When standard search techniques arent working?

[74mph]

Let's talk about what to do when the standard search techniques for Bass just arent working due to weather conditions. The "standard" techniques I am referring to are the basics such as throwing a crank or spinner bait to work several different depth ranges and structure/weeds to identify where those nice fish are holding.

Just yesterday I was fishing a lake that is somewhat new to me and I wanted to do a bunch of scouting using these basic search techniques. While I was finding a fair number of small fish over 3 - 5 FOW, weed flats on a spinner bait, I wasn't connecting with any nice fish and nothing was hitting a crank.

I know the weather patterns can just slow the bigger fish down and make them reluctant to hit the faster moving baits. In this situation, should one keep working the faster moving baits, possibly just work them as slow as possible, or should we switch to something like a swim jig or texas rig to work the bottom a bit slower with more finess. These are much slower presentations but could be used as a slow search technique to cover some amount of water.

Are there other search techniques that are a good standby to pull on these difficult situations?

Thanks for the help guys. Think technically and hopefully some of you will find this usefull.

Andrew

[RK]

Hiya -

When I'm kind of stumped like that I'll do a combination of faster reaction-type baits and soft plastics like jigworms. I use a crank almost like a depth finder to find points or inside turns on a weed edge or to feel my way around a point, then spot-check the stuff I find with a jigworm. If you don't have anything going in terms of location, slowing way down and fishing all plastics or jigs is tough because you can't eliminate water very quickly. Plus if there's any concentration of fish at all you can usually get SOMETHING to respond to a crankbait, then you can fish that area with a jig or something. Even when I'm fishing cranks I keep a jigworm rod on the deck to follow up on spots where I've caught a couple fish.

[Ray Esboldt]

Nothing is as comfortable to me as throwing a jigworm. Specifically, an 1/8 oz. with a 4 inch worm. If I am faced with a post-frontal day, it is the first thing I pick up. And, I will fish it as precisely (and slow) as I can on high percentage areas. If that fails, and it does at times, I pick up a crankbait and start slinging. I will cover everything I can with it - hard bottom, soft bottom, weedlines, and sand points. The fish didn't leave the lake and I am going to find them or load the boat scratching my head with tired arms.

[mainbutter]

When searching isn't working, things get tough. You don't know for sure where the fish are, but you also need to slow down to trigger bites.

This presents a problem, because you want to fish lots of water to find the fish, but if you don't pound an area slow with plastics or similar slow techniques, you won't trigger bites.

For me, I basically make the call that it is time to gamble and put all my eggs in one basket.. Stop searching and assume you found the location and break out slow soft plastic fishing. I don't move until I catch enough fish to have a better idea about what's going on in their heads, or until I get frustrated enough I'm not having fun at that spot anymore.

[74mph]

I like using a jig worm and should use it more often. This is great advice. I have a couple of related questions:

1) What is the advantage of a jig worm over a texas rigged worm, would you ever use a weighted texas rigged worm in this application? From my experience it is easier to run a weighted texas rig through the weeds.

Is there any real difference between a shakey head jig and a jig worm lure other than the way you use it?

2) If I think Jig worm I will often think of something greater than 1/8oz to get me deeper faster and cover a bit more bottom. I will often rig a football head and drag a jigworm across points. Is a heavier jig a good choice? I am still learning to feel the bottom with this type of rig and I like the heavier weight to let me know whats down there. I fish 8lb floro on a medfast 6'6" rod.

Thanks!

A

[Ray Esboldt]

Answers:

1) Slower fall, better feel (to me), ability to present a smaller bait, and I like it when it hangs on a weed. No difference to me in shakey head versus the traditional mushroom head. Jigworming is jigworming to me.

2) I throw a 1/16th oz. if the wind lets me get away with it. I like fish to get a good look at the drop. If a fish grabs it 3 feet down in 12 feet of water, I immediately throw a marker in the water. That fish may have just tipped off the presence of his buddies. A 3/8oz. football head is a good choice on a clean bottom and 1/8oz. football is great if the fish are riding low in the water column. Your rod choice and line choice are right on.

