Question for bass fishermen…

[roosiebull]

There is so much info needed to give you help. Location and a huge to get an idea of what the fish are doing. Is it a private pond or public pond/lake? If they are up on the nest, a white jig in their face. If they are deep and cold, big and slow.
With out some more info we will just give you our favorite baits and techniques.

Yeah, certainly going to have to figure out exacts on my own, I was mostly wondering what a few good options to have on hand for really cold water bass and their basic habits in cold water… of course everything is relative, and I wouldn’t fish if it wasn’t for the process… the most basic basics are what I was seeking… some broad starting points as far as technique and where they generally hang out in cold conditions.

The river here locally is high and ugly from snow melt, and figured I would check out something different, and have caught plenty of bass when I was young, but never a good sized one any mostly on accident… or the few decent ones I caught were cheating fishing whole night crawlers with no weight sight fishing them in warm water, but that doesn’t teach you much about bass fishing

Tried a little last summer but my motivation was extremely low, I went after work a couple times shortly, but it was after working for 10hrs in over 100 degree weather and didn’t want to be in the heat very long by choice, but I caught a few smallmouth, which was a fish I had never seen in person… working around there I saw a couple pig largemouth, but that was early morning and the couple times I went after work I couldn’t spot any (how it usually goes)

Opposite side of the spectrum, fishing them in bath water

 

[roadrunner]

I have some Ned rig gear… kinda funny, I have fished my whole life, both for recreation and almost my whole career, but the bass lingo I knew little of, haha… it’s certainly its own entity

My go to are the Wacky and Ned rigs.

 

[OneShot]

What state are you fishing? Some states like texas and Oklahoma the bass are on beds or moving to spawn within a week or two. States farther north, they’re probably stacking up on secondary points and in locations close to their spawning areas. The back of coves and creeks will warm up faster than the main lake. Dirty water will warm faster than clear water. The north part of the lake will warm faster than the south part of the lake. Look for wood or rock this time to the year as it holds heat better. This time of year, the afternoons and evenings can be better than the morning as the sun has warmed the water up more and made the fish more active.

Shoot me a PM if you want with specific questions or a map of the lake and I’ll help out as much as you need.

 

[roosiebull]

What state are you fishing? Some states like texas and Oklahoma the bass are on beds or moving to spawn within a week or two. States farther north, they’re probably stacking up on secondary points and in locations close to their spawning areas. The back of coves and creeks will warm up faster than the main lake. Dirty water will warm faster than clear water. The north part of the lake will warm faster than the south part of the lake. Look for wood or rock this time to the year as it holds heat better. This time of year, the afternoons and evenings can be better than the morning as the sun has warmed the water up more and made the fish more active.

Shoot me a PM if you want with specific questions or a map of the lake and I’ll help out as much as you need.

Southern Oregon, and great info. Did plan on afternoons for the reason you mentioned, and the water is currently pretty murky.

 

[jmez]

I would be fishing jigs and suspending jerk baits. Both very slow. Late afternoon around rock you could also try a lipless crankbait.

Creek channels or road beds leading into coves . Main lake and secondary points at the mouth of coves.

 

[Lytro]

Seems a little early for spawning, but if they're on beds, my go to is either a drop shot or a hair jig.

 

[ksp7146]

Make sure its legal in your state but the Alabama Rig is a great option for cold water. Slow roll it around bluff walls or anywhere there is a steep transition from shallow to deep water. I would also try a suspending jerkbait, once you get it in the strike zone pause it for at least 5 seconds and then twitch it a few times. The longer the pause the better.
Largemouth will live deep in the winter because the water temp is more consistent, but will come up to shallow rocks on a sunny day to get warm. Focus on bluff wall type structure where they can move up shallow with as little effort as possible, usually you can find this when there is a bend in the creek/river channel. You can use navionics webapp to look at a contour map of your lake: https://webapp.navionics.com/#boating@3&key=uxngGz`x~U

 

[MudBugVa]

When its cold I like to slowly drag lures on the bottom. My go to would be a senko or a jig. Another producer is is a large kietech fat swing impact swimbait on a jig head. Just bottom roll it slow enough that the tail kicks and you are occasionally hitting rocks.

 

[def90]

They certainly do, still a fairly common brand… they have passed the test of time for sure

OK, was at Cabelas a few years or maybe a decade back one day just roaming the fishing section and was looking for them and couldn't find them. I thought I did a search online afterwards and nothing came up at the time either.

 

[roosiebull]

So I went and did some scouting today, checked out access points and fished a little, water had cleared a bit from last week (maybe 3-ish ft of viz) the lake is fairly small, shallow and weedy… not really deep weeds, but I was certainly having some issues with the weeds. Was fishing 8# mono, and just ordered some 8# fireline crystal and plan on using a 6’ flouro bumper, and the 8# fire line will throw really good. It was blowing too which of course doesn’t help, especially in that situation, and the belly from the wind with mono is a pain in the ass too.

Seems like a drop shot rig fished slow makes sense? Little flat bill crank bait was fairly useless getting weeded up constantly, even fished painfully slow. I think an 1/8oz jig would fish, 1/4 almost seemed too heavy. Not much structure as in rock or submerged wood besides in really shallow near shore, almost seems like gradual channels

Missed one bite, but didn’t fish long, just wanted to get a lay of the land a little, couldn’t get too excited in the sideways snow

Now I’m committed though, I could have walked away if I didn’t take a cast, but now I have to catch at least one decent bass on principle. Still a little chunk of shoreline that looks deeper, so maybe there is some scenario there that I don’t know about.

There was a guy trying today, he looked pretty serious, with his quiver of rods but he didn’t catch any fish while I was there (he was in a boat)

If nothing else, nice not having any pressure, and there is a good population of fish, so I have that going for me. Supposed to be snowy and cold tomorrow, so I will probably just get further ahead on work

 

[roosiebull]

OK, was at Cabelas a few years or maybe a decade back one day just roaming the fishing section and was looking for them and couldn't find them. I thought I did a search online afterwards and nothing came up at the time either.

We still use them on the ocean for rockfish late summer when there is a lot of bait around and we have to scale down in bait size, those little mister twisters are still a good grub with good action… if it wasn’t for that, I wouldn’t have known. I think I have seen them at bimart too

 

[roosiebull]

Are any of the popular soft plastics for bass positive buoyancy? I assume some are, just don’t know.. might be beneficial with the weeds

 

[Macintosh]

You know a texas rig? Push the point of the hook all the way through and then just barely catch the tip back into the plastic, way easier to hook them that way on the light tackle you are using. Bullet weight or not, that wont get hung up nearly as much, and easy to fish slow. Deadsticking a tube or a plastic like that should catch a fish in those weeds. 40 is cold, they wont be doing much chasing at that temp, but a weightless texas rigged swimbait like a superfluke you can fish just like a suspending jerk bait right through those weeds…good cold weather way to provoke a strike, but still slow enough they’ll eat it.

 

[diverc18]

I would say it also depends on what caliber of fish you are chasing after. If you are just looking for numbers I would go finesse baits and methods like the float and fly, silent mega bass vision 110 jerk bait, 2.8in keitechs on a 1/8 oz ball head and smaller jigs/Carolina rigs. If you don’t care about numbers, it’s hard to beat crawling an 8inch hudd, defiant 210, savage gear pulse tail, and bait smith magnums. Could even through a couple big glides slow and methodically if the water is a little cleaner. Granted all these baits require dedicated rods and reels. This time of the year is my favorite time to throw big baits.

 

[huntsman22]