Bass Habits & Bass Basics 101

[roadwarrior]

RoLo,

Rating of your last post:  *****

(That's suppose to look like five stars).

This is a new perspective for me anyhow, I have never thought of it that way.

[Matt Fly]

Sorry Rolo,   For every point mentioned , theres a counter point.    Not all lakes are Resovoirs,   In Texas we have only one natural lake, formed due to an earthquake, Caddo.   Also you say when void of vegitation, they turn to the rivers.   80% of lakes and resorvoirs don't have a river running in.   Most are low lying areas with good runoffs that fill most TX lakes.

A lake is defined by being dammed that is fed by a river.

A resorvoir was built to store water, thus a water shed, no rivers.

Fork resorvoir, improperly called Lake Fork, has no rivers

Rolo, does your hydrilla grow from 20 ft depths?  ours does, why wouldn't you target deep fish in the grass?  Why limit your self the shallow grass bass.

Bass are gonna go where the bait is,  if thats timber for 2 months, grass for 6, open waters schooling in late Sept thru Oct chasing migrating shad, or eating crappie under some guys dock whos has 50 xmas trees planted.

If a lake is lacking structure, it will relate to contour.   Where ever that may be.   Middle of lake, banks, the dam,

Rolo, there is no magical chart that proves anything.   Each and every lake has its on mysteries.  Some lakes have boat docks, some don't, some vegitation, some never did, some wood, some never did, some have rivers feeding them some don't.   Some have good state programs, some don't.   Some have had bass clubs planting brushpiles to counteract the eroding timber, some don't.

So in the state of TX, we have only one lake that has happy bass.   Caddo and the rest are sad.

39.66lbs, 5 fish 1 day total, ring a bell anyone, Amistad 1-21-06, the guys where fishing how deep to win this tournament, 18-25 on a point.

For those of you that are bank beaters, how do you know theres no fish deep, your bank beaters!!!!!!!   How can you argue with success when you don't give it a shot.    

Texas State record was caught at 40ft,   18.18 while crappie fishing with a minnow.   That fat lazy bass was feeding on crappie most likely.    Caught two miles from Dam,    I said lots of lake records are caught in the dam areas because of the deeper water.    On a 75 mile long lake, 6 miles from the dam is still the lower lake and in the Dam area.    Don't  think I said off the dam, I said dam areas, which if most kept track, you would find that a large number of huge fish come from deep areas.    

[RoLo]

Rolo, there is no magical chart that proves anything.

Ah hah, and therein lies the beauty, because the magic is between the angler's ears  

The Chart Tells All,, no different that the price chart of a stock.

The only beneficiaries however are those who are able to decipher its wealth of knowledge.

This is not something you're going to read in a book (wouldn't that be special).

My wife and I planned a vacation to Sacandago Reservoir, New York.

As always I charted my trial sites on the hydrographic map of Sacandaga Reservoir.

When I arrived at the lake I stopped in a sport shop on the lake. I asked the owner

how the fishing was, and we began to chat. Eventually, he said to me, boy if I only had a chart

I could show you some good fishing spots. I told him that I have a lake chart in the car.

I got my chart and spread it across his counter. He looked at that chart for a long time,

obviously studying my scrawlings. Finally, he said to me, "who put this mark here",

I said, oh that's nothing, I did that at home. He said, "Oh yah it's something, that's one of

the spots I was going to show you. We went through that same ritual with about 3 other spots

that I had marked at home (lake unseen). Finally, he pointed at one of my marked spots and said,

"This spot here is my secret spot and one that I'd never tell you about". When I folded my map and left,

there were no additional hotspots on my chart. My wife and I still laugh about that today, in fact,

she's standing beside me as I right this.

[Peter E.]

There are two tools that will always make a good fisherman better, that is a chart and a good depth finder. The charts as Rolo had pointed out are essentail to locating fish in an area that is unknown, and as Rolo pointed out if you take the time to study a map before even visiting a new body of water then you have cut off four hours of fishing time in search of drop offs and points,bays and flats. A depth finder will then help you to find productive structure on the floor of the water body. Simply taking the time to search the water with a depth finder is a great step in being more effeceint in fishing. If an angler has a GPS then you can count off another two hours of search time on the water, and that angle can return back to that same spot within a couple of feet everytime after that.  A good GPS is one of the best tools for moving about on the inshore flats and in true swamps complete with their floating Islands which can leave a person disorinted for hours. But as RoLo pointed out the best tool a fisherman has is his own reasoning ability.

Peter

[Matt Fly]

Charts, in reference to water, are used to navigate, Maps are for fishing.    I han no idea you were refering to a chart as a fishing map, I thought you had a magic chart for all contours of types of lakes.    

