No Shad lakes

[GoneFishingLTN]

So In the fall most lakes in the back of coves are great and a main target, but what if there is no Shad? Most lakes here have a ton of bluegill and crappie. 
 

edit-side note no grass is alive this time of year

[the reel ess]

I fish a lake that has no shad that I've observed. It does have golden shiners. I've caught one before. But I don't think there are any baitfish that school up the way shad do. Therefore, the bass don't school up in large groups to pursue them. The lake sometimes turns into the Dead Sea in the fall and doesn't recover until late winter. Last fall was OK. This one has been very tough so far.

[papajoe222]

I fish a number of lakes just like the one you describe, although they are natural lakes.  The bass on those lakes will target the young of the year which are still fairly small, but abundant. As with most lakes, you'll find the bass where the forage is. Those small bluegill will stick to any green vegetation still available,often times through the winter.  I don't know where the young crappie would hang out, but they will search out dense cover for sure.  Hope that helps.

[CrankFate]

They will still eat shad and especially shiners. No matter what anyone says, I’ll never believe anyone that says that bass *like* to eat bluegills. Would you eat shrimps with the shells on them if you can take them off with your hands? Bass don’t have hands, so their only option is eat something else with no spikes on it. I’ve seen bass bleeding in the water after eating whole bluegills. I’d eat them whole if I had no hands and would die from starvation, too.

[Bluebasser86]

2 hours ago, CrankFate said:

They will still eat shad and especially shiners. No matter what anyone says, I’ll never believe anyone that says that bass *like* to eat bluegills. Would you eat shrimps with the shells on them if you can take them off with your hands? Bass don’t have hands, so their only option is eat something else with no spikes on it. I’ve seen bass bleeding in the water after eating whole bluegills. I’d eat them whole if I had no hands and would die from starvation, too.

My comparison has been if you had the choice between a cheeseburger, or a cheeseburger with glass shards in it, which would you choose?  Bass learn which types of food are easier to catch and swallow and surely favor them if they get the option. I was fishing a big, shad profile glide bait in a pond with no shad last Saturday, didn't stop the fish from eating it. 

 

Bluegills and crappie move shallow in the fall, so if those are the primary forage in your lake, the bass will follow. 

[CrankFate]

@Bluebasser86 this is why I never know if it’s match the hatch or throw something they might like better than the hatch.

[Jmurphy87]

I try to mimic the different colors of there forage, people act like I am crazy when I tell them that orange and green, blue helps me mimic gills or sunfish. It works for me so I keep doing it lol.

[padon]

one of the lakes i fish has no shad. lots of bluegill, yellow perch , crappie. the yellow perch will stay in the green grass in fall. Small crappie and bluegill go to shallow wood etc. remember its a food chain. if the plankton small invertebrates etc are shallow. the small fish that feed on them will be shallow, and the bass will be shallow.

[Spankey]

I’m getting bit. And I glad. Maybe should not be complaining because few bass are getting caught by the word on the street out my way. But my fish are small. 
 

I’ve been cove fishing thinking the numbers of bluegills there and Shad potential being there in shallow water. Vegetation in pretty good shape yet, bigger fish should be there. Admittedly I do struggle in the fall, but my bigger fish have also come in the fall. I’m gonna get out of that rut. This next time out I fishing harder bottom rocks, steeper rock drop offs, deeper water. Make it a point to mark things better. Points that drop off faster and deeper. 

[WRB]

Very few bass anglers think of Crappie as pelagic fish that school off shore. Shad and  Herring are both pelagic school fish, Shad can't withstand water colder then 45 degrees, Herring can. Cold water limits the range of Shad. Crappie are not limited by cold water and easily survive under ice over lakes. 

Bass eat all species of young of the year fish even their own.

Summer offers a smorgasbord of prey for bass, everything is available. Winter is the opposite as frogs hibernate, crawdads burrow into the mud, terrestrial critter are gone, mice and rats may be available. Basically it comes down to smaller size fish and crawdad that happens to be out.

 The colder water slows down the basses need for food being cold blooded. 

The transition between warm water period, turnovers and cold water period takes it’s toll and  challenging period to catch bass.

Tom

 

[Big Hands]

18 minutes ago, WRB said:

Bass eat all species of young of the year fish even their own.

I think if they can fit it into their mouth, even if it's just partially in their mouth with some dangling out, some of them will do it at times. Bass, at times when hungry, are greedy, canniballistic, gluttonous pigs. Some may be dainty eaters, but not all of 'em.

[Boomstick]

17 minutes ago, Big Hands said:

I think if they can fit it into their mouth, even if it's just partially in their mouth with some dangling out, some of them will do it at times.

