Spinnerbait Success...sorta

[logan9209]

Okay, I'm gonna keep this short if possible since most of you have seen my other posts. Today, I took my spinnerbait for a swim. The skirt has white with a few strands of black and white in it. It had a rear willow blade and a front colorado blade. Not sure of the size (2"). It is a quarter ounce.

The first trip I went around from north to east and to south east (on the eastern side of the "pinky finger"). I had 3 strikes and landed 1 bass. The bass was also my third strike which tells me he really wanted it. I learned a lesson: trailer hooks are your best friend. The first 2 strikes I was lucky enough to see my spinnerbait get knocked sideways. The second strike was a warmouth (rock bass).

The second trip was to the "thumb". After landing the 1 bass, 2#, my spinnerbait felt like it bogged down by some weeds. Next thing I know I'm reeling in a bass, but because my brain didn't react quick enough to set the hook, he flipped off despite the trailer hook. The third spot was in the first "finger" (west side). Nothing doing.

The important thing about today is that my confidence in spinnerbaits has shot through the roof. Thank you everyone who has steadily encouraged me over the past week to use a spinnerbait. Here's the map of my lake again. Blue is the wind direction, yellow is off limits, orange is the places I got strikes with no hook ups, and red is where I got hook up and did or did not land it.

[BamaBassChaser]

At least now you have something to work with. Start trying different colors, sizes and blade styles. If your lake is heavily fished I would try something really small like a Booyah Pond Magic spinnerbait or buzzbait.

[Jake P]

The trailer hook is the real deal. If im not fishing in heavy cover i use one 100% of the time. If im throwing in some thick crap i will sometimes at a small trailer or run with nothing at all. Like Bama said, change it up. If your getting strikes but not hooking up, slow your retrieve a little and see if that makes a difference. Make your jerks more erratic or delay an extra 2 to 3 seconds between them.

Good luck and keep at it! A spinnerbait can be extremely effective when you learn what works in what conditions. It is my favorite way to catch a bass.

[Kyle Mahaffey]

At least now you have something to work with. Start trying different colors, sizes and blade styles. If your lake is heavily fished I would try something really small like a Booyah Pond Magic spinnerbait or buzzbait.

I use Booyah Pond Magic and Strike King has one too, just not sure of the name. You got too here in the DC area. Also you can try reeling it in and just stop and let it sink a little. Saw in on the Bass Pros show. Mimics an injuried baitfish.

[smalljaw67]

What happened to you is what I call short striking and there are ways to get them to hit for real. First thing you need to know is you are on the right presentation, it has the fish excited and ready to commit but something is off. Usually the something that is off is either the color or the size, sometimes it is both so when that happens using a 1/4oz bait I would have changed colors first, nothing big just maybe a silver blade instead of gold or vic versa. That kind of strike is why I like to used banded skirts, most prefer a skirt be tied on with thread or wire but I like the band simply because when you get short strikers you can bring the bait in and pull the skirt off and put a new color on and it is like a different bait without retying. If you change colors and you still get short strikes then you need to change size, most of the time it means going smaller but if I'm using a 1/4oz bait I'll go up to a 3/8oz and try that out. Finally, the last trick that will help is the retrieve speed, you can sometimes make them commit by speeding up the bait like you are trying to take it away from them, this approach will often draw violent hits as a result and because of all the different factors involved with fishing spinnerbaits, it remains as my favorite bait of all of them

[Jigfishn10]

You were on them that's for sure. I'm with smalljaw, sometimes just a slight adhustment with spinnerbaits is all it takes. I usually speed my retrieve up on short strikers and if that doesn't work I switch the blades. It may be a gold for a nickel or vice versa or I may drop down a size or upsize the blade. One of those variations usually will get them to strike.

[logan9209]

I do agree with smalljaw and jigfishin, but I am also positive that even with short strikes if I had a trailer hook on the first three then I might have gotten 2 outta 3. I say 2 outta 3 because the warmouth (rockbass) mouth is a little too small to get around the hook. I've seen it attack the spinnerbait one time when i just let it fall to the bottom all of a sudden. poor guy tried for about 5 minutes and then he gave up.

Oh, I forgot to mention that I tried 2 types of retrieve. I used a straight medium retrieve (1 full turn a sec roughly). I also tried same retrieve but every so many turns I would stop reeling and bounce the rod tip a couple of times. The very first bass on a spinnerbait a month back was caught on the second technique. Yesterday's they were hitting on the first.

If I could just figure out why the were hitting in some spots and not others. I partially think that they were hitting on the eastern bank because the wind was blowing a surface current into it from the WNW. But the one I almost got in the "thumb" breaks that rule and I got him from the east.