Expectations too high or a common trend?

[Darren71]

Hello all. 

I was an avid bass fisherman as a teenager but lost interest when real life started happening. Fast forward 30 years and I have started back into the hobby. About 2 years ago I purchased a boat and outfitted myself with a supply of fishing tackle and rods. I am NOT using any FFS but do have a standard sonar / downscan fish finder on the boat. 

So here is my issue. I just can not seem to locate and catch fish. In the almost 2 year span of owning my boat and fishing say about 30-40 times out on the lake I have only caught say 5-7 fish in total. I have watched uncountable YouTube videos and read articles on how to locate and catch fish but no success. I have attended a few local tournaments and tried to speak to the competitors but it seems like everyone I try to seek advice from is very tight lipped on how and where to catch fish. Almost like I'm taking their first born child from them. 

Last weekend I watched the professional tour fish Lake Murray in SC. Wednesday I went to Lake Murray fished the same lures, same spots and docks as they were fishing 3-4 days prior and did not even get a single bite in about 8 hours of fishing. I am really confused about where I am going so wrong that I'm not catching any kind of quantity fish. 

Am I alone here in this situation? Is this a common issue in bass fishing? Are my expectations too high of actually catching a few fish each time out.

[DaubsNU1]

Hang in there @Darren71. I was a bit like you...stopped fishing when life happened, early 2000's.

 

Got back in to fishing when my last kiddos went off to college. Thankfully found this site and all the GREAT people here!

 

I struggled finding fish, watched a crap ton of youtube videos, asked lots of questions here, upgraded my old boat, started catching a few fish, got new lures, tried new techniques, got a few new rods and reels, learned more, asked more questions, posted pictures, asked even more questions, got a new boat.

 

I don't use FFS. I made switch from Garmin to Humminbird with my new boat. Felt the Helix was better and side and down imaging vs. Garmin. The Ulterra with spot-lock, auto pilot, cruise control, etc., has really been a game changer for me. Allows me to fish off-shore more...I'm still learning.

 

Keep reading, keep asking questions, and keep fishing!!!

[volzfan59]

I’m going to start my answer with a couple of questions. Do you you remember the baits you used as a teen? And, were you successful back then?

 

Here’s why I ask, several years back, (good night, probably 30 years ago) I started to implement some of the latest and greatest techniques and tried to emulate the way the “pro’s” fish. Absolutely did not work for me. Went back to old school bass fishing the way I learned when starting. No FFS, only use my electronics to see what’s on the bottom and for water temperature. For me, don’t fish deeper than approx 15’ usually it’s 10’. I only use old school tried and true techniques. Recently sold off all of the tackle, rods and reels that I had stored away.

 

Don't read this as a slam on new techniques and equipment, it’s not. Just telling you my experience. 

[WRB]

Welcome back to bass fishing and the BR site. 
Glenn has lots of video’s to watch on this site.

Beware too much info too fast can overload you and be frustrating. Slow down and develop 1 or 2 presentations you gain confidence with.

Don’t know what you have for rods and reels so can’t suggest what to start with.

Welcome to BR and feel free to ask questions.

Tom

[king fisher]

I recommend you hire a guide for a few trips or take a friend that knows the lake you fish well.  You could also do what I do, which is buy more tackle.  Buying more tackle doesn't seem to work, but I keep doing it anyway.  I don't know why I keep doing the same thing over and over expecting different results.  I am starting to question my sanity, but my friend the Bait Monkey say's my approach is not only correct but normal. 

 

I'm sure a few hundred dollars spent on a fishing guide will help more than a few thousand spent on the latest tackle.  Advice here is free, and there are some very good anglers willing to help. 

 

The best advice I can give is stay away from the Bait Monkey.  Not catching bass can be disappointing, but not catching bass while going broke, can lead to depression.    

[TOXIC]

Rig up a weightless Senko and get back to us. 😉

[MediumMouthBass]

Nearby i have about a dozen places to fish, majority of these lakes and ponds you might catch 10 bass for the whole year. Ive spent over a hundred trips to these places and its almost always 0 bass, a few panfish, and a pickerel or 2. A good day would be 4 bass, and thats rare. Not many in my family fished for bass so i had to teach myself, i too spent countless hours on youtube and here trying to learn, for awhile i thought the issue was me. Maybe i just wasnt good at fishing, or i wasnt working the lure right.

 

I started to stop focusing on myself, and instead to the others around me. They were much more experience in bass fishing and were also catching nothing. I started to understand it wasnt me, but the very high pressured local lakes. So I tried new places to fish, the doors opened. I caught PB's i never thought possible, had days where i would pull in a bass every cast, and it gave me a deep level of confidence i never had the chance to get before.

