“Clean up” bait

[Susky River Rat]

I was wondering if any of you have what I like to call is a clean up bait.  I tend to throw fast moving baits first. If I catch 4-5 then it seems like they aren’t eating that or got wise to it, I switch to something else. Usually some form of jig or slower moving bait to try. This in hopes to get a few more fish out of that particular area. 
 

Does anyone else do this or do they move to another area with what was working? If so what bait do you generally put on as your clean up?

[scaleface]

If I'm out on a point and catching bass with cranks, I'll hop a worm, tube ,ned... after the bass stop hitting the diving bait . Brush pile and lay downs same thing . I rarely fish behind myself going down a bank .

[FishTank]

I try to but I am not always successful. With most fish at my lakes if you catch one in a specific area, they scatter like flies.

 

If I get lucky, I go through a set of opposites. If I catch one on a big bait, I go BFS. If I catch one on a fast moving bait, I go with something slow.  If I get one on a jig, I go with a wacky senko and so on. 

[WRB]

Active feeding bass will chase down faster moving lures, neutral bass may not be willing to chase. Consider bass are neutral mood about 60% of the time during a 4 hour time period and 20% inactive leaving 20% active your odds are better targeting neutral bass or covering lots of water to find active bass. Choices.

Tom

[JediAmoeba]

11 minutes ago, WRB said:

Active feeding bass will chase down faster moving lures, neutral bass may not be willing to chase. Consider bass are neutral mood about 60% of the time during a 4 hour time period and 20% inactive leaving 20% active your odds are better targeting neutral bass or covering lots of water to find active bass. Choices.

Tom

I agree with the percentages but pressured bass add another layer. 

[Susky River Rat]

5 hours ago, WRB said:

Active feeding bass will chase down faster moving lures, neutral bass may not be willing to chase. Consider bass are neutral mood about 60% of the time during a 4 hour time period and 20% inactive leaving 20% active your odds are better targeting neutral bass or covering lots of water to find active bass. Choices.

Tom

I try to pick an area apart. A little bit if I catch some fish. Then it’s on to the next. It’s often on the susky you can think the area has died out then switch up and get 2-4 more.

[Jig Man]

We call them follow up.  It depends what the strike was on as to my follow up.  For example if it is a spinner bait I like to follow up with a buzz bait,  if a top water then some kind of plastic, if a shaky then the follow is a Ned just to name a few.

[FryDog62]

Top half of the water column - Caffeine Shad on Owner Twistlock Light hook.

 

Bottom half/near the bottom - Neko or shaky head. 

[GetFishorDieTryin]

Weightless senko, light shakey head/neko, mojo rig, finesse swimjig, t rig

[Pat Brown]

I usually just give em what they're biting well and then adjust if they stop biting or move.

 

Probably something to do with how conditions tend to create patterns and bite windows for certain baits across the whole lake.

 

If it's a good jig day one place, unless weather and conditions are rapidly changing in real time, no reason it shouldn't be in another etc etc.

[Spankey]

If I’m having a day that’s not going real great. Have had many days like that, Maybe a skunking is coming or heck maybe a day-o-dinks is going on and I’d like to go home having caught one respectable fish. The old Rat-L-Trap has come through. 

[Catt]

Now I know my problem...I ain't that good at math.

 

[Big Hands]

I don't have a rigid set of rules for such times. I'm mostly just out dinking around, doing what I want to do at that moment in time.

 

Sometimes, I'll drop an anchor and just sit there and relax, rig some different baits, or retie leaders, etc. and see if they will reload.

 

Sometimes I will try another version of a similar bait.

 

Sometimes I will try something totally different. 

 

Sometimes I will fire up the outboard and go somewhere else.

 

Sometimes, I will just move on down the bank.

[Bird]

I'm not so sure about " moving to another area ".

Some of the smaller lakes I fish I'll keep coming back to the same area over and over,  places I consistently catch fish.

 

Follow up baits has been a term used for a long time.

It has always been a slower presentation like a plastic worm around here.

[Motoboss]

If catching on crankbait or spinnerbait slows my follow up is a swimjig or soft jerk shad, then a slow sinking worm, working my way towards the bottom.

 

 

 

Or move to another area ?