 

This bass couldn't even get the other one down!

 

[gbassman519]

I fish resovoirs that ONLY have minnows, bluegills, for food so is the minnow like a shad to them ?

 

[Raul]

Do not overthink it fellas,

 

there's no shad ---> no problem

there's no shiners ---> no problem

there's no bluegill ! ---> no problem

 

there ain't no spinnerbaits swimming freely in any lake/pond/river in the world and pretty much if you fish with a spinnerbait you will catch fish. I've been fishing for more than 4 decades and honestly speaking, I don't believe in "match the hatch", to me is just a bunch of nonsensical mumbo jumbo and the last thing I care about when picking a lure from my tbox when I'm fishing is about how much it resembles something the fish might eat in that place.

 

So, if you want to believe you need to "match the hatch"  let me tell you ain't thinking right by thinking you need your baits should look like X or Y, bass forage is extremely variable and in hundreds of cases it might even be regional and what is available in Cali may not be available in Tx and so on, the ONLY FORAGE AVAILABLE ANYWHERE IN THE PLANET WHERE THERE'S BASS IS BABY BASS. 

[roadwarrior]

15 minutes ago, Raul said:

Do not overthink it fellas,

 

there's no shad ---> no problem

there's no shiners ---> no problem

there's no bluegill ! ---> no problem

 

there ain't no spinnerbaits swimming freely in any lake/pond/river in the world and pretty much if you fish with a spinnerbait you will catch fish. I've been fishing for more than 4 decades and honestly speaking, I don't believe in "match the hatch", to me is just a bunch of nonsensical mumbo jumbo and the last thing I care about when picking a lure from my tbox when I'm fishing is about how much it resembles something the fish might eat in that place.

 

So, if you want to believe you need to "match the hatch"  let me tell you ain't thinking right by thinking you need your baits should look like X or Y, bass forage is extremely variable and in hundreds of cases it might even be regional and what is available in Cali may not be available in Tx and so on, the ONLY FORAGE AVAILABLE ANYWHERE IN THE PLANET WHERE THERE'S BASS IS BABY BASS. 

[RDB]

There are times when matching the hatch absolutely matters and times when it doesn’t.  There isn’t a pro on ANY tour that would say that matching the hatch is nonsensical.  Matching isn’t necessarily about exactly replicating the bait species…there can be degrees.  Matching can include things like size, profile, color, movement and be influenced by water clarity, wind, light, how fast you are fishing, etc.  Whether people want to admit it or not, pretty much every angler considers the hatch to a certain degree.  As a general rule for me, the greater the distance a fish can see my lure, the more I will consider the hatch.  I will agree there is overkill, especially around color choices.

[padon]

i think people take this to a higher degree than it needs to be. i mean it only makes sense to try to roughly match in size color and profile. But its not trout fishing bass will eat whatever looks easy to kill when its time to eat. i mean a senko doesnt really look like anything but it looks alive and easy to catch. now if you have bass busting a school of three inch shad it makes sense to try to mimic a 3 inch shad. but in general bass are opportunistic and will eat anything that looks like food.

[OldManLure]

On 10/17/2021 at 4:37 PM, RDB said:

There are times when matching the hatch absolutely matters and times when it doesn’t.  There isn’t a pro on ANY tour that would say that matching the hatch is nonsensical.  Matching isn’t necessarily about exactly replicating the bait species…there can be degrees.  Matching can include things like size, profile, color, movement and be influenced by water clarity, wind, light, how fast you are fishing, etc.  Whether people want to admit it or not, pretty much every angler considers the hatch to a certain degree.  As a general rule for me, the greater the distance a fish can see my lure, the more I will consider the hatch.  I will agree there is overkill, especially around color choices.

On 10/16/2021 at 2:48 PM, Raul said:

Do not overthink it fellas,

 

there's no shad ---> no problem

there's no shiners ---> no problem

there's no bluegill ! ---> no problem

 

there ain't no spinnerbaits swimming freely in any lake/pond/river in the world and pretty much if you fish with a spinnerbait you will catch fish. I've been fishing for more than 4 decades and honestly speaking, I don't believe in "match the hatch", to me is just a bunch of nonsensical mumbo jumbo and the last thing I care about when picking a lure from my tbox when I'm fishing is about how much it resembles something the fish might eat in that place.

 

So, if you want to believe you need to "match the hatch"  let me tell you ain't thinking right by thinking you need your baits should look like X or Y, bass forage is extremely variable and in hundreds of cases it might even be regional and what is available in Cali may not be available in Tx and so on, the ONLY FORAGE AVAILABLE ANYWHERE IN THE PLANET WHERE THERE'S BASS IS BABY BASS. 

