Topwater frog fishing.

[Kyle S]

It's hard to say what variable is holding you up from landing the frog fish, however what I do know for sure is that frog fishing can test your patience as you're quickly finding out.

There are some days where i'll connect and land 9/10 blowups on frogs...and then there are the 1/10 days. The only advice I could offer is keep tinkering with your frog fishing setup and variables the  that you're able to control, but most importantly just stay at it and do you're best not to give up on it. once you land you're first frog fish you'll surely be glad you didn't!

Best of luck and don't forget to show pics when you finally connect!!

[Swamp Girl]

Frog fishing is also hard for me. SO HARD! If I were to offer advice, it would be like the blind leading the blind. I started a thread last year about my troubles with frog fishing and one guy said he caught 100% of the bass who hit his frog. I think about that comment from time to time and always think, "Say what?"

 

Wait! I do have some advice: As an alternative to froggin', I often pitch a plopper with treble hooks into an opening in the pads. They'll hit it and you'll hook them, but then you have to figure a way to get them out of there!!!

 

On 8/15/2023 at 6:15 AM, VTFan said:

Well I guess persistence does pay off.  I FINALLY caught my first two bass on a frog. I had caught bass on other top water baits before but this was the first on frogs.

 

Way. to. go!

[Zcoker]

Work those frogs with confidence in the thickest of junk and don't be afraid to give it to them good when they crash it! I slam them hard with 50-65lb braid as soon as I see or feel the hit. Drag? lol Lock her down! Lotta folks say to wait, or add a bit of finesse to the situation, which may or may not be the sure thing for them. When asked what he does, frog guru Dean Rojas says he slams them as soon as he sees or feels the hit. When I started doing exactly that, my hookup ratio floored. I hardly miss a frog fish nowadays. I also do the usual like bending out the hooks a bit, or adding bigger hooks, trimming the tail section....minor adjustments. But, for the most, it's game on in the everglades with a frog, a sure thing for a monster bass. 

 

As far as size goes, I've got a few of those giant spro king daddy frogs and have gotten bass where the frog is almost as big as the fish! Those things are massive yet very functionable. So frog size may be purely subjective, imho. 

[Swamp Girl]

19 hours ago, Zcoker said:

Work those frogs with confidence in the thickest of junk and don't be afraid to give it to them good when they crash it! I slam them hard with 50-65lb braid as soon as I see or feel the hit. Drag? lol Lock her down! Lotta folks say to wait, or add a bit of finesse to the situation, which may or may not be the sure thing for them. When asked what he does, frog guru Dean Rojas says he slams them as soon as he sees or feels the hit. When I started doing exactly that, my hookup ratio floored. I hardly miss a frog fish nowadays.

 

I am going to try ^this.^

[JackstrawIII]

One thought that might be helpful: if the fish are hitting but I can’t hook up on a floating frog, usually a buzz toad of some sort will work. 

[Dye99]

when I first started frog fishing I would say that Im only out there to catapult the frog back at me at 100mph with the help of local fish.

 

 

 

Nowadays it's second nature. Rarely drop a fish anymore. I just slow my set down, and enjoy it and don't over analyze.

[Bazoo]

On 8/3/2023 at 2:39 PM, Bazoo said:

I've had a lot of bluegill that have went after my frogs when I've used a smaller frog like the lunkerhunt pocket frog. I've actually caught several of the larger bluegill on it, one being the largest bluegill I've ever seen, over a pound on my calibrated estimation, he had a solid 1 1/2" wide mouth! I caught him right at the end of the cast, I was standing on a culvert that is an ambush point.

 

A lot of times, when its a bluegill, they will grab it and swim, even fight a few seconds, but when I set the hook it doesn't set because the fish only had the legs is my guess.

 

My thought is, you probably have missed some bass, but also have had bluegill going after your frog and those are much harder to get because of their smaller sized mouths.

 

I love fishing frogs.

I mis-spoke here... upon reflection, it was Rock Bass and not Bluegill that I've caught on the pocket frog.

[Carolina Pines]

My hookup ratio improved significantly after I made a few changes.  My brother in law has always been a good frog fisherman, and a couple years ago he bought me a Lews Mach Smash 6'10" combo that has become my frogging rod.  The shorter rod helps a lot working the frog in the thicker sections of lily pads. 

 

I like the standard Pad Crasher frogs.  I use 50 pound braid no leader.  I always bend the hooks slightly, and trim the legs back to around 2" long.  You don't want to bend them too much, but a little bit of bend definitely helped me.  As others have stated definitely lock down your drag. 

 

Biggest difference for me was when I changed my hookset.  I used to try to count 1,2,3 then set the hook but that only resulted in maybe 2/10 hooked fish.  Now I set the hook as soon as I reel down the slack. 

 

I also use a fast, vertical hookset straight up in the air.  My worm hookset is more of a sideways sweeping hookset... I quickly found out that wasn't working for me when frogging.  

 

Now I usually hook around 6/10 fish that blow up on the frog.  

[LrgmouthShad]

@TnRiver46

 

”They love the froggy”

[txchaser]