[Fat Ika]

On 5/7/2023 at 4:49 AM, Darnold335 said:

I was wondering if any of you have what I like to call is a clean up bait.  I tend to throw fast moving baits first. If I catch 4-5 then it seems like they aren’t eating that or got wise to it, I switch to something else. Usually some form of jig or slower moving bait to try. This in hopes to get a few more fish out of that particular area. 
 

Does anyone else do this or do they move to another area with what was working? If so what bait do you generally put on as your clean up?

Yes. First, stay and cleanup. For instance, was short struck on a swim jig twice and a jackhammer once by the same fish. Was a low pressure, great swim jig/chatterbait bite that day, so had a large profile cleanup bait for the day. 4.8 Deps Bull Flat free rigged. First pitch at that bass, turned out to be the biggest bass of the day. 

[Bankc]

Wacky and Ned rigs are my most common follow up lures.  A lot of times, it'll just be whatever I have tied on, so it could be a shaky head, jig or whatever.  But I tend to opt for a slower, more finessey follow up bait.  

[Motoboss]

I guess I’m lost in the description of “clean-up” bait. To me it’s a follow up to another bait that has been hit short or consistently missed (top water plug) to try and entice a positive strike (jerk shad, slow rolled spinner). Similar bait, similar method, different presentation. 

 

Don’t see how a bottom contact bait (ned, jig) is a clean-up for a swim jig, or anything fished in a different water column?  I see a ned or jig following a weighted swimming worm but not a reaction bait.

 

Am I missing something here?

 

 

[J Francho]

Are you cleaning up, or targeting fish in a completely different mode?  I guess my decision to switch might be more based on figuring out what bigger fish are interested in, rather than catching every fish from a spot.  And even if you're doing the latter, aren't you just scratching the surface of junk fishing - switching baits to see what they'll bite, if anything at all, without regard to pattern?  Interesting to think about when you're not on the water.  

 

I think follow ups to missed fish are a more important part of my fishing.  I already know I got a biter, now I want to catch it.  Think unweighted senko or fluke after a missed strike on a top water.  If that's what you mean, then there is one example.

[Susky River Rat]

@Motoboss @J Francho

 

i am not talking a follow up bait. I am saying you are on a spot and you catch 5 plus in that area on a crank bait. If you believe there are still fish in that area what do you change to if you want to try to catch them. I understand some people catch those  fish and leave to follow a  pattern. The rivers I fish I will pick apart an area because most times there is more there to be caught than on the initial fast moving bait offers me. Now I’d that bait does not produce anything in the first few casts I’m onto the next area with the fast approach.

[J Francho]

Then the same first question applies...does starting to junk fish net bigger fish, or are you wasting your time catching all the fish when you might already be on the big fish pattern?  That's a game time decision based on what you are catching and what you know is there.

[Susky River Rat]

2 minutes ago, J Francho said:

Then the same first question applies...does starting to junk fish net bigger fish, or are you wasting your time catching all the fish when you might already be on the big fish pattern?  That's a game time decision based on what you are catching and what you know is there.

Sure I like catching big fish. I frankly do not care to search out big fish only. I just want to have fun and get my rod bent.  If I only wanted to chase big fish I’d go back to musky fishing. 

[Catt]

IKD! If I know the fish are there, I'm going straight to the bottom. 

 

Y'all start with "moving" baits up in the water column, then slow down & go to the bottom. 

 

I do throw "moving" baits but I seldom start out with one.

[Tennessee Boy]

I’ll add another consideration based on lessons learned from FFS.  Bigger faster baits tend to get more reactions without hits.  Smaller slower baits tend to get fewer reactions but those reactions are more likely to be hits.  So throwing a big crankbait first might result in fish following it off the spot without hitting it.  Those fish usually won’t return to the spot immediately to hit your “clean up” bait.  These are tendencies not rules.  There are good reasons to start big and fast and there are good reasons to start small and slow.  You might also want to start somewhere in the middle.  It’s a judgment call that one must make on the water.

[Catt]

3 hours ago, Tennessee Boy said:

So throwing a big crankbait first might result in fish following it off the spot without hitting it.  Those fish usually won’t return to the spot immediately to hit your “clean up” bait.

 

Exactly what Ben Milliken said about throwing big swimbaits first which is why he throws them before leaving an area.