitate them, but could not get them to touch a lure.  Only place on the lake where I could actually see a wolfpack... or any active bass, for that matter.  Fascinating to watch, but at the end of the day pretty frustrating. 

@Choporoz, they reportedly blast shad like that on Watts Bar all the time, and are next to impossible to catch. I don’t fish there much myself, but it is a very common thing to hear about.

1 hour ago, MIbassyaker said:

Achievement Unlocked:  On the board for 2024, with my earliest ever bass of the season (by 4 days, apparently).

 

Finally getting a chance to escape a crushing work schedule, I spent a couple hours bank-hopping some river spots.  My stream thermometer consistently said the water was still only about 38 degrees, but these brown bass showed up (along with a few escape artists).  They were small but still satisfying ( biggest two went about 13").

 

 3" Kalin Sizmic Grub

 

They might be small, but being smallies, they all have BIG hearts.

 

55 minutes ago, TnRiver46 said:

@Choporoz, they reportedly blast shad like that on Watts Bar all the time, and are next to impossible to catch. I don’t fish there much myself, but it is a very common thing to hear about.

 

Below are all the photos of berserk, wolf-packing bass I failed to catch on consecutive days in 2023:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Welp, back at the Gun Club today.  71 degrees, partly cloudy with winds out of the south.  What a difference a week makes!  The shallows were crawling with bait.  Only managed two on a watermelon seed fluke.  But since it will be in the 70s again tomorrow with overnight lows in the mid 60s I think it shouldn’t be long now until I start seeing big ones cruising around.

 

@bp_fowler: Atta, Buckeye!

Struggled for these four today. They were pumping water into the lake out of the river and fish weren't happy with the muddy water.

A quick trip before supper and I got my March buzzbait fish knocked out.

 

 

And THAT is why you use a trailer hook friends.  😎😎😎😉😉😉

 

And another one buzzing a swim jig over some random bank:

 

 

Proof that jigs and buzzbaits are big fish baits. 😆😆😆🥵🥵🥵🎣🎣🎣

That’s a nice day of struggling @GreenPig! 

They liked the black choppo 90 today. Probably a dozen swipes missed but I stuck a good one. I believe it takes my mark for biggest topwater bass, 5.3#. Missed a couple on a bone spook too. Feels good.

 

 

                                                             

@MIbassyaker and @Jmilburn76  Congrats on getting the 2024 party kicked off properly!  

 

@thediscochef  Let's goooooooo buddy!   You earned and deserved that slaunch donkey.

 

@Choporoz My home lake is like that 50-75x a year if I had to guess including the last 10-15x I've been out.    There is nothing more maddening than watching countless fish blowup bait all around you, and you throw the kitchen sink only to get skunked or some scraps.   Going back to my first posts in this thread when I joined, I documented my frustrations over this fact.     I feel like if I've got any "experienced" insight into a topic it's this one.   

 

Couple quick things I've learned that have enabled me to at least catch fish during these times, some days it's still a fraction of the fish I'm seeing, other days you've cracked the code and it feels like cheating.    Not much different than overall Bass fishing if I really think about it.     It's a sub skillset among the dozens and dozens in the sport.   You're not alone if you google it that's for sure.  

 

1.  You have about a 2-3second window to place your bait in the middle of blowup/s, the majority of fish I catch happen when I achieve this window.

 

2. Within the above 2-3second window you have to make a pinpoint cast on the blowup/s, a foot short, left, right, or more than a few feet past, forget about it the majority of the time.  

 

You can flip 1 and 2, and vice versa, they are one in the same.   If you can achieve hitting both the time window and precise cast location, you can catch those fish on a ton of different baits for the most part.    Strolling a minnow, or a Vision 110/jr jerkbait are the two best baits I've found.     In the winter the A-Rig, Underspin, Blade Bait, flatside crank can be as good or better, and in the Fall, Spring and Summer a buzzbait, and popper can be as good or better.    

 

Ultimately if the blow ups are too scattered and you can't make that work, I've found the old adage "never leave biting fish" still applies.   You might get skunked throwing the kitchen sink at them, but it still presents the best situation to have success on that given day/lake imho.   

 

You'll crack the code next time pal  

Excellent info @AlabamaSpothunter, same here it’s only

worked for me when it landed there in under 5 seconds probably less 

@thediscochef, I'm so happy for you!

 

Thanks for the info, Alex.

I think it was Lake Murray last year where some competitors would not even make a cast until they spotted bass blowing on herring to achieve the 2-3sec window

Sometimes nothing works on those blowups, but like @AlabamaSpothunter said, I’m going to keep throwing at them until I’ve tried everything I have.

 

I had some success throwing a white senko, trick worm, or other slow sinking lures into the middle of those type of blowups last year.

Tank @thediscochef!!!!  Good info @AlabamaSpothunter!!!

 

Oddly enough I do great with chatterbait and crankbaits when I see them busting shad randomly out in the open water!  Give it a try!

 

Jerkbait is probably my favorite when they're pushing shad into shallow structure in the fall and post spawn.

Quote

Oddly enough I do great with chatterbait and crankbaits when I see them busting shad randomly out in the open water!  Give it a try!

 

I will. Thanks, Pat.