Uknowjusticemill

For spring and summer I throw a lot of creature baits like Yum crawbugs, lizard creature baits, senkos cut into ned rigs and swim shads or rapalas. For fall I switch to more aggressive swim baits, spinners, and big worms. Winter is the time I use live bait the most since I have very little luck catching bass in the winter without some kind of live bait like shad, shiners, crawfish, or nightcrawlers pumped with air on a weedless hook (work it slow) let the worm do most of the action itself. I fish clear water fast moving rivers though, for small lakes and ponds I would look above for better options.

This had always been my perspective, I've always done much better on live bait then I do on lures most likely because I'm not good at using lures to their max potential, it's like a 5 - 1 ratio with live bait winning for me. Plus I get a kick out of catching bait and then catching fish two for 1 special.

I catch all my live bait with either traps or dip nets (cast netting where legal) so price is not something I usually consider, I have a live bait bucket that I strap to my kayak and keep dipped in the water so it's always oxygenated. Mortality rates are an issue and that's why I mostly only use live bait for Stripped Bass, Catfish, Crappie, or Sturgeon, but I will use crawfish for bass since it takes them much longer to eat crawfish and I've never gut hooked a bass with live crawfish.

I hear the smallmouth tear those things up like candy, where do you get something like that a good bait shop or do you have to catch or trap them?

I know some people get all up in their feelings about people using live bait to catch bass, but to me it's just as fun and still takes a level of skill to pull off because you have to find and catch your bait, then find and catch your fish. I do like lure fishing even though I get less bites because when I do land a fish on a lure I get more satisfaction because I suck at throwing lures, whats yalls favorite live bait for bass for me personally it's live Gizzard Shad but minnows and shiners work just as well, and DONT FORGET live crawfish they are harder to get and I receive less bites but the few I do get are quality fish.

The dinks seem to be a mix of both, I catch SMB and LMB in the backwaters but it seems like SMB are the more common bass species, because the waters so clear I see lots of fish I don't end up catching and the the ratio is like 4 SMB to every 1 LMB.

To give advice I would need alittle more information, are you fishing a lake or river, is it a large lake or a smaller lake, does it have a lot of bank access to walk and cast the bank or is the bank mostly trecherous terrain. If you could explain the lake to me I could give you a few tips for where to look and what baits might help you to start out and get those first bass catches.

I've went fishing the last two days and I've been fishing the main river drifting the bank throwing some creature baits and worms at current seems that have steep drop offs or bottom changes like sand to rock gravel or flipping near docks that have bamboo walls. I've been throwing these Yum Crawbug in the green pumpkin texas red color and I caught a 12 and 14 inch smallmouth yesterday and lost the biggest fish because he dragged me into some pilings. Since its spring the crawfish will be starting to come out spring/summer so I'm throwing this crawbug on a ned like jighead that keep the crawfish floating upwards with his claws in a defensive position and I've done much better, the smallmouth don't act much different than Stripped Bass except they don't school up like Stripers.

Backwaters that are still water that's fed by the river with mats and bamboo, the bass here swim multiple feet into the mats and bamboo cover where there rock beds aswell.

Used to troll these 8 inch broken backs for Stripped Bass, the didn't cast well but when trolling they had a unique action and the stripers would just smash it, I used it on slow days to locate fish some days I caught 2 others 20. The days I caught less fish were usually the days I caught the bigger or biggest ones, when you run through a school of stripers you get a lot of bites but from the 16-25 inch range, every once in awhile I would get a 10 lb but mostly schooly size fish. Most the big stripers I caught were on live bait like Gizzard Shad or Bluegill, caught my biggest largemouth on a live gizzard shad maybe 6 inch long while drifting the bank for stripers, never had much luck catching stripers or bass on casting lures.

I understand the difficulty of fishing in a kayak while being pushed around, I kayak fish rivers and the current mixed with wind can make it a nightmare to stay steady and fish, most the time I get one chance to cast a spot as I drift before I'm 30 feet downriver and cannot hit the spot with another cast, under these conditions I find some backwaters to shelter from the wind.

I'm fishing the Colorado river which has both LMB and SMB, I've only really fished for Striped Bass, Catfish and Sturgeon in another state so bass fishing here is newish to me, the water is really clear and and has decent flowing current I like to kayak upriver and find backwaters to fish, 1 because it's easier to kayak fish in the slower or even still water than on the main river where currents make things difficult. But I also see more bass in these locations, the main river is mostly river rock bottom with weeds growing along the bank and algae on the bottom in the middle of the river. Most of the backwaters I find are small channels maybe 25 feet wide with weeds and bamboo everywhere, I see and catch more fish in these spots but they are mostly 8-12 Inches and no bigger, every time I've fished the main river I've been skunked except for 1 time I used live crawfish and caught a 3Lb smallmouth, so to me it seems the bigger fish are in the main river and the smaller bass seem to be tucked in back waters can anyone confirm or provide me with their experiences. To follow up, which baits are good in these types of situations I've used most robo worms weightless with a weedless hook, or small swim shads. I have some Rapala jerkbaits which I use from time to time but same issue only dinks. I've caught largemouth up to 6Lbs back home on accident while fishing large live shad or bluegill for stripped bass or catfish. I have some senko's but don't know how to use them besides wacky rig, but I avoid these bigger stickbaits because I only find smaller bass and they can't get it in their mouth all the way I miss too many bites, I have some plastic craws I wanna try since I caught a 3Lbs on a live crawfish last week.