 

Sometimes you just have to realize and accept the places you fish arent good, and move on to somewhere else. If i didnt, i probably wouldnt be bass fishing now.

[Junk Fisherman]

Have you ever thought about joining a bass club as a coangler?  You can learn A LOT from being a coangler.  

[JHoss]

I certainly wouldn't beat myself up about not catching anything behind the MLF guys. They're some of the best in the world and they just out immense pressure on those spots for a week.

 

Something to keep in mind, there will always be some bass on shallow cover. Maybe instead of stressing about finding the bulk of the population, you spend a couple days just covering water up shallow. When I first got into bassing, I struggled to understand the seasonal patterns and would often blank when I fished where I thought they should be. Things changed when I put a trolling motor on my yak and could just run the bank endlessly casting. I've evolved from that now, but there are still occasions when I just can't put it together and default to power fishing shallow and covering water. 

 

Like other guys said, see if there's a local tournament trail that accepts coanglers. My area has a couple fishing FB pages- if you had something like that you could post on there looking for fishing buddies and maybe learn a thing or two. 

[Sp33dSnake]

Welcome to the forum.

 

There is a typically a lull after a major fishing tournament.  My home lake, Okeechobee, just had a major bass tournament.  There are a zillion boats going 90mph all over the lake, putting a lot of pressure on the fish. Sure they release em alive, but the fish are rightly spooked a bit after.

 

I am not a bass expert, but my typical spots with typical lures have dried up.  Have to resort to old school finesse worms to pluck a few out.

 

Don't be too hard on yourself.  We had a cold snap here as well, and that's gonna make em a bit sluggish.

 

I've changed things up too, utilizing a tail spinner more, with mixed results. Sometimes experimenting with new lures is a great way to break a skunk streak.  I'll tell you, I know a spinnerbait is considered a great lure, but I've only caught a handful of fish on them over the years, but with a bladed jig I slay them. (Which makes absolutely no sense).

[scaleface]

The best advice I can give is learn to roll cast accurately and silently. I caught a lot more fish when I got serious about   casting . 

[casts_by_fly]

you'll get lots of replies about many topics about how to catch bass.  Everyone learns differently, lakes fish differently in different areas of the country and time of year. There are dozens of different types of presentations supported by dozens or hundreds of lures and variations of lures.  And that's not even going down to color.  That's a lot of variables right from the start.  Then there is the biggest variable- you.  So watch videos, maybe get a guide, etc, but try to simplify.  Pick the things that you do well or that agree with you and stick to them.  Get good at them.  Focus on one lake.  Learn how it fishes through the year.  Once you figure out a few things and get good at them, then learn a few things that are adjacent.  Like moving baits and fish a spinnerbait and crankbaits all the time?  Great- try chatterbaits, lipless cranks, and swim jigs in similar situations.  You could do a lot worse than sticking a couple different jigs on a couple different rods and not putting one down ever.

[A-Jay]

4 hours ago, Darren71 said:

Hello all. 

So here is my issue. I just can not seem to locate and catch fish.

Hello @Darren71 and Welcome to Bass Resource.

You've already received quite a bit of info & advice.

I think it's hard to know where to begin.

You mentioned that locating bass has been tough.

I hear that loud and clear.

Also, it's pretty tricky to catch bass if we don't find them first.

I wish I had 'the answer', but I don't.

Instead, I have a thought about locating the food that bass often eat.

This is usually quite a bit easier in the beginning than finding the bass themselves.

It's pretty common knowledge that bass are usually around what they eat.

That said, consider getting a can of worms or some other panfish bait,

and go pan fishing.

Bluegill, sunfish, whatever is in the waters you fish.

Finding a few places where the basses food is located or hangs out,

can often be expanded on a bit, which can lead us to some bass.

Then we can often duplicate success by fishing similar types of cover, depths and conditions. 

 

This sounds super basic, I know, but your first post here indicates

that you have some skills, you just need a little bump in the right direction.

IMO, this might be it.

Good Luck

A-Jay

 

[TnRiver46]

Which lake do you fish? Have you tried any different ones? Maybe a river ? 

