BROWN BASS TOOLS ~ Questions & Answers

[gimruis]

2 hours ago, 12poundbass said:

Too much trolling for walleye as a kid makes me cringe every time I hear the word trolling. Let’s watch paint dry. 

My parents do a lot of it when they walleye fish, both for recreation and in tournaments. It’s extremely effective especially in the warmer summer months using lead core with crank baits. It’s also a lot easier with a tiller, which they have.

[A-Jay]

This 5.82 lb specimen whaled a jerkbait over a very deep flat this morning ~ 

Fish Hard 

?

A-Jay

[J Francho]

Trolling is something rarely covered here, and barely covered in magazines of the past, at least with smallmouth as a target. Do some digging, and the techniques detailed for walleye and pike apply. I trolled the south shore of Lake Ontario for smallmouth starting at the tail end of the 80s, through the 90s, and into the early 2000s. The formula was catch any more than three on a spot or a pass, and it was time to switch to vertical baits. I still use the same techniques, except the only thing coming from the boat are SI frequencies and pings from the graph. Im looking for carpets of bait. That's where I focus. The Great Lakes are like deserts with small pockets that are an oasis for smallies. Much of where I fish lacks classic structure, so fish are scattered and concentrate in unlikely areas. yes, trolling is boring if you're unsuccessful. And bass boats are terrible at it. An open plan tiller with a throttle plate is the tool for this - one hand on the throttle, the other holding your favorite combo. 
 

I suppose livebait is always an option, but the price of the preferred fair far exceeds effective artificial baits. If you want to try them, a selection of leeches, pike minnows, soft shell crabs, and night crawlers will do. They often prefer one over the rest, that preference sometimes lasting days, causing many to declare one is better. Those guys married to one live bait get skunked. A typical split shot rig always worked best for me. So does a drop shot, if the snot moss is thick. 

[Way north bass guy]

I don’t actively target smallmouth by trolling, but up here as soon as the ice goes out in spring, we do quite a bit of trolling for lake trout ( about the only thing in season for a while in a lot of lakes). We usually troll jerkbaits ( the exact ones I cast for smallmouth), on a fairly long lead behind an in-line planer board. The first week or two after ice out we only get lakers, but after a couple weeks of the sun warming up things, even a very small amount, the shallower areas get flooded with smallmouth. In an average day, we’ll get 10 or more smallies along with the lakers, most of them are over 3lbs. Our bass season doesn’t open till June here, so any bass we get have to be immediately released, and if we get too many in a particular spot we move to a different area as we’re not supposed to target them specifically. If they were in season, I’d do much like @J Francho, and troll around till I found a concentration of them, then go back through with casting gear to pick the area apart further. 
Trolling can be boring at times, but under the right circumstances it definitely works to help find concentrated fish.  

[Team9nine]

1 hour ago, J Francho said:

Trolling is something rarely covered here, and barely covered in magazines of the past, at least with smallmouth as a target. Do some digging, and the techniques detailed for walleye and pike apply. I trolled the south shore of Lake Ontario for smallmouth starting at the tail end of the 80s, through the 90s, and into the early 2000s. The formula was catch any more than three on a spot or a pass, and it was time to switch to vertical baits. I still use the same techniques, except the only thing coming from the boat are SI frequencies and pings from the graph. Im looking for carpets of bait. That's where I focus. The Great Lakes are like deserts with small pockets that are an oasis for smallies. Much of where I fish lacks classic structure, so fish are scattered and concentrate in unlikely areas. yes, trolling is boring if you're unsuccessful. And bass boats are terrible at it. An open plan tiller with a throttle plate is the tool for this - one hand on the throttle, the other holding your favorite combo. 

 

We call it Spoonplugging - classic Buck Perry stuff...troll until you locate the school, then cast for the big catch. A bit more technical than it sounds, but very methodical and effective.

 

We have a group of guys that hit St. Clair every spring for smallies. They just got back last week. Using a combination of trolling and casting, they again caught several hundred fish over the 4-5 days including numerous 5s, several 6s and two over 7 this year.

[J Francho]

5 hours ago, Team9nine said:

 

We call it Spoonplugging - classic Buck Perry stuff...troll until you locate the school, then cast for the big catch. A bit more technical than it sounds, but very methodical and effective.

