I just cant seem to catch fish on a crankbait. I spend days fishing them shallow-deep it doesnt matter. I have only caught a few fish on them. I am pretty good with lipless cranks but cant figure out the other cranks. Any advice or something I may be doing wrong? I cant figure it out.

Are you bounching them of structure or riprap? Thats when i do best on cranks, especially squarebills. More often than not i have one bounch off a rock and a bass nails it on the bounce

Are you bounching them of structure or riprap? Thats when i do best on cranks, especially squarebills. More often than not i have one bounch off a rock and a bass nails it on the bounce

yep. bouncing them off rocks and sometimes wood. I probably just need to spend more time with them.

You must be around active bass to catch them on fast moving lures, not going to chase down your lure if they are not interested.

Try changing the pace and speed it, then slow it down and make different angle casts until the baas react.

Crank it 2 turns, 1 turn, 3 turns, rod pull, repeat randomly, etc.

Long tapering points are good places to try; both sides, up and over, from the bank casting out, form deeper water casting in, etc.

Tom

You must be around active bass to catch them on fast moving lures, not going to chase down your lure if they are not interested.

Try changing the pace and speed it, then slow it down and make different angle casts until the baas react.

Crank it 2 turns, 1 turn, 3 turns, rod pull, repeat randomly, etc.

Long tapering points are good places to try; both sides, up and over, from the bank casting out, form deeper water casting in, etc.

Tom

 

Good advice here. If you can't bounce it off cover or the bottom, adding pauses and twitches as WRB suggested is a good ploy. Try changing rod angles too.

Make sure the baits run straight. Try rattleless if you havent already dome so .Try  lures that dont have a lot of action. The Rapala FatRap is a great numbers bait for down to about 6 foot .

SC is probably getting a little warm for crankbaits, and fish are lazier about feeding. They might be more interested in early evening around sunset. I've found a stop-and-go retrieve works well if the fish aren't aggressively feeding, or reel it down to depth and then let it rise up to the surface giving it a twitch every couple feet. You could also just take the easy way out and troll them and for every 100 fish that don't bite 1 will.

 

Also helps to use fluorocarbon line and a sensitive rod. Crankbait strikes are subtle and if you aren't detecting them you're probably missing a lot of fish without even knowing it.

You must be around active bass to catch them on fast moving lures, not going to chase down your lure if they are not interested.

Try changing the pace and speed it, then slow it down and make different angle casts until the baas react.

Crank it 2 turns, 1 turn, 3 turns, rod pull, repeat randomly, etc.

Long tapering points are good places to try; both sides, up and over, from the bank casting out, form deeper water casting in, etc.

Tom

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