Thus my response, their are no magical charts!    Some times even though lakes are located close by each other, have the same makeup, same cover, same water clarity, the same rules don't apply on both all the time.  

[Michael H]

Those are good articles thanks for the links

[Guest bigtex]

For the question as of if bass have an inteligence level---I believe so.  

INTELIGENCE--  THE ABILITY TO LEARN AND UNDERSTAND OR TO DEAL WITH NEW OR TRYING SITUATIONS...ETC.

DUMB--LACKING THE NORMAL POWER OF SPEECH

I don't think DUMB is the right word to use.....

Obliviously bass have the ability to learn and understand or can deal with new or trying situations.  They know how to react to changing in weather conditions and traffic.  Now how smart are bass?  Well, I believe they have a form of amnesia.  I believe due to shock, fatigue, injury, or illness they may forget what might have not felt right to them the day before and therefore in time will bite the same lure that caused them pain or discomfort.  This is why some people think of fish as dumb.  What people don't realize is that bass are and can be SMART for a short period of time.  They don't have the long span of memory that we have.  Ex., If we were to bite a lure and get away, I can promise you that for the rest of the time that I am alive I will never bite a lure again.  Now with that being said, how many times have you hooked the same fish or a fish that has already been caught.  Just something to think about.

As far as where most bass are caught or stay, I believe during certain time of years they will be shallow and then deep.  For example, spring time= shallow and winter= deep.  This is not the case everytime, just most of the time.

[Maineiac]

I need to retire so I have more time to read and digest all the information that has been on here lately and then have the opportunity to try and apply it. I'm not even totaly sure at this point what info we are dealing with on this particular thread at this moment as folks have made some quite appropriate links between this thread and some others to the point where I'm more than a little confused so if I wander off topic my appologies but I also feel the need to tie some pieces together if for no other reason than it is how I process and I am so random abstract it is the only way I function real well.

If we are talking intelligence in fish we are probably not dealing with the equal of a finny Albert Einstein and the works of Pavlov and others have been mentioned but a better comparison might be made with the work of B.F. Skinner and his efforts with rats and operant conditioning. Pavlov made the connection with dogs and a bell rung at feeding time. A logical connection to this and our bass quary is probably the process that bass go through that allows them to "learn" that certain vibrations in the water indicate the presence of food or that certain smells/tastes indicate things they might want to eat. With Pavlov the process was then manipulated in such a manner that getting a drool reflex for the sight of or presence of food and the association of a bell sound to the point where the sound of the bell not in association with the presence of food would also evoke the drool reflex. This is in a nut shell what lure manufactures have been trying to do for years. If they can get a feeding reflexive response from fish without the presence of actual food all they are doing is playing off a naturally occuring conditioned response. Does this of and by itself indicate any level of intelligence as we would relate to it? No probably not but it is still a "learned" trait that we can and do exploit. Now this is mostly wrapped up around a process of positive reinforcement where certain stimulae can be exploited by the fish to gain feeding impulse satiation. The flip side of this might be to look at Skinners work with rats and a process whereby rats were Taught to respond in a certain way either through pushing a certain lever or bar and being rewarded with food or pushing a different button and getting a mild shock through their feet and a charged wire floor in the bottom of the cage. Through a process of trial and error most rats learned to avoid the dreaded tingley feet and were able to keep themselves fed.

This mixture of positive and negative reinforcement is probably what we deal with for the most part when we are talking bass beahavior. Why are hatchery reared fish so fragile when put into the natural environment? The simple answer is that they have not "learned" what stimulae in the wild translates into food or for that matter danger because they have been insulated from the need to "learn" beyond the fact that a hatchery worker walking along the raceway with a bag in his hand and a splash on the water means it is din din time. I have seen hatchery trout actually come to the surface in a feeding type mode when a small handfull of gravel was thrown across the surface. Now this impulse goes away quickly as these fish "learn" that in their new homes other things indicate the presence of food or danger but even with a fairely steep "learning curve" the vast majority of stocked fish do not survive long or well in the wild, a fact that makes put and take fisheries of questionable value in most places unless they become prime elements in the food chain of bass. Can you say California?

Now these "learned" traits and their subsequent retention or memory factor is where some of this gets very interesting. On this we are some what hung up on a process we as humans employ to understand the natural world. It is difficult for many of us not to give fish and other wild critters human like characteristics as a means of understanding their behavior. This process of anthromorfication can be both a good and bad thing because it can lead us correctly to mimic a fishes favorite food and feel with confidence that we are putting just what they want to eat on the ole fishy dinner table but can at times lead us astray when we try to give the fish traits and abilitis they probably do not possess. But hey we have all grown up with animal cartoon characters that talked and acted like humans so why not bass Thank you Walt Disney.

