Every year I tie a hollow body frog on. I’ll downsize to a smaller one. I’ll get strikes through the slop, I’ll get follows, I’ll trim legs down. And it’s more of a comedy hour lol. Getting fun blow ups and almost hooking fish. I’ll end up hooking 2-3. Then I come back to reality and tie on a buzzbait or a plopper or popper and actually catch fish again. Anyone else just not find frogging that productive?

The biggest fish I never caught was not caught on a Spro Bronzeye frog. I swear it would have went 9 if not ten. Drug it halfway to the boat before it threw my frog. I give up on them long ago. I can't catch much with them.

Just now, IYAOYAS said:

The biggest fish I never caught was not caught on a Spro Bronzeye frog. I swear it would have went 9 if not ten. Drug it halfway to the boat before it threw my frog. I give up on them long ago. I can't catch much with them.

I don’t think we are alone. I think there’s a lot of fisherman out there who fish on hope and anticipation with a frog. It’s more an entertaining time killer for me lol. Not to say there isn’t people out there who do really well on frogs.

I’m the opposite. I leave the poppers and ploppers at home and bring only my frog and buzzbait. The buzzbait is what I use when the boat is moving. The frog is what I use when I’m picking an area apart.

If you’re not catching fish with a frog - most of the time the issue is a combination of gear and hook set.

I think most people fish a frog to fast. Work the bait too much. Set the hook too quickly and slack line pull the bait out of the fishes mouth. Use the wrong size frog. Poor slack line management (BIG one with a frog).

If they are biting a frog, they can easily be caught on a frog once you get dialed in but it’s like any technique - you need success and practice to get consistency and that can take some work to get rolling.

I don’t think you need to fish a frog to catch fish or enjoy fishing but I need to fish a frog to throw a top water where big fish live. It’s not really a choice.

It’s the most consistent top water for producing fish over 6 lbs for me in NC by leaps and bounds and I love fishing poppers and catch lots of fish on them at ponds every year - but big fish see the treble hooks and leave it for the dinks 😂

The buzzbait is a good big fish bait also but seems to catch more numbers which really makes it a better search bait for covering water for me.

Another thing I do is fish it a lot in open water. I don’t just look for heavy slop I like to use it like a popper I can skip under trees or something like that on ledges or points or cast way back into brush on a flat or work a big lily pad field. I think mats or grass is like 10% of my frog fishing.

I have fished the hbf without any sucess. The places I have fished are covered in lily pads and very thick. Maybe one day it will happen.

3 minutes ago, Pat Brown said:

I’m the opposite. I leave the poppers and ploppers at home and bring only my frog and buzzbait. The buzzbait is what I use when the boat is moving. The frog is what I use when I’m picking an area apart.

If you’re not catching fish with a frog - most of the time the issue is a combination of gear and hook set.

I think most people fish a frog to fast. Work the bait too much. Set the hook too quickly and slack line pull the bait out of the fishes mouth. Use the wrong size frog. Poor slack line management (BIG one with a frog).

If they are biting a frog, they can easily be caught on a frog once you get dialed in but it’s like any technique - you need success and practice to get consistency and that can take some work to get rolling.

I don’t think you need to fish a frog to catch fish or enjoy fishing but I need to fish a frog to throw a top water where big fish live. It’s not really a choice.

I agree with all Of that for sure. But when I can switch to a horny toad and get in the same cover and start catching them I’m happy. It’s definitely me. But I think it’s the fish too personally. Very seldom do I ever have a bass actually explode and inhale a frog they knock it out of the way, nip what’s left of the legs all

That jazz.

3 minutes ago, ike8120 said:

I have fished the hbf without any sucess. The places I have fished are covered in lily pads and very thick. Maybe one day it will happen.

Mehh I just fish other baits that get explosions lol

Horny toad is just a buzzbait though. I am talking a day where they won’t hit a buzz toad or buzzbait at all happen plenty and often those are good frog days. Or areas where a buzzbait gets a good bite and then they won’t touch it again - that’s when I fish the frog in place very slowly. It’s like a jig or worm - not a spook.

I think the issue is like your other thread - you are struggling to slow down period! I understand and relate but it’s good to develop your confidence in slow and methodical fishing because it tends to catch the big ones 90% of the time.

Joe I'm a gonna put it this way...... for me fishing is not always about catching. For tournament guys and gals catching is necessary to win. But for a lot of us fishing is a stress reliever. A get away from the hectic rat race and a way of relaxing into exercises we just enjoy doing.

So for me using a frog is not considered a way to put the most fish into the boat. More of a quality fish method.

I only pull out frogs at first light and last light. Never in between unless there is a really good topwater bite on. Frogs are what I pull out while heading back to the boat ramp as the sun is going down and light fading and I need a hail Mary fish. Frogs are what I pull out when my regular fare is no longer working on the fish.

Frogs for me generally catch more quality fish than quantity.

Since I fish for fun, frogs have made the difference between losing to a fishing buddy or winning the day in terms of number of fish caught, who caught the biggest bass, etc.

