LMB: How deep is deep?

[Choporoz]

I'm always intrigued by the topics on deep structure; obviously deep means different things to each of us, especially dependent upon where we live/fish.  (I didn't want to hijack the great recent thread about deep sonar and finding fish.)  Most topics I've seen either don't specify what 'deep' is; are limited to ledge discussions; or carolina dragging at unspecified depths. 

 -I'm particularly interested in those that target LMB in 30'+ FOW.....or specifically do NOT target likely bass at 30+'.....thought processes, approaches, methods, etc.

[Bluebasser86]

A lot of the lakes I fish don't have 30' of water in them. They also lack any kind d of offshore structure to hold fish or bass populations to have a need to move offshore. For those reasons, I don't catch many bass deeper than 10' all year.

[NHBull]

Deep for me is 30 feet.  For a friend it is 50.  I have never caught a LM deeper than 25, but I am predominantly in SM water.

 

My comfort zone is 20 and below, but am going to target deeper ones next year

[J Francho]

My PB NY largemouth came from a drop off from a weedline that ended at 15', dropping off to around 35'.  For what ever reason, instead of reeling the 12" T-rig worm after getting out of the weedline, I let it tumble deeper.  I'm not sure how deep, but more than 20' for sure.  I felt something mushy, so I set the hook, and reeled in what felt like a waterlogged boot.  Turned out to be a 7-2 LMB.

[Dens228]

I fish a few quarries that are very deep.  That being said the deepest I've caught bass, and they were very large, were all the same day, early May, all three being over 21 inches and all three in different parts of the quarry, at the bass of rock walls, 22 feet.  That is the only time I've caught bass there deeper than 12-15 feet.  Normally once summer hits full blast the thermocline is at about 13-14 feet and I don't even mark fish deeper than that. 

[TnRiver46]

People troll downriggers for trout here and routinely catch largemouth all the way down to 55-60 ft. And they are often suspended over water 100+ ft just following baitfish. And people vertical jig smallies from over 60 ft down 

[Russ E]

I agree with @Bluebasser86  .

On most waters around here anything over 10ft. Is considered deep water.

There are a couple lakes that I can catch bass in 20ft., during summer, but they are the exception.

[Team9nine]

How deep is deep? Buck Perry stated (defined) deep water is anything greater than 8-10 ft. It works well for nearly all my Midwest waters, so that's what I go with.

 

That said, in winter, we routinely catch all kinds of fish in 30-35' of water here since the thermocline is gone, but we rately catch bass that deep. Seems like 20-22' is about as deep as I ever need to go for largemouth around here.

[BassNJake]

51 minutes ago, TnRiver46 said:

People troll downriggers for trout here and routinely catch largemouth all the way down to 55-60 ft. And they are often suspended over water 100+ ft just following baitfish. And people vertical jig smallies from over 60 ft down 

I've caught large mouth and small mouth at around 50 feet jigging a blade bait or a spoon.

It's crazy to me how they just suspend over the baitfish in that deep water.

It's not something I saw living in Ohio as I didn't fish lakes that were that deep.

But here in East TN I've done it at Cherokee, Douglas and Norris both in the heat of summer and in the dead of winter.

 

I always wondered what drives the baitfish that deep?

 

 

[bassh8er]

Are the bass alive when you get them out of water deeper than 20’?

[TnRiver46]

13 minutes ago, bassh8er said:

Are the bass alive when you get them out of water deeper than 20’?

Yep. Sometimes you have to fizz them, or eat them . A lot of our reservoirs are 150 ft or deeper, I have never reeled in a dead fish

[Paul Roberts]

1 hour ago, J Francho said:

My PB NY largemouth came from a drop off from a weedline that ended at 15', dropping off to around 35'.  For what ever reason, instead of reeling the 12" T-rig worm after getting out of the weedline, I let it tumble deeper.  I'm not sure how deep, but more than 20' for sure.  I felt something mushy, so I set the hook, and reeled in what felt like a waterlogged boot.  Turned out to be a 7-2 LMB.

That's interesting.

[Russ E]

12 minutes ago, bassh8er said:

Are the bass alive when you get them out of water deeper than 20’?

I have had a couple, larger summer bass caught in 20ft of water, that were bloated and floated on their side when I tried to release them. 

I had to degas them. Then they swam away.

[WRB]

Whatever depth they are active feeding in. Our western reseviors are very deep well over 100' on average. With the exception Clear lake and Juaqin/Calif Delta we don't have shallow natural bass lakes or rivers. 

