roaming bass?

[Red]

so three times in a row, in the very same spot on the bank...i have seen a school of bass....nice ones too...ranging from the 2-4lb range...they were all nice looking bass...anywhere from 3-6 in the groups....they just swim along the shoreline....wont bite anything i throw at em....just cruising along...what do you supose they are doing? what would you throw in that area to get bites? cuz all the times i have seen the fish swimming along i havent caught anything....also, all three times it was hot with bright sun....we can manage to catch dinks in the area but cant seem to get these nicer sized fish to bite anything..any thoughts?

Thanks

Cliff

[joez2872-ct]

same thing at my local pond there just sitting there in the sun  or moving  up and down shore  i have trown just about ever lure i have but   sumtimes i get  a nible or 2 with a jig   any help also  would be great got this one today in  a foot of water  on a senko

so three times in a row, in the very same spot on the bank...i have seen a school of bass....nice ones too...ranging from the 2-4lb range...they were all nice looking bass...anywhere from 3-6 in the groups....they just swim along the shoreline....wont bite anything i throw at em....just cruising along...what do you supose they are doing? what would you throw in that area to get bites? cuz all the times i have seen the fish swimming along i havent caught anything....also, all three times it was hot with bright sun....we can manage to catch dinks in the area but cant seem to get these nicer sized fish to bite anything..any thoughts?

Thanks

Cliff

[deepsessions]

sometimes you can cast out a little further and stir the water up with alot of topwater noise to get them in a feeding mode and then keep throwing the same bait or something else....if not a fluke,tube,senko, or Mattlures swimbait if the water is clear enough.

[nec237]

while in fla a few months ago  i saw the same thing being new to bass fishing i threw everything at this school of fish. turned out to be some alge eating fish the locals called mulets or something

[Red]

thanks guys, i am 100% positive these were bass...they were so close and moving slow...it would be hard to make that mistake

[Randall]

They are looking for bluegills and using the shoreline to pin up the bluegills so they can feed on them easier. Cast a Mattlures Bluegill ahead of the fish down the shoreline and fish it back as close to the shore as possible.

[T-rig]

Try an LC Sammy 115 in ghost sunfish.

[roadwarrior]

They are looking for bluegills and using the shoreline to pin up the bluegills so they can feed on them easier. Cast a Mattlures Bluegill ahead of the fish down the shoreline and fish it back as close to the shore as possible.

I run into this often at my local ponds and that is exactly what they are doing.

They don't bite all the time, but I can assure you, they DO bite!

[Red]

They are looking for bluegills and using the shoreline to pin up the bluegills so they can feed on them easier. Cast a Mattlures Bluegill ahead of the fish down the shoreline and fish it back as close to the shore as possible.

Try an LC Sammy 115 in ghost sunfish.

you guys are really the bait monkey in disguise arent you?

[Panamoka_Bassin]

I had this same problem, but KVD helped me out with it (ok, so he didn't personally help me, I just paid attention during a tourney on espn...).  A lipless crank or a shallow crank bait timed just right should get those buggers to bite.

[Tokyo Tony]

I often see the same thing on a couple of the little ponds I frequently fish.  Most of the time, by the time I see them, they've already seen me, but sometimes even after they've seen me, they'll take a 4 inch senko fluttering down in front of them.  

It's really helpful to know that they're looking for 'gills - thanks guys.  Come to think of it, the biggest fish I've pulled from those ponds was taken taken on a spinnerbait (chartreuse/orange/black - bluegill color) thrown along the weed edge while in my float tube.  So I'll definitely use more bluegill-imitators.

But Cliff - if they've seen you, you can try to temp them with a slow-falling senko...sometimes that works for me.

[WRB]

See the "Fishing deep open water " by Davis, post.

Pond bass tend to roam or patrol the shoreline because thats is where the majority of the ponds prey source is available.

WRB

[Tin]

If you throw out around them with a little finesse bait or a bait that immitates a bluegill (if thats what they are looking for) you can catch them. Make sure when the bait makes a light entrance into the water so you dont spook them. But chances are if you see them, then they probably can see you too. So they will be pretty spooky.

[Del from philly]

Throw a soft plastic.......a little smaller than your used to....maybe a 6 " curly tail worm, or a creature bait....

throw past the school, and then bring it about 3-5 feet away from the targeted bass and bring it up till it just kisses the surface, and then let it fall till the bottom,

sometimes, once it hits the bottom, they will swim to it, and then ignore it......if they do this, try something else.....

i had this same thing happen, and i got each of the bass to hit it once, and i missed all of them.....

i say, you get 1 shot at these bass.....and then they clam up.....i wasted my chance

[deepsessions]

how about a double fluke or small double swimbat setup? it can get messy if you don't space the leaders and size the baits right but can stir up some spooky or grouped up fish.

Also if you have some extra money laying around the Black Dog Shellcracker is one of the finest hardbait imitations. Or the 3;16 Mighty Minnow in bluegill. Lots of new options out there.

[.dsaavedra.]

wow when i first read cliff's post two things came to mind. lipless crank and spinnerbait. im suprised only one person said lipless crank and nobody said spinnerbait!!!!

anyway, yeah they are prlly lookin for a bluegill snack, so throw a bluegill imitator. if you cant afford the mattlures swimbaits, then an inexpensive and not too shabby bluegill swimbait is available from Storm for about 2.50. its called the kickin slab. i have one in bluegill color and its very durable and real lookin. the action isnt the greatest but it does ok.

[jeremyt]

This is a great topic for me, because I witnessed this first hand this past weekend.

  The bass were cruising a couple of feet off the bank and wouldn't touch any lure that I threw, I threw stick baits rigged a few different ways, spinner baits, jerk baits, jigs, pretty much everything that was in my tackle box. What really irritated me was the fact that the bass would pretty much make a big loop and work there way back and forth around the pond.

   While I did catch my pb bass Sunday morning, I  was getting really frustrated because I could see some bass that broke 5 pd mark and they wouldn't give any lure the time of day.

[deepsessions]

saturday I chased a 10lb'er that followed my hudd out of a tree for an hour. I got him to chew on a 6" basstrix paddle tail but he spit it right away.... I threw everything imagineable at him after that with no love. ...sometimes I'd rather just not see the fish I normally sleep better  :-/

[PondBoss]

This happens to me all the time.(well it used to happen)  See the fish and can't catch them with anything.  I started using a weightless trick worm in the loudest colors I can find.  Usually the electric orange is dynamite.  Fish it walking the dog style back to you slowly and no deeper than 6-12inches.  This is a killer for the pond bass around here, hopefully it will work for you there.