Jigging Spoons

[KevO]

Anyone got any tips or tricks for this type of fishing? I've had some success fishing with 1/2-3/4 oz spoons and baits like the silver buddy. A lot of the tournaments around here are won fishing this way in the winter months and I'd like to get better. Also what type of setup are you fishing them on. I've been throwing the 1/2 oz baits on a 7 MH crucial/ chronarch 50mg w/ 10 flouro.

[WRB]

If your structure spoons have treble hooks you may want to consider using a crankbait rod. 10# FC may be a little light for structure spoons, 14 # will save you a lot of lures and not miss any strikes.

My experience with structure spoons is with bass feeding on threadfin shad schools. Watch for birds feeding on shad, like grebes and use your sonar to locate the shad school size and depth. Your spoon should be about the same size and color as the baitfish. I would start with a 3/4 oz chrome or white cripple hearing or Kastmaster and change the hook to #2 chrome Owner treble hook with white or chartreuse chicken feathers.

You can make a lob cast the distance the equals the depth of the bait fish or a few feet deeper, engage the reel and let the spoon fall on controlled slack until it stops (set the hook) or is straight down. When the spoon is straight down you can jig it up about 3' and let it fall down through the bait fish a few times, then repete the lob cast etc, etc. A variation is make the same lob cast and let the spoon free fall to the depth of the bait fish and jig the spoon back through the suspended bait fish, this takes a lot of practice, but you cover more water.

The hook set is a lift and reel motion, keeping the line tight all the time to help prevent the bass from shaking off.

If you are tournament fishing and putting the bass in a livewell, learn to fizz the bass, if they are deeper than 35'.

Good luck

Tom

[KevO]

Thanks for the reply. Most of the spooning I will be doing will be at dale hollow when the smallies suspend over the grass humps. I will definitely bump up the # test on my line. I thought it was a little to light myself. As for the fizzing I know how to do that, but I lost my needle so I will have to buy another one soon.

[WRB]

Thanks for the reply. Most of the spooning I will be doing will be at dale hollow when the smallies suspend over the grass humps. I will definitely bump up the # test on my line. I thought it was a little to light myself. As for the fizzing I know how to do that, but I lost my needle so I will have to buy another one soon.

Smallies are less susceptible to over inflated air ladders then LMB, don,t fizz them unless they can't keep upright! I am not a fan of fizzing, it definitely harms the bass and is the reason I will not intentionally target basses deeper than 40'.

Tom

[KevO]

Most of time 35' is the deepest I need to fish. In the fall/winter 30' is about as deep as I need to fish, depending on the conditions.

[Glenn]

Here ya go!

http://www.bassresource.com/fish/jiggingspoons.html

http://www.bassresource.com/fishing/jigging_spoon_fishing.html

http://www.bassresource.com/mike-iaconelli-fishing/small-spoons-bass.html

[WRB]

If you are fishing vertical on 30 to 35' and the bass are holding on the baitfish, you can meter them, try the Rapala Ice jig. You work this jig like a spoon or silver buddy, you swim it in circles by lifting the rod tip, not jerking it and lower the rod tip with controlled slack....deadly.

Tom

[KevO]

Thanks for the tips and those articles!

[WRB]

My favorite structure spoon is Megabait Luna jig spoon, great colors and action.

The 3/4 pz black shad and chartreuse shad are both good and I add Owner size 2 feathered treble hooks. Wards Champ spoon is similar to a Kastmaster, wider with more flutter action. Lurh Jensens Crippled Hearing falls faster than the others and is good when the bass are deeper then 30'. There are several others, these are enough to get anyone into structure spooning.

Tom

[Crappiebasser]

I like finding fish and then moving past them casting back to the school. I jig and reel the bait back. I catch more than vertically jigging. I do foul hook a lot though. My favorite spoon is the Cabela's Real Image glow spoon with a feathered treble hook.

[BobP]

I catch bass as deep as 55' on 3/4 oz spoons. It's a vertical presentation that depends on your sonar. I also like the Cabelas Real Image spoon in glow white with a flashaboo or feathered treble but lately, I've been buying unpainted 3/4oz spoons from lurepartsonline.com that resemble the Cabelas model and painting them with Glonation acrylic white glow paint. I put on 3 thick coats of glow paint and topcoat them with moisture cured urethane for durability. Glow paint brightness depends on the number of glow particles it contains and doing them yourself, you can make a spoon that you can almost use as a night light. When it's dark down deep a glow spoon will wear'em out. I use the same spoons to fish for stripers, casting it into surface feeding schools.

[merc1997]

here are some tips that work on table rock. in the earlier part of the fall, bass here relate a lot to the creek bottoms, and most often will be bottom related. when these bass are 35 feet or shallower, we catch more bass casting and working the spoon back across the bottom. another pattern is flipping shad schools. bass will be suspended underneath these schools of flipping shad. a flutter spoon is usually a better choice for these bass instead of a jigging spoon. however on any given day one might produce better than the other. when fishing the flipping shad, cast the spoon right into the middle of the school. let spoon fall a few feet and then pop it up and let it fall back through the school. do not reel in the slack, but keep working the spoon deeper through the school. when spoon reaches 25 feet or bottom work it back to boat and repeat.

when the bass here begin to get 30 feet or deeper, they tend to start suspending following the bait fish schools. when they get in this mode, which usually starts around 58 degrees, we try to stay right on top of them and fish vertically. believe me this as a game of chase because when they get on a school of shad, they are like a pack of dogs, and they run those shad silly. you will spend a lot of time idling around trying to catch back up with them, stay on them long enough to catch a dozen, and then fire the big motor back up and start circling around to find them again. this spoon pattern will usually work down to about 49 degree surf temp.

here on table rock once the temps get to around 54 surf temp, there is a great deal of the lake that all the bait fish and bass are 50 feet deep or deeper. lots of stretches they are 70 to 80 feet.

hope some of these tactics might be applied to your tennesse waters.

bo

[KevO]

Thanks, I think it will help a lot. Dale Hollow and Table Rock probably fish really similar.