Paul Roberts

Iced in! Excellent! I thought you were in the south where this kind of thing might not set up so strongly. You are a lucky man, or very soon will be.

Oh yes, Another wind tip for you... In the early spring and again in the fall (but less consistent) wind direction is a major factor for me in locating active bass. This may or may not set up the same where you are -in Texas I believe? But here (farther north) teh temperature difference between cold winter water and sun warmed water is big. Bluegills and bass will pile into warmed areas thick -and it can be pure carnage. The wind can play a big role: The heat from sunlight doesn't penetrate very far and warm water floats so the wind will blow that warm water around. I take surface temps downwind looking for places where warm water has pile onto a shoreline or better a cove. Bait and bass can pile in heavy if the difference is enough. I look for good heating days with consistent wind -it's worth taking the day off work on those days. Last spring I tore a ligament in my elbow catching big bass over two days in such an area the size of my living room. I'm still fishing left-handed because of it. The spot I'm hitting today is pretty much the same deal -bass are smaller though. I'll be chasing heated water for a while, and watching the weather and wind to concentrate it.

I still have that one: "IF Secret System" its titled. Some of the same stuff pertaining to calendar periods and lake types is in the LM handbook though, except the Fish, Location Presentation stuff -but this last you probably already have imbedded. You can get the handbooks through IF, or Amazon.com. They are about $12 new I think. Maybe the Secret System booklet is still available. Well...I'm headed to one of my ponds right now -first day out with a fishing rod ;D . The pond is half free of ice. It has a big year class from 2001 that followed a drought -growth has been exceptional. Last spring they'd reached carbon-copy 16"-17" footballs. Some may break 18 this year. We'll see. Today I'm hoping to find a few. Water's still below 50 though, so I'm rigged for extremely slow speed. They should be piled on the north shore with the heat -some of the bluegills are there already. If anything it'll be nice to be casting again, and finally have a chance to fine-tune all the lures I doctored this winter: :-/ >

Hey Muddy, The In-Fisherman "Handbook of Strategies" for Largemouth Bass has a good chapter that covers natural lakes: Locating Bass in Natural Lakes; When, Where, Why. It covers natural lake structure, weeds and weedlines, depth, bass activity, competition, and the like. The book is worth having in general.

Re-posted. Pics of some of my larger bass last year from 7 different small public Northern Colorado waters. Six of these particular fish broke 19". They were caught on a variety of lures. All taken from shore or float tube.

Well I don't know Florida, but I'll take a stab at it. Two thoughts: Florida bass are more temperature sensitive than northern LMB, so even though it hasn't felt cold, it is winter there and the bass may have gone to deeper more temperature stable water. You should be approaching spawning time -Yes? Maybe the bass are now spawning oriented and looking for spawning sites. Your inlet may not have the hard bottom they prefer. But, since you say fishing was good in this area until October, and the other sub-tropical species have left too, only leaving the bluegills, I'd venture that what your seeing is a response to "winter" conditions. I'll bet they'll be back. In the meantime you should start hoofing and re-find your fish. Interesting. Let us know what happens.

Well, I'm not sure if China would make your criteria -from what I saw. Farm raised bass wouldn't count. And if anyone saw you with expensive gear catching fish, and then LETTING THEM GO, they'd think you were nuts.

I bought mine thru Amazon. Wasn't expensive.

I found the same thing, with both the BassMagic and the Hollow Bellies. I think it's because they are so newly poured. These have just hit the market and I don't think either company wanted to waste any time in getting them out. They don't want to miss the paddle-tail craze going on. (My guess is the price will fall eventually). I just left mine out for a couple weeks and the odor has dissipated. Stinks up the whole room though in the doing.

I have it. It is interesting; Enough that it brought up lots of questions. But, as I hear it, Mr Underwood and his wife died in a car wreck a year after the book was published.

I'm a bit concerned about the potential for hooking smaller bass (2lbers) in the eyes with the large hooks it appears these larger (6-1/2") baits are going to require. Anyone have any experience with these baits? What hook size are you using? Is the 7/0 really required? Can it reach too deep and puncture the eyes on smaller bass?

Hi Todd, I PM'd you.

I lived in China for a few years and I came to a pond where a group of anglers were float fishing with bait. I inquired how the fishing was in my toneless Mandarin and a women pointed to the water emphatically and repeated "Bigmouth! Bigmouth!" I wasn't sure what her meaning was. A while later I was in a fish market and lo and behold there was a tank of largemouths. Now you have to realize, in much of China, and especially in the south there are practically few "wild" freshwater lakes anymore. Angling is very different there too, although that is likely to change as the country develops. There are many man-made ponds that exist for fish farming and so, obviously, some are dedicated to largemouth bass. There was a fish pond behind my apartment that was a piranha pond (common in the fish markets) and it was amazing to see the carnage as schools of piranha swept into schools of baitfish. Scary! And my arm would start making a reflexive casting motion LOL.

Catt, I have no experience with power plant lakes, except that I've read most have cold areas too. This from Bighead in the thread you supplied: I believe this is exceptionally early. Not "just the same". I'll look into what's out there on power plant lakes. An interesting situation. Thanks for your time.

