I'm always surprised at the size of food bass and other fish try to eat. I went fishing this morning and tried a senko type lure (5" Yum Dinger, t-rigged, weightless) for the first time. The bass loved it and I caught some nice bass with it. On one retrieve, the lure was almost next to the boat and I felt a small fish hitting it. So I brought the lure near the surface so I could see what it was, it turned out to be a 3-4" bass with about one inch of the lure in its mouth. Since the lure is tapered and thicker in the middle, it looked like he got as much in his mouth as he could before being too big to fit in his mouth. I had him on the surface with his dorsal fin out of the water and he still didn't want to let go or he was stuck. He finally let go and swam away, but it was pretty impressive to see a 3-4" fish try and eat a 5" yum dinger.

Yeah that happens to me once in a while.  I caught a 6-8 inch LM on a 10in powerworm once.  They definately arent scared of anything.

I have caught quite a few bass this year that were smaller then my LC Sammy 128. Talk about no fear!

I have read that a bass will attempt to kill/eat fish up to 2/3 of it's own size.  I once was retrieving a Pop-R when I saw what I thought was a tiny splash at the lure.  Got it to the boat and there was a LITTLE LM stuck to one hook on the rear treble that probably wasn't half as long as the lure.  Talk about delusions of grandeur..... ;D

I think it is because the fishes natural scene to kill and eat. It see's something slow in the water like your senko but just a glimpse of it to not see its full size and goes after it. Works on small fry to. Early morning get a large 10" worm and find a schooling group of minnows or fry and just move it slow on the shore and watch a bunch of those little fish swim twords it trying to bite it.

This little guy hit a crank that was almost as big as him. I should have had the lure in the pic with him.  Agree it is amazing what they will hit.

My very first fish on a senko was a bluegill that was smaller than the 5" senko.  I have caught quite a few bass at night using an 8-10" worm that was longer than the fish.  

nice fish 8-)

Good post hamer. I have had a bass hit a rapalla origional floating that was about the same size as the rapalla. I also had about a 6 inch bass hit a 6 inch senko. Thing is the metabolism of a bass, or maybe the aggression of a bass realy slows when they get to a decent size. Maybe this is because the bass does most of its growing in early life so it eats more or is more aggressive then. Everyone knows dinks are easyer to catch than good size bass. Also maybe its because decent size bass have been caught as dinks before and are more cautious of what to eat. I deffinitly think bass learn what not to eat throughout their life.

Do you think a bass knows how big or how long it is?  

Hmmm...I am only 8 inches so I should only eat 4 inch baits?!?!?!

I had a 4 inch bluegill hit a 3 inch popper I was using one time.  His mouth wasn't even big enough to go all the way around the rear treble hook of the bait but he tried anyway. ;D

In a similar vein, I was fishing a small impoundment last week, up in a creek channel I've fished many times, flipping medium-sized plastics to scattered stickups washed in by spring floods. This is a favorite summertime pattern of mine, as most people just go down the banks and ignore the widely scattered branches, etc. that floods deposit on the flats, up to 200 yards either side of the creek channel.

Anyway, on one of these stickups I got a bite, set the hook, and eventually landed a 16-inch largemouth that had a softball-sized bulge in its stomach. Having caught a 4-pounder one time that disgorged a 10-inch-long muskrat in my livewell (yuck!), I didn't look too closely down the throat of the 16-incher, but just released it quickly. Why a fish with a meal that size already in its stomach would hit my creature bait, I can't imagine. The fish was absolutely bloated. I was glad that I wasn't fishing a tournament, as I'd have hated to answer the questions I surely would have got at the weigh-in, like how many sinkers did I feed that fish anyway?