There are 2 surefire spots at my favorite pond. The one i tooks a limit out of with beavers, and got a couple out of the other. The next day, i got a limit out of the other hotspot, since the other one didnt prevail. Now none of the fish are hitting anywere. Is it just because i have fished it too much (4 days this week, its spring break) and took too many out?(4,6,7,and4 fish each day) These are the only 2 spots that are consistantly pumping fish out and they just shut down now. Weather has been steady, and my teqniches didnt change until they needed to.

Are you keeping the fish you catch?? That would make a BIG difference IMHO. Especially in a small pond. I have a freind with a pond that I used to fish, and we could fish it every day of the summer and catch bass. We just never were allowed to keep anything. Maybe try using some lures the bass haven't seen? I know this was a big factor for us sometimes.

If you're dealing with a very small pond, it only takes one angler who knows the pond well,

to fish it down. You will hear otherwise I'm sure, but I'm speaking from experience.

When my wife was a real estate agent in Georgia, we got permission to fish three tiny ponds.

They were all going to be drained, filled and developed, so it was a catch-and-keep situation.

My wife and I fished down all three ponds in short order, as the fishing went from fantastic to subpar!

We were never able to come even remotely close to our performance during our first few visits.

Surprisingly, the biggest bass in those ponds were the first to fall, probably because the pond lords

are the most aggressive fish.

Roger

Season doesnt open for a while, and even so, i never keep fish from here, or pretty much any lake. The pond is about 5 acres, not really tiny, or big.

I suggest switching up lures then. Not just colors, but lures. In a small pond the bass seem to "know" your lures after a while, they just won't bite them. I'd give your go-to's a break. Switch it up a little, even try some minnows if it's allowed, just to give them something different.

If you are catching them on a sweetbeaver then you are either fishing it like a tube flipping it or working it on the bottom like a worm. The fish moved and or changed moods and you might need to change with them. When I first get to a small pond I will really whack them on one style of lure then for the next few days I always need to change things up to stay on the fish. You create fishing pressure and the fish change their mood because of it. You could be fishing and catching bass right up on shore cover one day and the next day find that they moved to the outside of the cover suspended. You change to a crankbait or spinnerbait and get back on the fish. I always find that the fish will be on one of two style baits. Either drop or falling baits or horizontal lures. That is what I start with then fine tune as I go. You might find that the fish might drop to deeper water or move to points. In most cases you will find other groups of fish the more you search around. Rule of thumb for me is if I found fish figure out where they went and change what I am using by their mood.

Its a really private pond, me and 2 other people fish it. Its weird this year. They completley skipped the senko bite, which was great last 2 years. And the tube/spinnerbait bite should be comming up any day. But inbetween those periods, i never fished it too hard. All my fish so far came off of a sweet beaver, 1/4 oz. jig, and a variety of tubes. Ive tried spinnerbaits, crankbaits, and even topwaters. My huskey jerks wouldnt work were the fish were, the weeds. Im thinking of using a floating rapala and twitching it above the weeds next.

I had the same problem in my 10acre pond this year. No one fishes it but me, but yesterday I was having trouble getting them to bite anything. Switched to drop-shotting and put on a 4" Watermelon Seed Lizard and they started going nuts. I was about 3' off the bottom of a 15' at the deepest point pond. I usually throw the largest spinnerbait I can find a few times and then start drop-shotting or texas riggin.

Water level could make a big difference too. Is it noticebly shallow/deep than last year? Even 6in difference can make a difference as to where the bass will be. I know I have a place I thought I had figured out, I went their the other day and the water line was way higher, so I had to reevalute what I needed to do.

conditions are normal, weather is steady, i just dont know. The deepest part is probably about 7' or so, its all shallow. I havent had a deep bite in about 1 month, So i have been focusing on them shallow. Maybe they moved to the other, unfishable bank that requires a boat? (its thickly wooded) Or maybe they are just deep.

It doesn't take much fishing to pressure the fish in a 5 acre pond.  If the water is clear to stained I would go with finesse presentations that you can slip quietly into the water, and I would definately find a way to fish those other banks.  Sometimes all it can take to start catching fish again is to show them the same lure that they are used to seeing but in a place that they are not used to seeing it.

When I first read that you were taking say an average of like 5 fish a day from these two spots I assumed like RoLo did that perhaps you had over fished your honey holes. After hearing that you where releasing the fish you had caught I took into account the number of fish and days you had fished there and I came up with this: the fish you released put the school down. In other words when ever you release fish into a school those fish that have been caught seem to tell the other fish, "Hey don't bite that or you get a free boat ride". Now how this happens is not really known although I would attribute it to pharemones or something along those lines. When you start to fish these areas again try taking the fish you have caught and placing them in a keep sack or live well or light stringer, preferably not a keep sack. Doing this can make the difference of catching say 4 fish in an area or catching 6 or 10 fish. Another thing vary your presentation, fish the edges first before casting directly into the structure, and take the utmost care of the fish that you catch because they are the ones you will catch later. Try down sizing and even super sizing your presentations, vary your weights and colors. Go from 1/4oz to an 1/8oz or go to a 3/8oz, the varying speeds of the falls will trigger strikes from different fish and penetrate the weed differently. Try craw worms as well as the sweet beavers, paca craws and so on. Your technique need not change so much as your presentaion to take the optimum number of fish out of the area.

Good Luck and God Bless,

Peter  

Not all of my fish came from these spots, its just that they usually produced some fish for sure. Ill get one here or there, and maybe 1 or 2 from each honey hole. Its just that there always seems to be at least 1 fish stupid enough to bite in one of those spots.

Well there are always some stupid fish but the best ones are the smart ones.

Peter