I see a jigworm as a search bait. If I can get them to eat that bait, I now know where they live. Confidence is the key, and I fish it everywhere. Deep, shallow, docks, whatever. I have even lit 'em up fishing it in deep rushes. When things are slow, everyone needs a confidence bait that they know how to maneuver throught the water - jigworm for me.

[Juan Grande]

Ray,

Do you just fish the jig worm with the hook exposed? I would assume you can get jig heads with an offset shank to t-rig them.

[Ray Esboldt]

Exposed hook. You can probably get jigs that would allow you to do that, but you might be better off throwing a small texas rig.

[Hester]

Could some of you guys post some pics of your favorite jig worm choices?

I'm sill usually texas riggin when I would like to jig worm instead, but i'm just not sure of what to use.

thanks, Hester

[RK]

Hiya -

Ray covered it pretty well but I'll add a couple thoughts.

1.) I think one of the advantages of jigworms is they settle on top of the weeds and hang up a little bit. When you pop them off the weeds then let them fall it's really a major trigger. Part of why you use as light a jig as you can get away with is so it settles lightly on the weeds rather than sinking into them. I use a 3/32 oz head 95% of the time.

I think an exposed hook on a jighead is better too because your hooking percentage is way higher. When the bite is off fish can be amazingly sneaky about picking up a bait. An exposed hook will catch on their jaw when you lift the bait up and give you a chance to feel them and set the hook. With a light wire hook I think you end up catching a lot of fish you'd have missed entirely on a Texas rig. This weekend I definitely landed some fish because of an exposed hook.

I think a mistake a lot of guys make when they try jigworming is using too heavy a jig so they can feel it better. Jigworms take some getting used to because for the most part unless you hang up on a weed you really don't feel much of anything. You just kind of fish the weight of the jig. Line watching is critical. Most of the hits are line twitches. When in doubt set the hook. As Ray said, the slow fall is a major part of it and a heavier jig falls too fast.

As for jigworming vs. shaky head... Some differences in philosophy I think. Shaky head seems to be more bottom contact oriented and a little heavier jigs maybe. Plus a lot of the time those baits are Texas-rigged. Variations on a theme really, with somewhat different family trees in terms of where the technique evolved.

2.) I use light football heads too. Great around docks with a clean bottom, and outside weedlines. Kind of hard to find good, light football heads though. Need a light wire hook to fish it on lighter gear and they can be a challenge to find. Northland, Gamakatsu and Lunker City all make good ones.

Hester - Don't have any pics, but 75% of the time my jigworm is a 3/32 oz Northland jigworm head with a 7" Berkley Power Worm. The rest of the time it's a 4 " worm on the same head, like a sickle tail Power Worm, or a straight tailed finesse worm. Pretty basic deal.

Cheers,

Rob Kimm

[Juan Grande]

Good tips Rob. I always enjoy reading your stuff.

[74mph]

Ray and Rob,

Great information here guys. This is the kind of stuff that keeps me going no matter what the conditions might be. I was ou this weekend and caught quite a few bass and even a couple of nice walleye (20" and a 15")fishing with a jigworm technique. It was interesting because the crank bait bite turned back on for me and the jigworm was still able to find some bigger fish.

In light of the crank bait bite I had another searching realted question regarding depth. Typically when searching for bass with a crankbait Ill use a DT-10 to DT-20 crank. I havent experimented much with the shallower diving baits. This is mostly because I am typically getting into alot of weeds and I get frustrated and start throwing a spinnerbait, chatterbait or swimjig. When searching with a crank bait do you guys try a few different depths between the 3 and 10 foot range?

Do you fish methodically from shallower to deeper or base your decisions off of the weather patterns? I think I might be missing out on a bunch of fish by switching away from the crank bait in those 3 to 10 foot depth ranges.

What do you think?

Again thanks for the replys this has been a great post.