”match the hatch” is the second most meaningless term in bass fishing.  A long held credo for fly fisherman, it has been co-opted by marketers for bass bait manufacturers.  It is their strategy to convince us to buy 4 or 5 versions of a bait when 1 would likely work.

 

[king fisher]

Matching the hatch weather for bass, trout, or other game fish isn't just about shape, size and color.  It is also about depth, and where in the water column the prey the fish are used to feeding on are located.  If they are feeding on crayfish on the bottom in 10 feet, they probably wont even notice a surface lure imitating a mouse, even though bass love mice.   If they are crashing shad on the surface, then a crayfish pattern fished on the bottom might not be the lure you want even though bass love crayfish and will eat them.  If a bass will eat anything he can when he is hungry, then why not fish the same lure every day all day?   Taking match the hatch to an extreme is not necessary or productive, but not trying to find out what the bass are feeding on is also not productive. Bass can even ignore live bait. When I was a kid I tried fishing live craw dads suspended under a bomber.  I found out bass love crawdads but not suspended under a bobber.  I switched to fishing them on the bottom and caught lots of bass.  I failed to match the hatch with the crawdads not by what I fished but by how I fished them.   I can make almost any lure imitate a crawdad by the way I drag the lure across the bottom.  It doesn't have to look exactly like a crawdad, but if I don't retrieve the lure to look like a crawdad scurrying across the bottom kicking up mud, than I wont catch many bass keyed in on crawdads on the bottom.  In this case I matched the hatch with type of retrieve not color, shape or size.  If the bass are feeding on suspended bait fish, I can take a plastic craw and match the baitfish by swimming the craw at the same speed and cadence as the baitfish.  I'm still matching the hatch, again with the type of retrieve.

      The key to matching the hatch is finding out what prey the bass are accustomed to eating that time of year under the conditions of the day, and figuring out what characteristic, or combination of characteristics the bass are keying in on to help them catch their intended prey.  Yes they may also eat something entirely different if the opportunity arises, but most likely they will continue to hunt what they are already eating as long as they are able to easily catch the prey.

      Matching the hatch originated with trout fishing, but trout are also top predator's in many ways similar to bass.  They will eat mice, frogs, crawdads, as well as insects.  Matching the hatch works for trout fishing, and I firmly believe helps catch bass as well.

       If there are no shad in a lake, but their are bluegill, that doesn't mean shad colored lures will not work, but don't expect to catch bass busting bait on the surface in 40 feet of water, ripping a shad imitating surface lure.  The odds would be much better fishing a bluegill shaped, and colored lure, near places where bluegill live.  Rainbow trout colored lures look similar to so many other species of fish, that they will work anywhere bass live.   The dark spotted back with grey silver sides, looks like anything from suckers, to shad.  I don't think many bass would care if a shad had a pink stipe across its side.  If you are fishing a lake where the bass eat lots of rainbow trout, it may be important to have the pink stripe simply because that may be a trigger the bass key in on to help them catch the trout.  In that case It might help to exaggerate the stripe making it more pronounced than it is in the wild.  Most likely it wouldn't matter, and the size, shape, and speed will be want you want to match.

[Bankc]

I fish lakes all of the time with no shad, but only bluegill.  Bass still target shad type lures.  They're opportunistic predators.  They'll eat anything that looks like food, even if it doesn't look like their normal food.  I've seem people catch bass on a lure that looks like Homer Simpson, and everyone knows bass show dismal Nielsen TV ratings when it comes to animated adult comedy programs.  

[PressuredFishing]

On 10/7/2021 at 4:13 AM, GoneFishingLTN said:

So In the fall most lakes in the back of coves are great and a main target, but what if there is no Shad? Most lakes here have a ton of bluegill and crappie. 
 

edit-side note no grass is alive this time of year

Bluegill and crappie do the same thing, they go to backs of coves to school. There are also perhaps glass minnows or small forage you don't notice other than shad, they school those up too

[GoneFishingLTN]

I heard bluegill go deep during the fall is this wrong

[Scott F]

30 minutes ago, GoneFishingLTN said:

I heard bluegill go deep during the fall is this wrong

Fall isn’t the same everywhere. Deep is also relative. When the lake turns over and the water temps are relatively constant from top to bottom, they can go everywhere. While there are still green weeds, bluegills will hang around them all winter even under the ice in just a few feet of water.

[Boomstick]

On 10/22/2021 at 3:16 PM, GoneFishingLTN said:

I heard bluegill go deep during the fall is this wrong

They have left the shallow water in my shore fishing spot maybe 3-4 weeks ago. They were everywhere this year!