Here's the scenario:

Pennsylvania reservoir

6:15pm (7pm sunset)

Water temp is 70 degrees and bait along with the bass have been moving shallower for a few weeks now

 

I am trolling around secondary points and cuts and there is bait popping everywhere, literally everywhere. I see little slivers of shad popping out of the water spread across an area stretching 100 feet from the bank, for a stretch a few hundred yards long. It seems obvious, reach for the topwater... buzzbait, popper, frog, anything!

 

But here is the kicker: Not a single bass has blown up anywhere on any of these baitfish. 

 

Fan casted my tail off without a single sniff from any bass. So what's your call? If you see bait popping literally all around you (not in specific tight pods), do you start fan casting topwater, or do you keep flipping the grass edge for those transitioning fall bass?  

I would throw a weightless fluke.

I'd be throwing an underspin.

When bait's popping and the usual stuff isn't working try crawling a small wake like a 70mm Yozuri 3DB very slowly through the action. It's an easy target and gets bites. A floating or slow floating jerkbait worked the same way will do the trick too.

Spinnerbait waked under the surface

This weekend an A-rig was madness in the middle of all that. As was a white chatterbait and a keitech with a willow blade. Caught maybe one on topwater, and that was on a white buzzbait down a weedline. Mid-column was en fuego.

And this was with the bass coming out of the water on the shad... But topwater lures just weren't getting it done. Bait was trying to hold at ~5ft deep all day. 

Tons of bait with nothing around it this morning. A case of too much of a good thing I'm afraid.

Try throwing an underspin.

Great big topwater

 When shad are that thick and no bass biting just ignore them and fish like they are not there .It was late in the day so there should be some strong shadows then maybe targeting cover on the  shady side would do some good .Or maybe not . 

In that situation I start with a 1/2 ounce buzzbait. From there I'll work down the water column with a spinnerbait.

 

With the bait fish boiling my motto is "splash and flash".

Sounds like everyday all the time on the TN river. I try to fish where I don’t see any shad. You can’t even catch me on a cupcake if I’ve already eaten 25 cupcakes 

It's like chasing ghosts, sometimes.  I usually stick to my plan, unless I actually see something that resembles feeding bass.  Otherwise, it's a distraction.

Rattletrap

2 hours ago, scaleface said:

 When shad are that thick and no bass biting just ignore them and fish like they are not there .It was late in the day so there should be some strong shadows then maybe targeting cover on the  shady side would do some good .Or maybe not . 

Yep, this...

 

I usually just say, stupid shad, go away and keep fishing what I was fishing.

 

If bass are blowing up on them I would throw a weightless fluke though and make it act like a wounded one.

15 hours ago, Born 2 fish said:

I would throw a weightless fluke.

this....

If you see a log of bait and you don't get bit in several casts, there's a good chance there's no fish under the bait. Some lakes have so many shad that there's big schools of bait roaming around and no bass chasing them. Look for other schools of bait that have fish attacking them, or as mentioned, just fish normal, like they weren't there

11 hours ago, looking45 said:

If you see a log of bait and you don't get bit in several casts, there's a good chance there's no fish under the bait. Some lakes have so many shad that there's big schools of bait roaming around and no bass chasing them. Look for other schools of bait that have fish attacking them, or as mentioned, just fish normal, like they weren't there

^^^^^This