I've read Buck Perry's books and it's similar. He complicated things that wouldn't make much sense where the structure was really just a gradual down ward slope a 100 miles wide. When I read his stuff it felt like we were already doing what he said, just not using his baits. By then there were better cranks than his spoon plugs. Most of my trolling techniques, with regard to turning, current, wind, and speed control I learned from uncle on his salmon charter. 

[TnRiver46]

6 hours ago, Team9nine said:

 

We call it Spoonplugging - classic Buck Perry stuff...troll until you locate the school, then cast for the big catch. A bit more technical than it sounds, but very methodical and effective.

 

 

I’ve always tried this with gas motor for bass (2 mph) and electric motor for crappie . What I always find is they won’t bite when I cast, but they will always keep biting if I keep trolling. I feel like this means what is triggering the bite is the lure whizzing by quickly. 

[roadwarrior]

6 hours ago, Team9nine said:

We have a group of guys that hit St. Clair every spring for smallies. They just got back last week. Using a combination of trolling and casting, they again caught several hundred fish over the 4-5 days including numerous 5s, several 6s and two over 7 this year.

 

It's on the bucket list, maybe next spring. 

Can you recommend a guide and place to stay?

[Team9nine]

2 hours ago, roadwarrior said:

 

It's on the bucket list, maybe next spring. 

Can you recommend a guide and place to stay?

 

I’ll try and find out where they stay and launch out of...but not certain any of them use guides. I’ll ask though.

 

3 hours ago, TnRiver46 said:

I’ve always tried this with gas motor for bass (2 mph) and electric motor for crappie . What I always find is they won’t bite when I cast, but they will always keep biting if I keep trolling. I feel like this means what is triggering the bite is the lure whizzing by quickly. 

 

Yep - depth and speed control. There are some days you simply can’t reel fast enough to trigger much of a bite compared to the speed you can generate trolling.

[MassBass]

Also you can get a crankbait down deeper on the troll than you ever could by casting. 

[desmobob]

When I was younger, trolling to locate smallmouths was what I did almost every time out.  My local smallmouth lake has rocky shores, rocky islands and rocky shoals.  I used to wear half the bills off Rebel Deep Wee-R crawfish pattern crank baits trolling them!   

 

I think my favorite way to fish when I stopped was with a Mister Twister curly tail grub under an overhead spinner, Beetle Spin style, on light or ultralight spinning gear.

[TnRiver46]

51 minutes ago, MassBass said:

Also you can get a crankbait down deeper on the troll than you ever could by casting. 

It’s wild! My 2-4 foot square bills hit bottom in 9-10 feet 

[TnRiver46]

51 minutes ago, desmobob said:

When I was younger, trolling to locate smallmouths was what I did almost every time out.  My local smallmouth lake has rocky shores, rocky islands and rocky shoals.  I used to wear half the bills off Rebel Deep Wee-R crawfish pattern crank baits trolling them!   

 

I think my favorite way to fish when I stopped was with a Mister Twister curly tail grub under an overhead spinner, Beetle Spin style, on light or ultralight spinning gear.

I bet the deep wee R would go down halfway to the center of the earth being pulled behind a gas motor 

[desmobob]

14 minutes ago, TnRiver46 said:

I bet the deep wee R would go down halfway to the center of the earth being pulled behind a gas motor 

My old Berkley Cherrywood rod  (in the Down-East rod holder) would be bouncing up and down like crazy as the Rebel tried to hammer its way though the bottom of the lake!  ?

 

The boat was a Glastron V-156 tri-hull with a three-cylinder, twin-carb Mercury 65HP two-stroke.  I can still picture that Merc shuddering, jerking and belching as I trolled for hours with it at idle.  Those funky center electrode spark plugs never fouled... for the life of the engine!  

 

Trolling is a great way to cover a lot of ground to locate active fish.

[J Francho]

Rebel Deep Wee-R and Deep Craws will go pretty deep.  Those were go to baits back in the day because they ran true without spinning out as much as compared to many other baits.

 

I'm gonna say trolling is THE way, and I probably won't ever do it again, but lacking anything other than rudimentary sonar and basic paper mapping, this was one way to solve the issue.  The only reason I see today to troll for anything is because you can't cast what you are trying to entice the bite with. That situation rarely, if ever comes up in brown bass fishing.