OK, I see the confusion. Again I think it's the definition of "spawning" behavior. Yes, males and females feed aggressively in the warming shallows prior to spawning. But, I am describing spawning behavior. I don't consider the first inshore movements in late winter/early spring as a spawning movement. It is a heat seeking and feeding movement. I recognize spawning behavior as when the bass become primarily spawning site/substrate oriented -cobbles, tree roots, etc... Males tend to come first and make beds. Females come when they are ready. Males wait for them and actively solicit them when they do come in. Or abandon if they came too early, which is not uncommon. I call this substrate/spawning site orientation prespawn. I call it spawning when the females are there, being solicited, and dropping eggs. Does this jive with what you've seen?

Catt, I read through that thread. Great stuff. A lot of variables being batted around though. One guy, Bighead, had a post that I think agrees with what I've seen: "I agree with most of what you guys are saying. I'm usually fishing rattletraps for prespawn fish by early Feb. even though some fish can still be caught on jigging spoons deep. However, I'm not sure about water temp not being the major driver of the start of the spawn. I've been one of those guys that hits Fork and other area lakes hard waiting for the first fish to move up. I've done this every year since 1988. What I've seen time and time again is that the first fish will be on the beds after a warming trend of at lease a few weeks. Sometimes this is in Feb., March, or April depending on how cold the winter was. The very first males appear near 58 degrees in the upper ends of the lake. Then a front will blow in and cool the water temps 5 degrees or so and the fish move back out to water a few feet deeper. When the temps rise again the fish move back onto the beds. As some fish finish their spawn others are starting, usually a little farther south on the lake where the water is becoming warmer. There are exceptions to this, some lower lake creeks spawn early maybe due to warmer run off or ? The local power plant (hot water) lakes spawn around the end of Dec. into Jan. I don't see this related to hours of daylight or moon phase as some suggest. Also, we sometimes have a secondary spawn in the fall. It's never anywhere near as large as the spring run but it usually happens when water temps have again returned to the 60's whether that be in Oct. or Nov. This is JMHO, thanks for an interesting thread. -big" Again, I'm defining "the spawn" as females dropping eggs. Males may be prompted to dig nests on warm spells, even well early, but they may abandon them. I think a lot of anglers will see this and say, "Oh, they're spawning!" But, it takes two to tango.

Yeah, it is complicated. I was pretty sold on the moon, until I started really paying attention, and found that the bass missed some moons, or spawned despite an "off phase". So, I started to wonder. I've been doing my observations in small waters, in two groups -shallow and deep. Maybe on my small waters the bass are more confined by conditions and miss the moon because of this? In my deeper waters, the beginning of egg dropping did coincide with the full moon, but then again the temps had not reached what I've read is appropriate until then. I'll be watching again this year. Thanks for the links. Interesting stuff.

The moon and the spawn: I too have been keenly interested in the moon's influence, because of what I've read and from a mere handful of personal observations enough to get me serious about looking into it. Here's my understanding so far: Temperature is critical in fish spawning, in general. The scientific literature says that bass eggs suffer high mortality at 55F. Now I'm assuming this is the "hatchery northern largemouth" (stocked all over), and thus this number may not apply to surviving native strains in pockets throughout the country, or for the Florida subspecies. Thus temps need to be above that if a female is to be successful. Further, bass are known to initiate spawning when water temperatures stabilize above 60F. Stabilization is noticeable if you bother to keep a running tab. It happens when the days get long enough to defeat the nights cooling and water (which returns heat slowly) reaches a certain level of heat that the night now cannot steal away. The vast majority of the moon information comes from anglers, along with some angler catch statistics compiled by researchers. These "studies" have shown trends toward moon activity, but in general it's far from definitive. Catch data in my view says more about fishing than the bass' behavior there are just too many variables. Statistically these retrospective reviews are very weak, at best, and considering the sampling method (fishing), I do not feel they offer very much. As for angler theory, there are well known anglers out there espousing very different theories: Full, New, Half, three-quarter to full, full to quarter, and others. If all were correct, then there just isn't a time not to kill em, or angler moon theory is bunk. But maybe some are correct, or offer something. What I've seen personally in the past was what I thought was full moon influence on females, both at time of egg laying (initially temp influenced they don't spawn on a too early moon), but also prior. But these observations although intense, are really few in number. So I decided to really check it out a couple years ago and started observing the spawn not just fishing it. I chose small waters in which I could see the fish, and recorded what I could given the time I had truly insufficient. I tried to initiate some help from other local on-line anglers but that didn't pan out too well too much time required and no training in what to look for and where to apply one's time. Heck, most people want to fish in their free time, not diligently record behavior and just as important, the lack thereof. You can visit my attempts in the Colorado Reports page on another site, it's called The Moon and Spawn Journal. It's long and full of observations, and the final result for the first year was not definitive. But I was able to exclude the full moon for egg laying. Nest building in males coincided with the new moon but it also came immediately after a warming trend which probably better explains it especially since egg laying also came on the heels of the next intense warming trend, which fell right in between the new and full thus excluding both. I haven't written off the moon. I recognize the limitations of my efforts and understanding. As you can see this is complicated and it'll take some time (years) before I can satisfy myself one way or the other. Now if I had a stable of grad students at my beckon call, this could be covered much more effectively -it might only take three years to better refine the questions. Yes, science is painstakingly slow whereas opinion is often instantaneous (LOL). As it is I'll be looking again this spring, but not likely recording everything on-line.

