Best And Worst (Hardest) State To Fish?

[Montanaro]

Rhode Island would probably be pretty terrible

[MassBass]

Ive heard it on tv that "If you can catch fish in Connecticut, you can catch fish anywhere". Of course that state does have the striper migration that passes by, but catching that gamefish is usually not as easy as one may think. 

[RSM789]

For me, the best bass fishing has been in Texas (with Florida a close second).

 

The worse would have to be Alaska.  It is so tough, it makes you wonder if there are any bass in the entire state...

[Scott F]

My favorite state to bass fish in is Wisconsin. It may not be the "best" because the lakes are frozen 6 months out of the year and the bass don't get to double digit weights, but there are a HUGE number of lakes, high numbers of fish and very little pressure. Plus, there are smallmouth and largemouth. If you are looking for easy pickings, Wisconsin is it.

[IDUTBass]

Northen Utah can be pretty tough for bass, lakes are over fished and people will take out big femails like its nothing they dont care. Plus the northern park of the state seems to be only interested in garbage trout, they wont put any money into warm water hatcherys, good thing idaho is only about an hour and half away, way better fishing and not nearly as many people.

I am the same way. I don't even buy a Utah license anymore unless I'm going to Sand Hollow or Lake Powell. I used to fish Mantua and Hyrum but your constantly fighting people. I just pay the 90+ dollars and drive to Idaho to go. Most the time I have the whole lake to myself.

[Ozark_Basser]

Delaware Flat out SUCKS.

But what about that dude on the Bass College (I think it's called that) on Youtube?  He tears it up in Delaware. 

[greentrout]

Let me put in a good word for the great state of Mississippi. In the northern part of the state crappie fishing is great along with bass fishing. Move down south a bit and you still have great crappie fishing with bass caught in the mid teens. You like the rugged outdoors style of fishing? Places like Black Creek that wind through a national forest giving the fishermen opportunities for Crappie, LMB, Spotted Bass, Catfish and Red Bellies while seeing deer on the banks and winding through a path of breath taking nature are common.

 

Go further South to the coast and bassers are fishing in brackish water in the coastal waters while their salt water brethren are wading for Specks and Reds all up and down the coast. Of course, deep sea fishing provides guides with a nice living.

 

Just a small sample.

 

Old school basser

[F14A-B]

My favorite state to bass fish in is Wisconsin. It may not be the "best" because the lakes are frozen 6 months out of the year and the bass don't get to double digit weights, but there are a HUGE number of lakes, high numbers of fish and very little pressure. Plus, there are smallmouth and largemouth. If you are looking for easy pickings, Wisconsin is it.

Never fished there, but it's some of the most beautiful country I've ever seen.. Been in and around greenbay a few times! Very cool farms & silo's...

[Bluebasser86]

Anyone ever taken a fishing vacation to go to Kansas???   

 

We have blistering hot summers, sub zero temps in winter, a full days drive from the closest ocean, very limited fish species to pursue, limited bodies of water to fish and almost all the good ones are heavily pressured, and the state couldn't care less about bass anglers. We may not be the worse, but KS has to be close. 

 

Best I would probably go with Texas. Lots of huge lakes along with smaller bodies of water, all capable of producing monster bass. It gets hot but it never gets really cold so I'll take that trade off. Tons of saltwater fishing opportunities, not to mention lakes with great crappie, stripers, catfish, and monster alligator gar. 

[wisconsin heat]

My favorite state to bass fish in is Wisconsin. It may not be the "best" because the lakes are frozen 6 months out of the year and the bass don't get to double digit weights, but there are a HUGE number of lakes, high numbers of fish and very little pressure. Plus, there are smallmouth and largemouth. If you are looking for easy pickings, Wisconsin is it.

Wisconsin can be tough though. I agree that there are a lot of lakes and little pressured ones at that. Central Wisconsin isn't the greatest, southern wisonsin lakes seem to produce more bigger fish and up north there are a ridiculous amount of small lakes to fish.Unfortunately for me I do not live in that part of the state. Another thing is lack of shore access, dense woods and brush up to the shore make it impossible to walk and cast along the shores. Also a few lakes around my area are having stunted growth problems :/ . If you can find the smallmouth though, that is crazy fun. 

Also, because bass fishing starts in May and they pretty much shut off in late September there is only about 5 months to fish.

[massrob]

I don't know if Massachusetts is bad or good I've never fished anywhere but some ponds around my house and the charles river next to my doctors office. But in my first season of fishing I caught 6 fish over 5lbs I don't know if I'm just lucky or if I kinda know what I'm doing. I am so happy that I started fishing it's the best decision I've ever made. If anyone knows any good places to go in Massachusetts let me know cuz I'm going everywhere next season. I can't wait to get a kayak so I can get on the water.