[TnRiver46]

3 hours ago, J Francho said:

Rebel Deep Wee-R and Deep Craws will go pretty deep.  Those were go to baits back in the day because they ran true without spinning out as much as compared to many other baits.

 

I'm gonna say trolling is THE way, and I probably won't ever do it again, but lacking anything other than rudimentary sonar and basic paper mapping, this was one way to solve the issue.  The only reason I see today to troll for anything is because you can't cast what you are trying to entice the bite with. That situation rarely, if ever comes up in brown bass fishing.

Shoot. Comes up everyday ! 

[J Francho]

I'd be curious what you cannot cast that you can troll that you'd use every day. Sounds like a unique situation. 

[Uknowjusticemill]

Used to troll these 8 inch broken backs for Stripped Bass, the didn't cast well but when trolling they had a unique action and the stripers would just smash it, I used it on slow days to locate fish some days I caught 2 others 20. The days I caught less fish were usually the days I caught the bigger or biggest ones, when you run through a school of stripers you get a lot of bites but from the 16-25 inch range, every once in awhile I would get a 10 lb but mostly schooly size fish.

 

Most the big stripers I caught were on live bait like Gizzard Shad or Bluegill, caught my biggest largemouth on a live gizzard shad maybe 6 inch long while drifting the bank for stripers, never had much luck catching stripers or bass on casting lures.

[roadwarrior]

9 minutes ago, J Francho said:

I'd be curious what you cannot cast that you can troll that you'd use every day. Sounds like a unique situation. 

 

The Mississippi Rig.

 

Alabama Rig with 13 arms (12 on the outside, a longer one in the middle). We rig this with

1/4 oz swimbait heads, 3.25" Rage Swimmer outside, 4.75" inside. This is used mostly for

stripers. My main fishing partner caught 19 to my 1 a couple of years ago. Most of his fish 

were 15-20 lbs, but  he caught a 26 and my fish weighed 28 lbs. 

 

[J Francho]

Striped bass <> Smallmouth Bass. 

[TnRiver46]

49 minutes ago, J Francho said:

I'd be curious what you cannot cast that you can troll that you'd use every day. Sounds like a unique situation. 

I have only ever attempted trolling crank baits and the smallies smash them. Especially when you cant buy a bite casting any lure. I think it’s the speed of the plug that makes them bite when they otherwise won’t (which is all the time). This isn’t like the northern lakes where everyone catches 5 lb smallies non stop. The fish are always there, they can’t just leave. Locating them isn’t hard, making them bite is. It’s kind of the complete opposite of all traditional smallmouth info, here it’s just one big river and all the fish act the same . We don’t have that “once you find the smallies they are easy to catch” phenomenon 

[A-Jay]

20 minutes ago, TnRiver46 said:

I have only ever attempted trolling crank baits and the smallies smash them. Especially when you cant buy a bite casting any lure. I think it’s the speed of the plug that makes them bite when they otherwise won’t (which is all the time). This isn’t like the northern lakes where everyone catches 5 lb smallies non stop. The fish are always there, they can’t just leave. Locating them isn’t hard, making them bite is. It’s kind of the complete opposite of all traditional smallmouth info, here it’s just one big river and all the fish act the same . We don’t have that “once you find the smallies they are easy to catch” phenomenon 

OK ~

So who is this 'everyone' person, and do you think they would take me fishing ?

A-Jay

 

[TnRiver46]

27 minutes ago, A-Jay said:

OK ~

So who is this 'everyone' person, and do you think they would take me fishing ?

A-Jay

 

Haha! It’s usually competitors 1-30 that have over a 20 lb bag of smallies in the tournaments on st Clair, st Lawrence, simcoe, etc. 

[Turkey sandwich]

I love that this thread is still alive and kicking.  This really should be a book (seriously, it's that good) and @A-Jay is the man for sharing it for free. 

 

 

[A-Jay]

  Regardless of the season for me, one very important factor to consider when trying to 'predict' where to be & when, revolves around what I think (or hope) the bass may be looking to feed on in a given area.  Much of the time here that often involves yellow perch & crayfish and that played out again early in 2021.  However this year, there seemed to be a fairly strong perch spawn as I was seeing more than usual; both in the way of small schools in the shallows and following my bait to the boat.  The presents of this bait is almost always a good thing and when I could be around it, seems the plus size Brown Bass were too.

 

Fish Hard

A-Jay