During the cold water periods with no thermoclines the bass can go as deep as the baitfish are located, during warmer water periods with thermoclines the bass stay above it, average in most deep structure lakes is around 35' and bass can be anywhere from near the surface to the thermocline depending where the bait is located.

My personal depth limit is about 40' do to air bladder expansion issues. My deepest LMB was a structure spoon fish at 60', I was pulling some loose loops and the spoon was on the bottom, reeled in the loose line the spoon moved up about a foot and the bass grabbed it. Deepest smallmouth was around 80' caught fishing for lake trout on a Sonar lure bouncing it uphill from 100' the bass loaded up at 80'.

My PB 5 FLMB were caught between 15' to 25'.

Tom

[Ktho]

The lake I like going to the most, diamond valley lake, is a very deep lake. I'd call 30ft+ deep but I also routinely fish in 30-50ft of water especially in the summer and winter.  The structure I'm fishing that deep is rocky humps or points usually with jigs and drop shot but there's a fair amount of bottom contact baits that are successful. Sometimes you can get them swimming a little underpin over it but usually bottom contact for me. 

 

Forgot to talk about approach. For me fishing that deep I'm almost always positioned on the shallow side of the point and working uphill, almost always uphill. The points are often not the classic tapering points but will have a little saddle before rising up with a hump/knob on the end. I like to have the boat in the saddle firing out over the end of the point. Sometimes I'll sit right on top of the hump, let's me fire casts off the side of it and work uphill and also lets me fish the drop shot vertically if thats the way they're moving. 

[Deleted account]

I fish for bass (and everything else) at whatever depth I find them, be it 6 inches or 6 fathoms. I prefer to catch them in 3-8 ft of water, but I'm going wherever they may be. Around here, most of the places I fish are shallow, so that's what I do. I've caught LMB in 40 ft, and SMB in 60 ft but I don't do that a lot. FF reads down to 1200 ft, so that's the limit,  We'll be fishing sea bass in 500-600 feet in a few weeks, zero fun, but makes for a good Xma$.

[Catt]

Depth in my opinion is relevant to the body of water you're fishing. 

 

The deepest I've caught LMB off the bottom is 27'

 

I have caught them suspended 25-30' down over 50-60' of water. So would that count as 60'?

[WRB]

4 minutes ago, Catt said:

Depth in my opinion is relevant to the body of water you're fishing. 

 

The deepest I've caught LMB off the bottom is 27'

 

I have caught them suspended 25-30' down over 50-60' of water. So would that count as 60'?

That would be 25'-30' if they were suspended in 300' of water in my book.

Tom

[WRB]

I recall asking Aaron Martens a few years after he started fishing the Bassmaster tournaments what was the big adjustment, without hesitating he said learning to shallower. Out west we fish deeper because that is where the bass are located, midwest and eastern lakes bass tend to relate to cover more and deep water is 15'-20'. You can't fish deeper then the lakes are.

Tom

[J Francho]

2 hours ago, BassNJake said:

It's crazy to me how they just suspend over the baitfish in that deep water.

There are a few guides up here that specialize in these fish.  They are VERY hard to beat in open team tournaments when they double up in a boat.

2 hours ago, Paul Roberts said:

That's interesting.

City Dump.  Just north of the bridge on the east side.  You know the spot.  The weed line has not been as well defined as in past years, though.  I still go back and try anyways.

 

2 hours ago, bassh8er said:

Are the bass alive when you get them out of water deeper than 20’?

 

Yes, and I've never needed to fizz them, unless they were going into a livewell.  It's not my favorite way to fish a tournament, but on places like Erie, it's necessary.  They swim away fine when immediately released.

[lo n slo]

i fish alot of docks and brush piles in that 25’ zone unless there is a distinct thermocline that would dictate otherwise 

[NHBull]

Guys on my lake troll for trout and salmon, often at 50 feet.

They are always catching SMB on the turns when the bait slows down and drops a bit 

 

.......I have never heard of anyone on Squam catching the same from a bass boat

[WCWV]

The majority of my home waters are 50' plus in areas and in the winter months that's where I'll catch them. 

In the summer months I'll usually catch them on structure in the channels around 30' or so.

Our largest lake which has more smallmouth, has depths of 250' in the summer and around 180' or so in winter months. 

I've caught smallmouth at 70' to 80' in summer and winter. 

Have never had to fizz a single one. 

[Mobasser]

Most of my fish come from 10-15 ft deep. One older quarry that I fish has water that is 30+ deep, but I've rarely found bass that deep there on that lake. Average would still be 10- 15 ft throughout the year

[Dwight Hottle]

I caught a smallmouth off a wreck in 50-55 fow. Released it right away & it swam down without any visible problems.