[Lund Explorer]

Best - Home

 

Hardest - Everywhere Else!

[Zach Dunham]

Fishing seems to be the toughest overall on a certain "parallel" going across the US. New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Delaware, Ohio (if you take the lakes in the state and exclude the Lake Erie shore), Indiana, Illinois (again excluding Lake Michigan), Iowa, Nebraska, Dakotas, etc. If you go further north into New York and the general New England area, you get massive numbers of smallmouth and even bigger largemouth than in the areas I mentioned. Same goes for the Great Lakes. If you go further south you get much better largemouth fishing.

 

This is all just my opinion based on observation and I do not have statistics to go with it.

[bighed]

Down home gets my vote for best.  Can't swing a dead cat around without hitting great bass lakes.  Ok, a long tailed cat, because EVERYTHING in TX is far away!  Something like 900 miles the long way across.  Not sure about worse, caught bass everywhere I've tried    

[CarolinaBoy4Life]

I know plenty of people that kill it up north. They catch multiple 5lber's and up during the year. That's in MA, NY, PA. There are some good sticks up that way that can really get on em. The problem is it takes time to learn the area and the movements and locations of big fish. These guy's go after only big fish with big baits. NC is a good state to fish in. Not too much pressure, alot of lakes, and the chance to catch a DD is real. We have some TOADS swimming around. But I'd go California, TX, FL as the top three

[Slefler]

I like Texas lol, can't say I've had worse anywhere else seein as how the only other state I've fished in was Mississippi which was a phenomenal crappie trip.

[FunkJishing]

Rhode Island would probably be pretty terrible

RI is great actually haha there's access to both fresh and saltwater and you can catch HUGE lmb and HUGE stripers. the water isn't as clear as maine's water (where i live now). and as far as maine goes it's an all aroung great fishery. all the waters are really clear, if you want cold water species fish northern maine. Warmwater species go southern maine.

[OntarioFishingGuy]

Not a state, but the fishing up here in Ontario is much better than it is given credit for. Good LMB fishing, some of the best SMB fishing around, arguably the best muskie fishing on the planet, tons of panfish, and great walleye as well. Huge carp are also a blast on light tackle.

[RMcDuffee726]

New Hampshire and New Hampshire...Live Free or Die baby!!!!!

[Angry John]

Connecticut is great water and i have fished almost half the state on the east side.  The rivers are good for SMB and LMB and the lakes were decent.  I was reborn a fisherman i this state so i may be a little jaded.  I now live in washington state next to the puget sound and its very rough.  This is the hardest place to figure them out and i have never found a pattern here yet.  NY was much easier for me!

[ww2farmer]

I am biased to NY. We might not have many bass over 8lbs, but we have unreal amounts of 3-5lb fish...........both LM and SM. And you can catch them any way you want. Deep, shallow, grass, rock, wood, boat docks, big lakes, small lakes, rivers, streams, ponds, etc.....Plus we have other species that often cooperate when the bass don't...........but they have teeth LOL.

 

The only other state I have fished in was Florida, and I have caught fish there too, so I don't have a "worst"

[EmersonFish]

You are definitely right there, down south has some great fishing around st george and lake powell, to bad its about 5-6 hour drive for us northern guys.

I did some lengthy survey on line years ago that was supposed to tell me the best place in America for me to live based on my lifestyle, interests, climate preferences, etc... Every city on the list that came up was in the southeast except for #1, which was St. George, Utah. Kind of caught me by surprise, but as I looked into it, it started to make sense.

[EmersonFish]

If I wasn't married with kids, I'd had moved to East/Southeast Texas by now. So many great bass fishing lakes and easy access to the Gulf. I'm in Missouri, where we have some pretty good bass fisheries; but everybody and their brother, and his cousin, and their nephews, and everybody else, knows about them, and owns a bass boat.

[DILLY07]

I love fishing in Iowa. I always catch fish no matter what. I've fished in the Lake of the Ozarks, Wisconsin. Not bad places. 

 

Seeing people fishing from Alabama, Texas, Florida, California, Georgia. They all hold big bass. 

[BasshunterJGH]

Northen Utah can be pretty tough for bass, lakes are over fished and people will take out big femails like its nothing they dont care. Plus the northern park of the state seems to be only interested in garbage trout, they wont put any money into warm water hatcherys, good thing idaho is only about an hour and half away, way better fishing and not nearly as many people.

Isn't the vernal area pretty good fishing? I heard flaming gorge and pelican lake are good. I guess that's still pretty far away from u though.