Twenty years ago, I always carried a few crankbaits along on my fishing trips.                                          I fished most of the standard models by Bomber, Bagleys, Poes, and Rebel, in both shallow and deeper diving versions. At times, they were good fish catchers.                                      Getting over a point, hump, or especially a drop off with crankbaits used to work good.                                                              Now, I don't even carry them anymore.  Not a single one.My crankbaits are tucked away in an old tacklebox in a closet at home.                                                The reason I stopped fishing them? Chara, the invasive weed. On two of my favourite lakes I've watched this weed get started and slowly increase to cover more and larger areas, making it impossible to fish any crankbaits, lipless baits, or any treble hook lure.                                               This invasive weed has changed how I fish. When I started bass fishing in the early 1980s I spent a good amount of time learning to fish a plastic worm. Now, I'm glad I did. It's still the all around best bait for catching bass around these weeds.                                                           Springtime, I can cast some spinnerbaits. But once it starts getting hot and these weeds reach they're peak growth, it's a plastic worm that works the best. That's ok though. The plastic worm has been my favourite bass lure for a long time. Aside from plastic worms, I carry a couple of poppers, buzzbaits, and spooks for topwater fishing, along with a Johnson Silver Minnow spoon, which can be a killer bait around the weeds.                                                        I'm wondering about others here on BR. Have any invasive weeds forced you to change how you fish your favourite lakes? 

One of the little lakes I fish occasionally can be unfishable for a couple months in the spring until the summer heat burns off the Eurasian milfoil. 

 

The worse change the weeds has made is the 2 lakes I fish that the state has decided to start poisoning the weeds during the heat of the summer. It's almost completely killed one of the lakes that use to be a really good little bass lake. The other is big enough and deep enough that it didn't have quite as much vegetation and enough space to deal with the dying weeds, but the unforeseen consequence was the algae blooms that have followed now that the weeds are gone and algae is the only vegetation left and nothing is there to filter any of it out. The green slime on the surface is so thick at times it looks like solid land. 

2 lakes i fish on are just pure slime in the bays come 2nd week in august and arnt fishable till sept.

The Chara overran the lake I fish most . There was still a few crankbait fish being caught off-shore but for the most part the bass stayed shallow in the growth . The fishing was actually quite good . I started using a lot of toads  . Texas rigs were useless , as the chara has no roots and I would just bring in a wad of it . The mats are declining now , since grass carp were introduced . I imagine it will all be gone before the year is over . Spinnerbaits have been deadly around and over it as it continues its  decline .

 

I didnt know it was invasive , I thought it was natural in lime rich environments .

2 hours ago, scaleface said:

The Chara overran the lake I fish most . There was still a few crankbait fish being caught off-shore but for the most part the bass stayed shallow in the growth . The fishing was actually quite good . I started using a lot of toads  . Texas rigs were useless , as the chara has no roots and I would just bring in a wad of it . The mats are declining now , since grass carp were introduced . I imagine it will all be gone before the year is over . Spinnerbaits have been deadly around and over it as it continues its  decline .

 

I didnt know it was invasive , I thought it was natural in lime rich environments .

The conservation officer told me that they were putting grass carp in here also. He told me that these chara weeds can grow one inch per day in the hot weather. I've had to fish over and under it on these lakes. 

1 hour ago, Mobasser said:

The conservation officer told me that they were putting grass carp in here also. He told me that these chara weeds can grow one inch per day in the hot weather. I've had to fish over and under it on these lakes. 

They put grass carp here in a few of our lakes and ponds to try and control the weed growth and it did absolutely nothing.