I can tell you from personal experience I have trolled back to the ramp thinking I won for the day and then my buddy whips out the frog and starts catching them while my technique is no longer getting a bite and by time we get back to the boat ramp his frog takes the win for the day. One of my buddies caught 3 nice bass back to back on way to ramp and I could not get a bite to save my life- or the win. I lost to the frog!

I think frogging is something you have to enjoy doing first and foremost, and second think of it as a quality fish catcher and not a quantity fish catcher- usually.

I also think location is important to successful frogging. To me Florida is the place. Some high up mountain stream clear water no cover fast current place might not produce any fish. Its location, location, location as well as timing. High noon is not the best time around here. So I've learned first light and last light are when they come out around here. But to each their own.

I will say a frogging rod is one of the few around the clock dedicated setups I have. All others change around, but not the froggin' rod!

Another issue to frogs is we have to slow it down for them to work and just keep thinking there is a monster lurking below it waiting to pounce on it. Just give them the time- let it sit there- barely twitch it....... hard to do sometimes I know.

Your waters there in Iowa just might not be the best location for frogs? I don't know. I've only been to Iowa fishing once and not thrilled with the water quality I was seeing there in SE Iowa. Everywhere I went the water was chocolate brown and fishing was not very good for me possibly because my Florida techniques just don't work well there.

I'll take your frogs if you don't want them! 😉 Florida lily pads and frogs were made for each other!

Oh I fully agree. And that’s an excellent point. I worked pretty hard this past weekend fishing jigs and Texas rigs. All

Small fish and slowing down. Found that groove again. I’ve always been great at slow methodical baits. But god I just can’t get a frog down lol. I can’t stand there and fish a frog slow for more than say 10-15 minutes after that I just gotta move on to another bait lol. Yet I’ll stand there and fish a jig all day lol

My thing with frogs....I hate them in the wind. When the line bows I can't get a good hookset. Then when I keep my line low it gets all caught up in the pads and I also can't get a good hookset. So I use them sparingly. If I'm going into the thick stuff I generally prefer punching/flipping.

I'll use a few baits on my frog rod.

1. the Booyah Pad Crasher and the popping Pad Crasher. If fish are aggressive you'll hook them. Often there are only tiny bass in the vegetation. Sometimes bass don't even bite, they just swipe at it. I've had them do this 3 consecutive casts. Be sure to bend those hooks out enough to see space between the frog body and the hooks. It makes a huge difference.

2. Toads. I'll use the paddle type feet sometimes and the curly ones other times. Usually in sparser vegetations where I can keep a steady retrieve. When the bass strikes you can lower your rod, let it sink and be sure they have it before swinging away.

3. Try a Johnson Silver Minnow with a curly tail grub or some sort of trailer. This will get the followers when it falls off the mat or it'll sink a little when they miss on the mat. Be ready, they hit it hard. It's very weedless so you can just reel it back through weeds and pick off the occasional bystander.

I bought a Strike King Moss Boss to give a try, but I haven't been somewhere with much vegetation yet due to family health issues, mine and my wife's. I'm planning on Saturday morning.

Sometimes they won't bite on the surface, but they'll bite a T rig. My fav for that presentation is the Yum Dinger. I caught my PB on it in lilies at the edge of deeper water. Remember, bigger bass, the kind that will annihilate anything, are loners. If you're getting a lot of misses, it's probably dinks or even bluegills.

5 minutes ago, the reel ess said:

I'll use a few baits on my frog rod.

1. the Booyah Pad Crasher and the popping Pad Crasher. If fish are aggressive you'll hook them. Often there are only tiny bass in the vegetation. Sometimes bass don't even bite, they just swipe at it. I've had them do this 3 consecutive casts. Be sure to bend those hooks out enough to see space between the frog body and the hooks. It makes a huge difference.

2. Toads. I'll use the paddle type feet sometimes and the curly ones other times. Usually in sparser vegetations where I can keep a steady retrieve. When the bass strikes you can lower your rod, let it sink and be sure they have it before swinging away.

3. Try a Johnson Silver Minnow with a curly tail grub or some sort of trailer. This will get the followers when it falls off the mat or it'll sink a little when they miss on the mat. Be ready, they hit it hard. It's very weedless so you can just reel it back through weeds and pick off the occasional bystander.

I bought a Strike King Moss Boss to give a try, but I haven't been somewhere with much vegetation yet due to family health issues, mine and my wife's. I'm planning on Saturday morning.

Sometimes they won't bite on the surface, but they'll bite a T rig. My fav for that presentation is the Yum Dinger. I caught my PB on it in lilies at the edge of deeper water. Remember, bigger bass, the kind that will annihilate anything, are loners. If you're getting a lot of misses, it's probably dinks or even bluegills.

This is spot on well said with everything in it.

I use only in open water.

Good Fishing

Panther Martin Superior Frog

Ymmv, but my frog success went up after a couple of things:

1. Proper rod. More Moderate. Give the Broomstick to the ex. 🧙

2. Proper frog. Soft. Good hooks. Spro in the garbage. Scum Frog and Teckels are my favorites but others work.

3. Every bite is different. Sometimes its immediate and they hook themselves. Other times you have to wait a beat or two before swinging.