[Tennessee Boy]

I spent a lot of time as a teenager wading creeks and fishing for bass.  When I grew up I bought a boat and tried lake fishing for the first time.  I read magazines and books (this was decades before YouTube).  I couldn’t catch a bass.  After several trips without a bite I got frustrated and decided to run as far up in a creek as I could go so could do some creek fishing the way I did as a teenager.   I started catching bass immediately and started enjoying my boat for the first time.  I soon realized that with a few minor changes I could use the same techniques to catch fish on the main lake.  I just kept fishing and learning from there and I have continued doing that for the last 35 years.

 

As far as copying what the pros were doing on Lake Murray,  keep in mind that the leader in the AOY race going into the tournament caught 3 fish in two days on Murray.  They don’t show the ones that are struggling on camera.

 

My advice is go have fun.  Go catch some brim with worms and a bobber if that’s what it takes.   The rest will come with time.

[Bazoo]

Howdy and welcome.

 

With no other information to go on, I'd say you need to focus on a small handful of lures. Those lures I think would perhaps change depending on location, but would be safe to say these are core lures everywhere.

 

-Squarebill crankbaits that dive to about 5' in colors gold or shad

-5" Senko worms with or without a bullet weight in colors green pumpkin and whatever else suits you

-Zoom finesse worms and Trick worms in colors white, watermelon red, green pumpkin. I'd rig this weightless, or with a split shot rig.

-Rebel pop R for a topwater

-3/8oz white or white/chartreuse spinnerbait, double willow in spring/summer/fall

 

For me, those would be solid go to lures for just about anywhere, and I think most here would be able to do well with them also.

 

My secret lure, though, is a bit uncommon, but is widely available. Zoom fat albert grubs in green pumpkin. But instead of rigging it on a jig head that is common for grubs, I texas rig it. I usually use a 2/0 gamakasu extra wide gap hook with a 1/16 oz bullet weight. It is something the fish doesn't see a lot rigged this way, and I use it in place of the popular ned rig.

 

I would limit my tackle selection to those, or no more than 1 more, and I would focus on shallow water areas where they would work. Master these, then move on to other lures, other depths, and new techniques.

 

[IYAOYAS]

To be honest the way I eased myself back into fishing after I got out of the service was to pick up a 3/8 ounce roostertail and a decent spinning rod and just fish it everywhere. All the baits I used to kill them on as a kid that were cheap and simple was what I used for the first few years I was back. Beetlespins and roostertails will catch literally everything in the water and they are cheap to buy. Give them a try and see if your catches increase.

[Logan S]

The thing about people getting into fishing (or back into fishing) at a point when they have the means to get the boat and all the tackle you want....Is that they tend to blow past the fundamentals, since they're not "stuck" with limited access to water or limited by the gear they have.  

 

I see it all the time... New guys struggling and telling you how they were trying such and such technique that's popular on the tournament trails. It's like information overload, or paralysis from analysis.

 

Just go out and throw some baits at the bank for a while. Figure out what your favorite baits are, use them more.  Look at where those baits work, find more areas that look like that. 

 

Notice I didn't mention any specific baits or places?

[Darren.]

I agree with those suggesting fundamentals, or the "basics".

 

Sometimes when I was struggling with finding them, I would

take a super simple setup - a long pole (no reel), a length of

line, a hook, a float, and live bait. I would put it down near

fallen trees, bushes, docks, etc. What I learned was from the 

variety of fish (and mud turtles) I would catch. From bluegills

to catfish to white and yellow perch to bass to pickerel. The 

almighty nighcrawler caught a lot of species. What is like that?

 

The almighty stickbait worm. I began experimenting with it

and enjoyed more and more success. Mostly rigged wacky style.

From there and over the years I began having great success with

Ned rigs and hard baits, too. This site was/is an incredible resource

from the forums to the articles and videos. Saturate your brain with 

what's offered here and go forth! Oh, and welcome aboard! And

great name! @Darren71

 

Sometimes simplicity can build confidence which can lead to trying

new and different things. I do like the idea thrown out to hire a guide.

I've done that in saltwater (with groups) and man can they put you

onto the fish and show you the baits and techniques.

[Jar11591]

You’re in the right place here to improve your bass finding and catching skills. A lot of good advice already. 
 

@Darren. took the words out of my mouth. The power of the stick worm is real. Rig a 4 or 5” stick worm wacky style on a size 1 finesse hook. Head to the shoreline and find some downed trees. Throw the senko around the edges of them. Not every tree will hold bass, but if you fish enough shoreline trees, you’re gonna run into bass. What you probably need most is confidence in what you’re throwing and where you’re fishing. It’s amazing how that can translate into results. Throwing a wacky senko or dinger around shoreline timber is in my opinion, the easiest way to catch a fish and gain some confidence.