Catt, I see. These are pre-spawn temperatures. Thanks for clarifying. And thanks for the reference to Bowling. I'll look him up. Interesting observation. You say "all over the pond". Would you say this was the majority of bass? Was this a cold spell? Just curious. bassguy09, I'll respond separately. The moon's effect on the spawn has been of particular interest to me. I was once a firm believer. Now I'm a bit shakier on it.

Thanks Kent, I've seen some good boards fall into the pits because of nasty comments. Thanks for the heads-up moderating.

Catt, Your observations are interesting, and I've heard anglers talk about "spawning" in 55F water. I think we need to better define spawning and "prespawn" movements though. In my experience the first movements to the shoreline are two-fold in purpose: to follow heating water, and subsequent feeding. I do not call this the prespawn period, but the initial heat-up period. And it's primarily a feeding movement in terms of the bass' behavior. I view the shift to pre-spawn as a shift in focus from food to substrate, and it occurs after shallows warm further. This is first seen in males. The definition of spawning is females actually dropping eggs. Males will make beds prematurely, and abandon them; I've seen this and hear about it every year, all over the country, as much as a month prior to actual spawning. Most anglers call this premature bed making spawning. It's the movement of females that signals the start of spawning. And interestingly they too make inshore movements, in groups, well prior to actual spawning. Research indicates that it's the stabilization of temperatures of the shallows that trigger egg-dropping. Photoperiod plays a role, but it's a large scale role, (and the zeitgeber is likely set the previous year, not as a direct response), with temperature stabilization being the immediate factor. I've heard anglers mention seeing females dropping eggs in water as cold as 55F. From what I understand this is likely by accident of circumstances, and probably results in a nest with very poor survival. In large water bodies, with a large reservoir of cold water nearby, strong winds can roll up cold water, impacting spawning in progress. Also, severe cold fronts can kill eggs and cause bass to abandon. It is possible, of course, that what you describe is a strain of bass that has eggs adapted to colder water. Also, many temperature studies (although not all) have been done with hatchery largemouths and these fish represent a select proportion of the overall diversity of largemouth bass throughout their range. Or, since this seems to be a southern phenomenon, it may be northern bass mal-adaption? Florida strain largemouths are supposed to be even more temperature sensitive and spawn at higher temps than northerns. I'm not arguing, at all. I'm trying to figure out the spawn too. I guess my question is: Are these bass you observe in 55F water, females dropping eggs? If so, would you say this a truly regular thing in your area?

BaitMS, The definition of a true thermocline is more rigorous than that. What you are feeling surface heating as heat does not penetrate water well. Heating enough to penetrate the depths takes time over the season. Most shallow waters cannot maintain the reservoir of cold water needed to create a tru thermocline. Are those warm and cold bands you feel important to fishing -they sure can be!

I fish small waters too. My deepest is 18 feet. I've taken temp profiles as I fish -part of my journaling and general interest while fishing. My ponds warm all the way to bottom. In mid-summer, here in CO, the surface may hit 86F, with a bottom temp at 14 feet at 79F. Wind plays a big role. If your pond at 22 feet is steep sided and shrouded in forest, it could potentially stratify. But if wind can penetrate, likely your pond mixes.

BassAkwards, I'm in Boulder too. The bass begin to drop eggs about the first week in May. Males dig beds about a week prior, but may make premature beds even earlier. You will know eggs have been dropped when males are "locked on" to beds. These times vary with local climate by a week or so. As to water temp, hatchery northern strain largemouth (unknown and mixed origins) eggs suffer high mortality at temps below 60F. The spawn (egg dropping) starts as temps stabilize above 60F. In our area this occurs the last week in April through May. Not all females drop eggs at the same date, but the majority of spawning will occur close together and within these dates. Also, in shallower ponds spawning occurs earlier (late April/early May) than in deeper ponds (early to mid May). If you catch this message and want to know more, PM me. Paul

Ditto the soldering iron, although these are pretty hot -kind of overkill. The welder would likely be better especially if the element is fairly long and thin for getting into the tear better. Also, even in a pinch on the water, a butane lighter can melt the head back together. The problem with heat in general though is that it softens the plastic considerably. It will give some more fish per worm though. I've gone to cyanoacrylic glues, Krazy Glue to be specific, for repairs. I keep a pin in the container the KG tube comes in, for cleaning out the nozzle. With a gentle squeeze, make sure the glue is going to flow, then insert the tapered nozzle into the tear, then squeeze a tiny amount as you pull the nozzle out. It works very well and stiffens the area of the tear.