Summer to Fall Transition on a Small Lake Full Of Shad

[iceintheveins]

One of my lakes is chock full of shad, and this years spawnlings are 2 to 3" long. Bass are still in their summer patterns, grass and weeds are still green, air temps still over 60 at night and 85 to 95 during the day. But the bass have lockjaw. I am thinking because there are so many shad. Most of the shad seem to be in the shallower coves around the grass early in the morning. The only other cover is a little rip rap and a couple brushpiles besides all the grass near the mouths of the coves and the thick matted weeds in 2 to 5 feet of water. Lately only frogging has worked well but even that has been slow. Any other ideas for presentations or patterns? It closes to boating October 1st for the season to protect migrating waterfowl, so I only have about 3 weeks left to fish it. So when it closes they will only be in transition, not full on fall patterns.

[Bluebasser86]

In the lakes I fish, you have to find the bigger shad to find the bass worth catching. There will be tons of dinks around those little shad that are gorging and difficult to catch, but the bigger fish will be hanging around the shad that made all those little shad. 

 

If you do fish around those little shad, you have 2 choices. You can either try to match the hatch as close as possible, or try something that really stands out. I usually do best with the latter. I just imagine the odds of a bass picking my bait out of thousands of shad when it looks the same as all the shad is way less likely than if it looks markedly different. 

[livin2fish]

This time of year a Silver Buddy type bait seems to work "decent" when the lake is teeming with baby shad.  Like blue said, smaller bass in the 1 to 2 lb range.  May hook a very large catfish though.

[TOXIC]

Yamamoto DShad or any Fluke style bait would be my go to.  No question.  

[RyneB]

I fish a lake similar to what you are describing. Early fall late summer there are 2 main baits on my deck. A drop shot rigged with a Yamamoto shad shape worm, and a good size swimbait. I find the fish with the drop shot, and then work the area with the swimbait thoroughly. putting that drop shot near a school of shad is almost a guarantee fish. I will not leave a school without showing them my swimbait though.

 

Not sure if there are corn fields around, but a topwater mouse worked in real shallow water as close to the bank as you can get can be deadly once they start cutting the corn. It can be a deadly technique during that time.

[WRB]

It's the water temperature not air temperature you should know.

Threadfin or Gizzard Shad? Threadfin are smaller size 2"-4" average, eat phytoplankton  and hide in weeds/brush at night. If the prevailing wind blows the plankton towards the wind blown side of the lake that is where the bass will be located.

Basic 1/4-3/8 oz gold/silver blade spinnerbait with shade color trailer should work for you.

Tom

[scaleface]

I usually find that bass are either on points of some sort or pockets . The points can be the mouths of coves , weeds that stick out further , the tips of laydowns etc. The cut  are the opposite . Inside the coves , in pockets of the weeds ...One day can be different from the next . It might take awhile to pattern them but once it gets established , look-out . Just takes experimentation on what lure works that day . The lakes here are so full of shad that at times it seems like the whole lake is filled with them . When they are like that I ignore them . What has worked well the last two outings for me is a buzzbait with the skirt removed and a shad Yum Money Minnow super glued on . The bass have been smashing it . 

[lo n slo]

sometimes those bigger fish can be found lurking near the bottom in those areas frequented by the shad and schooling fish. that is where a simple texas rigged plastic can yield big dividends. and like bluebasser said, it doesn’t necessarily have to resemble the natural forage.