Andrew

[Ray Esboldt]

Good question, Andrew. I always feel like I am missing a bunch of fish, but I am what I am. I can fish deep and feel comfortable whatever that depth may be on the lake I fishing.

I have had some success throwing shallow running cranks up on weed flats. But, I will say that since the advent of milfoil, those opportunities have been fewer. I know there are fish sitting up on flats under milfoil. And, that's where the crankbait deal kind of falls apart for me. Jigworm too is not a good option up there. However, if I am going to fish "up", I still look for edges. That might be mifoil to cabbage or coontail or softer bottom to firm (which usually coincides with a weed transition). No matter what, I am looking for a distinct change.

[Juan Grande]

Ray,

Got another question for you. If you're fishing with 3/32 jigs (mushroom I assume) on your jig worms with a 7" worm, do you buy hooks with long shanks? The lighter jigs I've seen have a short shank and and hook would be pushed through on the top 1" of the worm only. Does that matter?

[Coach Dog]

Great info guys! What hook size are on those 1/16 and 3/32 oz jigs?

[RK]

Hiya -

74 - I'm kind of an oddball I think in that I fish deep when I can and shallow when I have to. I'm a better deep water fisherman, and I just flat out enjoy it more. When I do go up on the flats as you described, I actually really like rattle baits. You can control the depth on the very precisely and they're great for covering big expanses of weeds. Ray's right on about finding changes in weed density, type, or bottom content. Weedbeds aren't uniform, and edges hold fish. The more edges you can put together the better off you are I think.

Juan and Coach Dog - The heads I use have a 3/0 I think. They're the Northland Jig Worm heads, but several companies make good ones - Outkast, Gopher (the original Mushroom head which comes in several variations) All Terrain and others I'm sure. They do have a longer shank. The main thing though is a bigger hook bite. Get jigheads designed for jigworming. They usually have better keeper collars too.

Cheers,

Rob Kimm

[the man]

In the situation you described 74mph I usually would use a slower moving finesse presentation such as wacky rigging a heavy weight sinkworm or drop shotting a hand pour finesse worm.

[Acemac]

just fish for walleyes you will find the bass then.

[Ham]

Ray or anyone....What rod action and line do you have when Jig Worming

[KickNBass]

I use a G.Loomis SJR782 (6'6" Mew Power, probably fast action) with 8-10# Flouro or 10-15# braid.

[RK]

Hiya -

I use a couple different set-ups, but I fish jigworms a lot so it kind of makes sense to me to fine tune a little bit.

Most of the time I use a 7' medium power fast action rod with 8# fluorocarbon. If you want one rod to handle 95% of your jigworming (plus do a lot of other stuff too), a 6'6" or 7' med power fast action rod and a 2500-size reel with a good drag matched with 8# fluoro or mono would be my recommendation.

Cheers,

Rob Kimm

[Ham]

When using a 1/16- to 1/4-ounce jig the rods I looked at were med light. The med were 1/4 to 5/8 I think. So I was looking at the Med -light rods. So I go check out the med for lighter ounce jig sizes.

[RK]

Hiya -

I kind of think the weight ratings on rods are not much more than suggestions. I have a MH spinning rod rated for 3/8 to 3/4 and I can toss 3/32 oz jigheads as far as I'd possibly need to. OTOH, I have a ML rated for 1/8 to 3/8 oz and I throw 1/2 ball heads with grubs all summer with it. Ratings get you in the ballpark but they aren't hard rules for sure. I can toss a 3/32 oz on a med-heavy partly because you can whip a jigworm as hard as you want - not like a jig and minnow or jig and leech that'll fly off if you sling it hard.

Cheers,

Rob Kimm

[Ray Esboldt]

I agree 100% with RK - usually do. Somewhere in the 6'6" to 7' range with a medium action works out well for me. 8lb. mono is my typical choice, but I have a could specialty setups as well.

[Cecil]

I use the same 7' med action with 8-10# flouro. A med-light will work for casting and setting the hook. The main reason I use a medium is you need to be able to snap the bait off the weeds. A med-light will not allow for that snap.