Search the Community

Hey Guys and Gals, I was out fishing the last few days and saw something I haven't seen before. I have a good idea of the patterns of bass when they spawn. I live in central Indiana and the spawn has just started really. While I was out bed fishing at my local ponds, I saw something weird that I personally haven't ever seen before. While working on a bed fish, I would notice that the fish would leave the bed for a minute or so and go into the grass line. Which in my eyes is normal. The thing that was weird was the same fish would go to multiple beds and stay there for a few minutes then head off to another bed. Has anyone ever heard of bass having more than one bed? If you have any ideas on why they would do this please let me know, i'm curious.

With the spawn coming upon most of the country and with it full swing and almost over in Flroida, this is a HUGE topic on a lot of angler's minds. It's always been a huge debate in bass fishing in ethical terms: bed fishing. Many are against it, thinking it hurts future bass population, but a recent study conducted by Florida Wildlife Commision (FWC) answered this dilemma. This past February at the Bassmaster Southern Open's captain meeting, FWC showed the results from an AMZING study. Every variable was perfectly covered. In summation, they studied spawning bass in multiple regulated ponds. They knew the exact amount, size, and length of every bass in them as well as being tagged. During the spawn they would troll and even snorkel/dive to find beds and investigate the spawning behavior of all the bass. In half of the ponds, they measured the amount of bass that spawned and the amount of offspring after one year. They did the same with the other half of the ponds but all of the beds were fished. They caught every bass that would bite. From what I remember, I believe they caught 1/4 of all the spawning females as well as a certain larger amount of males. All caught fish were immediately returned after data was taken. In the end, the ponds that were fished put out MORE offspring. They were even able to tell exactly what parents made each bass and what bed they came from due to the magic of genetics. This is only one controlled study and I'm sure there will be more to come. Also, it can be taken into consideration that these were Florida Strain Largemouth and the bass were released back to the same area as the bed they came off of as soon as statistics were taken of the fish. So there is reason to speculate other strains and species may have a different turnout as well as keeping a fish in the live well may cause a different result. What can be taken from his study however is that fishing for spawning fish may not be as bad for the species prolification as we may seem to believe. Something to take into consideration next time you're staring at a double-digit!

Here in central Florida the spawn is in full swing. Caught a handful of 4-6 pound class females and a ton of bucks. Spotted a giant in the 8-9 pound class range and gave it to my buddy to catch. Surprised I haven't seen any more Giants. Noticed that the majority liked to spawn shallower than usual. Caught all of mine lately on the Gambler Burner Craw. I fish mostly ponds and on the lakes I've noticed the spawn is mostly done with a couple stragglers although they do spawn all the way through August in certain places and can start as early as October on Okeechhobee. West Lake Toho had an exceptional spawn this year with a lot of big girls caught and all were insanely aggressive. Heard from pro "Big Show" Scroggins during practice for the Southern Open on West Lake that they were spawning so shallow you could cast on the bank, drag it in an inch and they would beach themselves to get it. How's yalls spawn doing?