Cant Catch Fish Without Plastic Baits On The Line.

[Tyson Holman]

I have been fishing for pretty much my entire life. I have spent hours studying bass fishing, much of that time has been on this site. Regardless of this, I still cannot manage to catch fish with anything other than a plasitc bait. The senko is my top bait, with plasitc lizards and worms right behind it. I have no problem catching fish on these baits. But for some reason I can not catch anything on any other lure, I try to use the right bait for the right situation but I sill can not manage to catch one. I am extremely frustrated.  So my question is, has anyone ever had similar problems? if so how did you get over it?

 

 

 

I appreciate your help

 

-Tyson

[einscodek]

If you cant stop catchin fish.. thats a tough problem to have..

Imo you are using the best lure category anyway but if you need some variety, you need to go on a few trips with just the lures you want to get used to fishin and force yourself to use them exclusively.

My guess is you toss them willy nilly haphazardly and quickly go back to yer tried and true plastics.

[Scott F]

Do you have any friends that are good fishermen? Friends that can catch fish on baits that aren't soft plastics? Take them out or go with them and see what they do and where they do it.  If you don't know anyone like that, join a fishing club. That's what being in a club can do for you.

[DBL000006]

A spinner bait is a great Lure to use. I actually prefer them over Crankbaits. You can throw a Spinner bait anywhere. Unlike a Crankbait, it'll get hung up. Sometimes that could be a good thing with a Crankbait. The Bass sees the crankbait getting hung up in weeds. The bass will strike it. It all depends on where your fishing your Crankbaits at. The depth, color of the water. 

[Fish Murderer 71]

I catch more quality bass with plastics than anything else I use.  I catch the largest bass in shallow water so I use a jerkbait with great confidence.  I've caught 100's of decent sized fish with a jig and the C-Rig.  I throw a crank bait just for fun - never caught anything that big with it yet but I do catch fish with it.

[livetofish28]

Get a KVD 1.5 in blue gill and a storm silent arashi in chartreuse craw. Find the nastiest stick/rock/whatever cover you have throw the bait past it and then crank them back through the cover smacking the bait off of the structure and hope for a reaction strike. Crankbaits are one of those baits that will produce well in lots of different situations you just have to commit to them for a trip or two. That's what I did to try to learn to fish the jig and now I have confidence in it. You just have to gain confidence in it and then once you do you will become an addict lol

Tight lines

Andrew

[A-Jay]

Perhaps it's all about perspective.

 

Seems you've managed to find out what works - you're done.

 

Welcome to "The Summer Pattern"

 

Congrats

 

A-Jay

[TNBassin']

Grab some red eye shad an yo yo that thing. It will catch fish.

[SPEEDBEAD.]

If you have a specific technique in mind, only equip yourself with those particular baits and FORCE yourself to fish them. It's tough fishing for a couple hours and not catching anything and it's really easy to pick up something you are comfortable with in order to catch a few fish to break the monotony.

 

Or you could just keep fishing plastic baits and getting bit. It's not a problem to be a one trick pony if that one trick is REALLY good.  

[Mswen]

I have been fishing for pretty much my entire life. I have spent hours studying bass fishing, much of that time has been on this site. Regardless of this, I still cannot manage to catch fish with anything other than a plasitc bait. The senko is my top bait, with plasitc lizards and worms right behind it. I have no problem catching fish on these baits. But for some reason I can not catch anything on any other lure, I try to use the right bait for the right situation but I sill can not manage to catch one. I am extremely frustrated.  So my question is, has anyone ever had similar problems? if so how did you get over it?

 

I actually had a similar problem.  But it was almost the opposite.  When I was really young the only things I used were live bait and crankbaits.  I tried jigs, spoons, and spinners, but I was fishing from shore and as soon as they got snagged, they were gone.  I couldn't even keep sinking crankbaits very long.  I've improved on all fronts, though on some (jigs) I still need work.  Like others have pointed out, soft plastics is a good category to have mastered.  As for others, only taking the baits you want to learn to use is a good suggestion.  Here are a few suggestions that I tried.  Let me know if they are helpful

 

Think about the similarities between what you know (soft plastics) and what you're trying to learn.  If you have success with soft jerkbaits, try a hard jerkbait in the same situation.  Use squarebills or spinnerbaits to explore the same brush where you might use a texas rig.  Mid or Deep diving crankbaits are good for exploring deep structure where you might also use a Carolina rig. 

 

It helps to build some confidence in your lures and tactics.  When I want to try something new, I got to a farm pond or to one lake in particular that is overflowing with 16" bass.  If a lure won't catch fish there, then it's probably not worth keeping it in my tackle box.  Just knowing that a lure has caught fish can make a difference when you're out on the lake.  Some of my "go to" confidence baits are Bandit 100 & 200s (300s to a lesser extent), and Berkley Flicker Shads, mainly because these two lures seem to catch just about anything that swims.  You can also add soft plastic trailers to spinnerbaits, buzzbaits, jigs, and chatterbaits if that helps.

