Hey guys,

How long is the typical post spawn stage for LMB?

What do you like to throw to catch em' ?

I've had luck with spinner baits, poppers & lizards. ;D

It all depends on the bass, the lake, the weather, and the baitfish in many of the lakes I fish.

But a good rule of thumb is 2 to 4 weeks.

On Clarks Hill I throw Super Spook Jr, flukes, and a short leader C-Rig.

On most the other lakes I throw a spinnerbait, jig, small dropshot, or a T-Rigged Ol' Monster.

There's a generous overlap in seasons between the spawn, post-spawn and summer periods,

which makes it difficult to quantify the actual length of the post-spawn. Speaking for Florida,

the post-spawn period is a hazy, indistinct period that seems to last up to two months,

namely April and May. Buck bass during the post-spawn are far more aggressive than cow bass,

and in Florida anyway, the big girls seem to dissolve away during the 'early' post-spawn,

but after they recoup, a few super pigs are always taken during the 'late' post-spawn.

Meanwhile, the little bucks are cooperative throughout the entire post-spawn period.

During the 'early' post-spawn the bucks offer a great topwater bite ,

and then toward the end of the post-spawn period they become suckers for a lipless crank.

Actually, this is the signal that the post-spawn period is transitioning into the summer season.

When bass chase shad in late spring, fishermen commonly attribute this to a shad spawn,

but I have my druthers about that. Most of the school shad are about 2 to 4" in length,

whereas sexually mature gizzard shad can range upward to 10 or 12" in length (threadfin to 8").

Perhaps I'm wrong, but I believe that these late spring jumps are the result of fingerling shad

aggregating in corners and on drop-offs. Though bass are credited with being crafty

in locating shad, they instinctively seek out all the same structural features.

Roger

Lake-wide Gatorbassman is right it lasts about as long as the spawn as not all females spawn at the same time. For individual fish, it doesn't appear to be very long, from what I see in the small waters I fish. This is what I see:

Healthy females will spawn more than once. Toward the end of the spawn some willing females run out of males to spawn with it appears. Once males have eggs, they are unwilling to let another female on, attacking it like any other intruder. Such late females will cruise shorelines and hang around outside of occupied beds. These "jilted" females are catchable -I've done best with slowly swum/killed jigs, tubes, and worms. They seem unwilling to chase, having short strike windows. Go horizontal or aggressive with lures and you'll catch males. Fish more vertically and slowly and you'll pick up females.

After they are done, I just haven't seen the "recuperating period" others talk about. I assume the confined strike window and spread out locations of "post-spawn" females accounts for the difficulty in catching them consistently. But this might be different in other waters. From what I've seen females come out of spawn-mindedness hungry. Here, they do two things:

-Some females (quite a few in my waters) hang out just outside bluegill spawning colonies. In my waters, find a colony and there will be bass there and colonies with larger gills attract big females. I'll buoy colonies like I would key spots on structure. I fish swimming jigs, swimming worms, and tubes to these fish. Topwaters can work well too I like walking baits.

-Many drop away from shore and collect on structure and/or developing vegetation -small clumps can do it if they are isolated only/best thing available. This scenario can bring large catches as moving bass can really stack up on such spots. In my small waters I may catch a dozen fish from one spot, but a friend of mine fishes larger reservoirs and has taken 30 from a spot! These are not all females though, but I do find some big females mixed in. They are aggressive and horizontal presentations will catch em. I use cranks a lot, and swim jigs, and tubes (falling).

Ralph Manns is a pond watcher too, and he reports something interesting that males remain aggressive for a time after the spawn causing a shift in dominance between sexes, normally determined by body size. Ralph feels that males can push females from prime spots. So, if you are catching shorts (post-spawn males), move, but not necessarily far if the location is good. This isn't something I've managed to make use of, but is something to keep in mind.

Good luck with your waters. Let us know what you find.

Edit: Great stuff from Roger too. It appears maybe he sees the aggressive bucks moving females too. Love the shad interpretation too. I'm fishing bluegill based waters.

Observational data collected by various Parks & Wildlife agencies across the southern states shows a window of several days to several weeks depending solely on the individual bass.

The key to catching post spawn bass is the same as pre-spawn which is learning to follow the breaks/break lines they use to migrate to and from spawning areas.

Once the post spawn period is over and feeding returns to normal just about any technique will produce excellent results.