4. Determine if they're actually eating it, as opposed to slapping, killing, kissing, etc. If they aren't committing properly, change color, size, retrieve, something.

Hope some of this helps.

Have not fished a frog much since my days living in Missouri. We would toss a holly body frog on the lily pads...let it set for a bit...then slowly work to the edge of a pad...walk across the water to another pad...wait, and repeat. Great fun watching LMB's blow up the frog as we worked between pads.

Sadly not many lakes around here with lily pads.

We don't have much grass-mats or weed beds that can be worked with a frog. Get a lot of the mossy-green stuff...which just gets everything messy and is about impossible to fish.

Jackall kaera and Deps slither K are two smaller frogs that get a lot of bites, have good hook up ratios and are easy to walk. Not ideal for the heavier cover mats but great for most other situations.

Hollow body frogs are one of my most productive summer time techniques when the pads come in and the milfoil and hydrilla mats up. My conversion rate on hook ups is pretty high. I think most people are too slow on the draw with hollow body frogs. The blow up you see is what happens after the fish has engulfed the bait and turned around headed back down into the water. If you wait for any amount of time longer than it takes to realize you have a strike and swing on em, it’s gonna be too slow. I’m not sure how and when the myth started getting perpetuated that you should wait on a hollow body frog hookset, but the second I stopped following that bit of conventional “wisdom” my hookup percentage went way up.

Also I agree to those who say downsize your frog. I’m most often fishing with a pad crasher Jr.

44 minutes ago, the reel ess said:

1. Try a Johnson Silver Minnow with a curly tail grub or some sort of trailer. This will get the followers when it falls off the mat or it'll sink a little when they miss on the mat. Be ready, they hit it hard. It's very weedless so you can just reel it back through weeds and pick off the occasional bystander.

Such an underrated bait. Extremely weedless, can bring it over the top of the really thick stuff and then drop it into holes and let it flutter. Works pretty well even in open water just straight retrieve and then letting it fall and die it acts like a weedless flutter spoon.

OP

You got good advice

In my opinion..

Location, technique, timing and equipment in that order is key.

Every time I’m on “The Lake” a (green/pepper original Scum Frog) is the first thing I grab.

It’s kinda my thing.

Tip…Pay attention!

When in a pad field don’t just cast and wind between pads.

As you’re working it back scan the area watching for any pad movement especially if it’s in a fairly straight line.

That’s Mama!!

If you see it, she’s gonna hit it!

You got her attention and she’s rubbing on the stalks coming to you.

Give her every opportunity to keep her interest while keeping her comin.

Some of my biggest hits come after I land or pull it onto a pad,

let it sit there for about 5-10 seconds and then pull it off gently.

Be ready while you twitch or walk it if you get that far.

If you miss her, keep doing it as most times she’ll come back.

If there’s one, there’s another

Mike

About once or twice a year I tie a frog on anymore. I've tried more times than I should note with them around here and the bass just don't relate to them very well. I think a lot of guys fish them frequently and they see a bunch of them. If it is a day when the fish are looking up then you might get a couple fish on them. Low light late evening on a couple of the 'pond' like lakes I fish might get you one or two. But if I can throw anything else instead I will. Mats and heavy pads are the only places I'll tie them on anymore since you can't get much else through it.

I love fishing a frog, but my lake has only rock at normal pool. The lake needs to flood about 10 feet before I tie one on, but I have 2 questions for you regular frog users: (1) What are the softest body ones you know? (2) How do you manage to bend those super strong hooks up and out, just a little? Got a third question: How do you repair a frog when the hooks have been ripped out?

I’ve never had much luck on them either. I’m not giving up on it, there are just too many bodies of water near me that set up well for that kind of fishing.

The way I figure it’s just one of those techniques that’ll take me some time to get proficient at. For me that was the case with jigs and other topwaters including buzzbaits, but I’ve broke that curse recently.

One the thing that helped me with other baits I’ve struggled with was just going out with only one rod and only that bait tied on. Forced myself to get good at it.

That being said, at the end of the day fish what you want to fish. No worries.

When the conditions call for a HBF, I'm throwing it.

8 hours ago, Tackleholic said:

I love fishing a frog, but my lake has only rock at normal pool. The lake needs to flood about 10 feet before I tie one on, but I have 2 questions for you regular frog users: (1) What are the softest body ones you know? (2) How do you manage to bend those super strong hooks up and out, just a little? Got a third question: How do you repair a frog when the hooks have been ripped out?

Deps slither k is one of the softest. Very good hookup ratio. It’s pricey but it also walks super easily. Have caught plenty of fish on it in open water.

I don’t have any trouble with frogs, provided the water ain’t been fished heavily with frogs right before me. Anytime others have been frog fishing. I usually go straight for a fluke or lizard, both weightless.

Kind of the reverse is, I have caught a fish in open water at the pressured lake fish, on hollow body frog. In the middle of the day too.