 

Think about what you may be doing differently because you are used to fishing with plastics.  For instance, part of my problem with jigs and spoons is that I forget to pay attention to things like sink rate and to watch my line, and often by the time I am aware of a strike, the fish has spit the lure out, or I miss it altogether.  With hard baits you should change direction, add pauses and change speed.  A sudden sweep of the rod, a few fast cranks, or a series of twitches, followed by a pause, can often trigger a strike.  Remember that you don't want the fish to inspect the lure, you want them to grab it while they can.

[Tyson Holman]

I really appreciate all your help. I hear the swim bait can be very effective this time of year. Would you guys think a swim-bait a good choice to try to focus on? or should I start with something different? if so what is a good choice? 

[Sam]

Tyson, I have not read the above posts as I wanted to give you my input by being 100% objective.

 

There are three levels to the water column the bass can be in at any time of the day or night.

 

Top

Middle

Bottom

 

If you are catching them on the bottom with plastics then that is where they are the day and time and place you are fishing.

 

If you cannot get any bites on any "moving or hard" baits then they are not in those water columns.

 

The trick of bass fishing is for you to go hunting to find the pattern for that day and hour.  Once you find the pattern you fish it until it stops.

 

Then you try another bait in the three water columns to see what they have decided they want for their next meal or out of aggression.

 

So don't give up. Bring a few of a lot of baits and give them a try. Some will work while others will not.

 

That's bass fishing.

[papajoe222]

The biggest problem I had was overcomming the transition from live bait to hard baits.  Your situation sounds very similar.  Sam makes avery good point about the fish's location in the water column. The point I'd like to make concerns the presentation of hard baits vs. that of soft plastics.  That presentation revolves around both the fish's location AND their activity level.

Many soft plastic presentations are slow, deliberate, accurate ones and those will catch both active and inactive fish.

Hard baits are designed to be fished faster and as such appeal to active fish or as reaction baits eliciting strikes from neutral or inactive fish.

If you're catching active fish with your soft plastics, it's a good indication you can switch to a faster, hard bait presentation and not only continue to catch, but likely increase their number as you can cover more water faster with them.

You can tell the activity level of the fish you're catching by observing where and how you're getting bites. Inactive and neutral fish have a very small strike zone, so they won't move far to get to your soft plastic. Also your bites aren't as profound from neutral fish. Often you won't feel the bite, or it's very subtle.  Deeper hooked fish, fish that come out of cover to bite, or fish that take the bait and run with it are indications of active fish. Build your confidence in hard baits on active fish and you'll be finding yourself finding ways to catch inactive fish on them.

[WRB]

Do you find catching bass boring?

You are using soft plastics that appeal to bass the majority of the time, that is why they work so good.

Faster moving lures appeal to active feeding bass. Next you are out and catching bass on soft plastics, try a lipless crankbait, very high percentage faster moving lure. If you see surface feeding activity try a surface lure where you observed feeding activity. Otherwise enjoy catching bass on soft plastics.

Tom

[Catt]

After carefully considering the whole scenario I fail to see a problem!

First off you've mastered one of the most difficult techniques, for that I applaud you.

I'd bet 60% of this site can not consistently catch bass on a Texas Rig.

Secondly as we transition from post spawn into summer the spinner/crank bait bite drops off while the bottom techniques pickup. Re-read what Sam eluded to "Top, Middle, & Bottom.

As for the other lures, it'll come to ya!

[shawnFL]

Very interesting. I was catching so well off senkos and other plastics that I stopped using them for the sake of progression. Lately I've found that poppers at sunset have provided some of the best fishing I've had since the start of this year. Of course the hula popper can't catch me a fish for the life of me, but taking advice from guys here, it's not outrageous that your bait isn't on the menu that day. After much patience and often times frustration, I feel like fishing with hard baits is more rewarding and requires finer practice.

[The Fisher]

I had the same problem. I was catching exclusively on wacky and weightless senkos and all kinds of TRigs with worms and baby brush hogs. I then learned to fish jigs (plastic trailer) which are close to TRigs for me. Then I started to use some plastic swim baits like flukes, Keitech swing impact, Storm wildeye swim shad, etc. My buddy was using a Storm Chug Bug so I started using one at sunset and learned topwaters are a lot of fun. Another buddy was using a rooster tail so I tried that with some success and now I'm trying spinner baits and crankbaits with really no success. But I'm not giving up. I agree with previous posters to learn from others and go out with only the bait you want to learn.