First good frog bite

[Ryan N]

I fished this frog the whole year and NADA, nothing! This lure has been in the tackle box ever since and I wanted to see if the fall season could make it happen.

I saw crazy wake under the cheese near the bank and worked the frog through, bass ate it like it hasn’t ate in a week. 

I have a bigger strike king frog I’ll have to try to see if i can get bit.

 

One of the things i’ve learned with topwater lures like this is to always be moving. Never assume a spot has willing fish, rather you want to cover as much water as possible because if a bass decided not to eat it, it’s never going to no matter how many times you throw it back at em.

[Pat Brown]

Hey!  Congratulations!  Frogs are my favorite way to catch a bass - you'll find that cadence is very important when working areas.

 

Sometimes I'll go my usual fastish mid tempo walk for hours without a bite and I'll consciously slow my cadence a lot and start catching them everywhere I wasn't on my first pass through an area.  Almost like a jig or jerkbait sometimes must be given some substantial pauses during a retrieve.

 

I kind of learned this over the summer in very clear water where I could see big bass follow my frog and sit with their nose up to it underneath it and they would only bite it if I let it sit for a really long time!

 

I catch frogs pretty good on mats for sure, but my favorite place to catch frogs and in my opinion the place where you're going to usually catch the biggest ones is shade pockets/ overhanging trees on points and channel swing banks this time of year the bigger ones seem to be on the channel swing banks outside of the coves and the smaller ones tend to be inside of the coves/more in the vegetation - at least until the flip and then it seems like everybody's in the cove - at least right now it seems like that!

 

Most of my fish that have been over 4 lb that I caught on a frog this summer were throwing my frog to the bank underneath a bunch of stuff that creates shade in super shallow water that's near deep water and a cove/creek LOL.

 

I also feel like if you can get to the very back of a cove to where it's ~ 1 ft. or less you can catch really big ones in the vegetation!

[Mike L]

There’s a lot to be said about covering water especially with a frog. 
I have the most success fishing fast and keep moving but always throwing in the most likely of spots. 
 

But the stop and go, varied retrieve cadence unique to any specific bait most times is the trigger. 
 

 

 

 

 

Mike

[Pat Brown]

I will also emphasize the importance of *ACCURATE* and *QUIET* presentation when trying to tempt the big girls.  

 

When you make the cast correctly - you don't even need to move it an inch many times.  The big ones will eat it the instant it lands if you do it just right a lot of times or on that very first twitch.

[Swamp Girl]

@Pat Brown, you deserve your own TV show. You are so good at analyzing bass and teaching us. I can get bass to hit my frog. That's easy-peasy, but it's so difficult for me to hook them. I know what I'm supposed to do and I do it well with all other surface lures, but with a frog, I panic.

[Pat Brown]

7 minutes ago, Swamp Girl said:

@Pat Brown, you deserve your own TV show. You are so good at analyzing bass and teaching us. I can get bass to hit my frog. That's easy-peasy, but it's so difficult for me to hook them. I know what I'm supposed to do and I do it well with all other surface lures, but with a frog, I panic.

 

I think it takes a lot of experience to know when to set the hook and there are times when you're doing everything right and you just miss them and learning to accept those is part of the deal with frog fishing for sure. I find that if the fish are hitting my bait and not committing to it, it has more to do with my retrieve than anything else.

 

I think that when you get that cadence dialed in they choke it every time. Cadence is action, frequency and inertia.  There are times when you want it to boil. Like a little insect and barely move but be pretty frequent and there are times when you want it to boil. Like a little insect and barely move and be very infrequent. There are times when you want it to sway from side to side very rhythmically but at a slow pace and there are times when you want it to sway from side to side at a manic pace.

 

There are times when I need to pop my line to make the Frog spit water from side to side as it walks and there are times when it needs to swish and glide across the surface with no spitting at all. 

 

It's really interesting when you get it dialed in because it seems like when you get it dialed in for that day for that pond or lake - you can have some insane times.

 

I still rank casting accuracy and ability to be quiet with entry over cadence every time but cadence is the next most important aspect of frog fishing.

 

As a little addendum to this all - A piece of juice that has caught me many big fish over the years that I figured out is you can cast your frog up onto the bank and then slowly walk it into the water and it's the quietest most natural presentation you can possibly achieve with any lure!!! 😉😉😉😉