Small personal pontoon boat bass fishing

[Daniel Langel]

Hi there i am fairly new to the site but absolutely love it there is just so much information here it's amazing! So I recently got a small personal pontoon boat and it's awesome so much better than trying to fish from shore! It's nothing fancy but it works! So I am having some serious problems finding bass with it. It very different than trying to fish from a normal boat where you can stand up. You can sight fish but with the pontoon it's not that easy.. I have an anchor for it and I find it so much easier when I drop anchor otherwise I get blown all over the lake.. I live in like 30mins south of Seattle and there are bunches of small lakes in the area that have great bass but feel like my fishing sucks cause I have boat now and haven't caught a bloody thing.. I been bass fishing as long as I can remember it's the only kind of fishing I know.. Anyone out there have any tips or suggestions on fishing from a pontoon boat? Here's a picture of my boat. Thanks for any help or suggestions!

[Scott F]

I too have a personal pontoon. I use mine 99% of the time on rivers though.  In shallow water, I just put my feet on the bottom to hold myself in place or I just stand up. While not shown in this picture, I use a depth finder also.

 One thing I don't like about the Classic Accessories boat that you have is that the foot pegs are so close together, I don't see how you get in the boat. I also lead the fish I catch between my legs. With almost no gap there, it must be hard to land fish. I'd take the rubber grips off and cut back the foot pegs.

Other than that, I fish the same places I'd fish out of any other boat. I seldom sight fish even when in my regular boat. Usually, If I can see the fish, they can see me so I try and cast to other targets. The pontoon should make very little difference in your fishing

[A-Jay]

Hello and Welcome to Bass Resource ~

Keep Casting.

A-Jay

[Darren.]

Welcome aboard!

I fish from a kayak and I look for things
like downed trees, stump fields, bushes
in the water, grassy areas and so on.

Look for points on the land as they'll
continue from dry land into water. Bass
often congregate on points.

What kind of things are you fishing? Hard
lures? Soft plastics?

[Daniel Langel]

I use to be all about crank baits and spinnerbaits... That's all we use to use growing up but now you have all these fancy things!! Lol! My eyes have been opened up to senkos and various different creatures.. I usually weightless Texas rig the senkos or creatures.. Or sometimes I'll wacky rig the senkos but there is usually to much cover i.e. Downed trees or pads for that.. I have also been told about swim jigs and chatter baits and have a few of each but all of my success was on weightless Texas rig senkos or creatures thrown in pads. I don't have any electronics money's a bit tight for that... I don't even have a electric trolling motor yet.. I know it's post spawn right now females are in recovery mode while the males are taking care of the fry.. Maybe I'm not throwing the right stuff and they are just really picky right now.. 

[Roger, The Smiling BassHole]

Hey Daniel!

Welcome to the site!

I fish from a Hobie Float Cat 75. I'll try to put a photo on, but sometimes I have issues doing the photos here!

I can also be challenged to find where the fish are. I just recently acquired a FishHunter. It's a portable fish finder that sells for $250. I haven't completely mastered it yet, but it does find fish, but then I can't seem to catch them! I'm not sure if they could be small bait fish, but that should mean bass anyway.

One of my favorite places to fish has a lot of weed growth at the end opposite of the put in (of course!). I love to go right up to those weeds, and throw a frog, Wiggle Wog, or Weed Demon in the weeds, and then let it sit, sit, sit, sit, TWITCH, and bam, there's a bass. Not every time, sure, but often enough to keep me interested!

I also love to throw spinnerbaits through the vegetation, and get hits that way too.

I used to fish worms a lot, but haven't done those as much.

I understand about the wind. One day the wind was blowing 13 mph (which is described as a light breeze), which was enough to keep me from being able to move forward against the wind! I just let the wind blow me back to shore.

Hope you have some great fishing adventures ahead! Maybe the winds will die down later in the summer.

[fishnkamp]

Anchors are great, but do a search on youtube for shallow water anchors. There are several videos on hot to use an anchoring pole with kayaks and could easily adapted to your application.  They can be easily and cheaply made by going to the Max Gain's website. There you will see some how to videos and Max gain sells the parts to build your own setup.  i would think one two piece 6 or 8 footer should work and disassembled  could easily lash down to the pontoons with bungee straps or something.  Dropping an anchor in shallow cover may hold the boat but spook your fish.    

[Roger, The Smiling BassHole]

On June 23, 2016 at 3:31 PM, fishnkamp said:

They can be easily and cheaply made by going to the Max Gain's website.  

@fishnkamp

How do I find Max Gain's website?

[fishnkamp]

Here you go http://www.mgs4u.com/shallow-water-boat-anchors.htm  I had purchased a used DigIn anchor Pole used from a friend. Thursday I ordered the three pieces to modify mine. oday they arrived by USPS  for just $6 shipping. The quality of the pieces is gorgeous, very nicely machined. I can not wait to finish this up so they will fit in my rod locker.

 I will cut the 12 foot long pole in half, install the two pieces to make them work like a pole cue and I will cut off the solid pointed tip so I can install their metal tip. I intend to modify the tip first just in case I run into trouble. I do not expect to thou.  

[Roger, The Smiling BassHole]

Thanks, Fishnkamp!

[John Lea]

I have an old Scadden that I just retired since there is a slow leak in one of the tubes and I don't have the energy to find/fix it.

I put a trolling motor on the front since I found it uncomfortabe to have it behind me and only use the oars at launch and recovery.  I also raised the seat but that was because I am a poor at casting with a fly rod.  I don't know if the added height is actually needed with the casting rods I use now.  I see fish but see more from a higher boat.

Raising the seat makes it a pain to row though (knees) and I plan to put it back down if I resurrect the thing as a rowboat.    I also put a fish finder on it but I did not change my approach of casting to the bank so it made no sense to deal with it. 

I toyed with adding a removeable keel to deal with the wind but found that by leaving the oars in the water it reduced the effects of the wind.  Thinking back I should have done the keel since leaving them in the water means they actually change position and need to be repositionned but if I did not leave them in, I would spin like a top with the motor and wind.

It has an anchor system but I never use it.  Instead I use one of those orange plastic lip grippers on a cord to latch on to brush or rushes if I want to hold a position

Edited July 7, 2016 by John Lea
Added brush clip