nhbassin

I got on the water with a buddy yesterday in Southern NH and fished for about 3 hours. It was very cloudy with light wind and the water temp was 63. The first hour and a half we fished spinnerbaits, top waters, senkos and soft plastics on drop offs and rocky structure. With only 2 fish to show for our efforts, we decided to go to the opposite side of the lake and fish a large shallow flat that is covered in lilly pads and various vegetation. We ended up with over 30 largemouth in the last hour and a half, most coming on a chatterbait with rage craw trailer. Most were 11-13 inches long and none of the fish were over a pound and a half, but it was still good to catch a bunch. Has anyone got on fall patterns and caught any picture worthy fish lately?

The Nashua River may be one of your best options for a big fish in the Nashua area, and this is one of the best times of the year to catch large bass. I have had great luck with largemouth in the fall by throwing a chatterbait with a rage craw trailer (pictured below), on days that have some wind and clouds. That may help entice some of the larger fish for you. If you give it a try, make sure to vary your retrieve. Most of my good fish on this combo have come when reeling in then pausing to let the bait fall a few feet. Good luck.

I got out with a few friends on Sunapee last week for 3 hours of evening fishing one night and 4 hours of morning fishing the following day. Tubes and Senkos got us half a dozen smallmouth between 3 people, all of which were under 1 pound. Top waters, spinnerbaits and crankbaits were unproductive. We fished from 5'- 20' deep on main lake points, drop offs and some coves. It was painfully slow and I would not recommend for anyone to fish Sunapee without quality electronics. Even despite the lack of fishing success, Sunapee is still a beautiful lake worth visiting.

Thanks for the replies NHBull and Keiran. My buddies have only landed one smallie (on a strike king coffee tube) in the first few days they have been at Sunapee and I will be joining tomorrow to see if we can find a few fish.

I am joining a few friends on Lake Sunapee this week and hope to target some largemouth. The friends have rented a pontoon for the week, so it is not an ideal fishing set up and has no electronics. I am not looking for any waypoints or specific pieces of structure, but can anyone direct me to a cove/portion of the lake that is most likely to hold largemouth? Any help is appreciated and thank you ahead of time!

There is good access to the Charles river at the esplanade. Google it for directions and you will see that its easy to walk to and you can hook into multiple species there. If your a little west of downtown, Crystal Lake in Newton or the Brookline Reservoir are easy to fish as well, but you would need a short Uber ride to get there. Good luck.

Now that most of the bass in southern NH are done with the spawn, has anyone been catching them on deeper summer patterns yet?

I got after some largemouth on beds last week and managed a 4 pounder and this 6.6 pounder on a whopper plopper. It was over 21 inches long and had a mean belly! All of the beds I found were in 1-2 feet of water so it was pretty fun to hit them with a top water first for the aggressive ones, then picked off the finicky ones with a senko after. On Saturday I took a trip out on Lake Champlain with my buddy and despite multiple hours of heavy rain, we managed to get 7 solid bass each. Most fish were pre-spawn in the 7-14 foot range and we caught the bigger ones on tubes in current. The one pictured below is my new personal best smallmouth and weighed in at 4.1 pounds. If you ever get a chance to fish Champlain, I highly recommend it.

My 2nd (7.1 pounds) and 3rd (6.81 pounds) biggest largemouth in New Hampshire came from designated trout ponds. I would highly recommend giving it a shot, even though I am not sure about the rules for night fishing. Good luck!

Good to hear that they are on beds everywhere. I found a few good ones on beds yesterday and they wanted nothing to do with a green pumpkin senko, but were aggressively trying to push a black senko off of their beds. Ended up with one just under 4 pounds and lost a few others that were slightly larger.

Yesterday the water temp was 64-66 at a lake in southern NH and largemouth were on beds, so the spawn is on! I will be searching for big females after work today, which brings me to a question for everyone. Smallmouth will eat anything that touches their bed, but largemouth can be much tougher to entice. What are your go to baits for bed-fishing largemouth?

Over the next few weeks, it will be tough to beat the productivity of a jerkbait in NH! I purchased a few yo zuri suspending jerkbaits and the prism perch pattern and they look perfect in the water! Here is a link to them at Tackle Warehouse if anyone is interested. (http://www.tacklewarehouse.com/Yo-Zuri_3DB_Series_Jerkbait/descpage-YZ3J.html?from=Google&gclid=Cj0KCQjw8YXXBRDXARIsAMzsQuUfMbHgiL07rx48_2DIH93d2YkDatcG3nm0EP1mK2ipwHXJUB7WNhUaAigfEALw_wcB)

Wow! That would be a heck of a bag in a tourney. Just curious, were the fish all on deeper structure still?

Hey NH guys, It is still going to be a few more weeks, but the ponds and lakes in southern NH are beginning to open up. What are the first baits you guys plan to throw this spring when targeting icy-cold largemouth?

This weekend I cruised around on a small southern NH lake on my buddies boat and the water temp was 61. There are still a few more weeks of good fishing left before winter sets in!