And so it is that we would like to asscribe memory as we understand it to fish. When it is much more likely that what we are dealing with is a series of conditioned responses that have varying levels of validity and strength from fish to fish and from situation to situation. Are some fish "smarter" than others or are we just dealing with fish with varying levels of conditioning? I suspect that for the most part big ole bass are those that for what ever reason made the correct choices early on and continued to make those correct choices through life through a process of positive and negative reinforcement. And yes even big old "smart" bass can make some pretty poor choices at times. I would guess that most really good fish are caught not because we found a   one with a lapse of "memory" but because we presented a particular bait in a particular manner at a particular time in a particular place that for some reason fell out side of the bass's operant conditioning and ended up saying to the fish "hey that odd looking piece of plastic thats smells like something faintly familiar and that is moving in a manner sort of like other food I have eaten and is where I normally eat must be ok so I will give it a try" so if we can present something that does not by itself alarm the fish and that fits into its conditioning we have the chance to get bit.

I suspect a large part of this especially for larger fish is the avoidance of danger. If we can present to it and not elicit a flight impulse then we are half way there. The Murray book and those huge worms of his probably are in this genre. A big hunk of plastic moving ever so slowly across the bottom didn't register as a threat so moved into the could be food column. What does a 7" Senko look like to a fish? Probably little in the real food chain but put one down in the right area all gooped up with something like Smelly Jelly and deadstick it until you find youself talking out loud about how long it has been since you last moved it and you are doing exactly what I am talking about. In nature slow movement is most often interpreted as safe or maybe edible. I know this does not explain the good fish caught on reaction types of baits but if we consider the entire capacity of a fish to "think" through a situation a bass in a position of ambush that has a bait flash by is given very little time to apply any kind of "thought" process. In any given situation there will be fish that will or will not react in the manner we would wish. I fish a pile of very clear water and sight fishing can be a season long situation. I have put fish in a react or lose the opportunity situation and had them crush the offering. I have had many more situations where I have for some reason elicited a leave it alone or head for cover reaction. It is probably why most serious trophy hunters opt for closely mimicing known food items than opt for reaction bites.

I also think that those of us in more Northern climes have another interesting element many of you do not have. I have noticed that after several years now of Senko type baits cleaning up on fish that the hey days may be behind us for some of those fish. Yes I know the bait type still produces but on some water it isn't what it was. B U T our fish do not get pressured by open water fishing all year round. A good cover of ice sees to that. And I have noticed that right after ice out I can still have some real good days with Senkos but the window of opportunity is not what it once was and the great early Senko bites would seem to indicate that there is a factor in the equation that shows there is a loss of "learned" response but apparently it is one that can be reinforced all to quickly. This I have to admit is just a guess on my part but it is what I have observed.

I think ultimately what we are dealing with though is less inate intelligence but the fact that those fish that do make it to larger size may simply have been among the few that made the right early choices and might just be more naturally wary to start with than their unluck brothers and sisters. Is it possible that bigger fish are those with better developed senses? I have often wondered why it seemed to be so much easier to spook big fish than say smaller ones. Are those fish that get bigger simply endowed with better sensory capabilities leading them to be able to make better responses.

[Maineiac]

Ok I checked back and it looks like we are tackling this from two sides on this thread and as I have all ready run off on the whole fish intelligence thing I might as well take a shot at the big fish deep water connection. R Warrior and I will probably sound a similar cord on some of this and I hope I will show for some reasons of territorial similarity. I'm probably going to tick some of you off on this and please understand that is the farthest thing from my intent, as I want to start by patting all the contributers to this thread on the back for building an incredibly informative and thought provoking discussion. I have printed it off and insisted my 2 partners and my oldest read all of it because of the well reasoned insights given.

All that said we need to set some delimiters for the discussion or at least I do to qualify what I wish to say. The areas I need to look at even before starting would be what constitutes big? What constitutes deep and is this even a discussion for large parts of the country? Now I believe I saw along the way on here that we would be limiting ourselves to a depth discussion on fishing for LM and not SM. That is probably a good thing as the issus surrounding SM and depth can get quite interesting and probably deserves a seperate thread of its own. What say RW? Should we at some point tackle that can of worms?

B I G? I fear that for some of us this isn't conceptually a good topic, the reason is that there seems to be a mind set that anything less than 10 pounds does not qualify as big or even as a trophy and that more likely most are of the opinion that one needs to be talking in the teens before they have standing. Well that is fine for some but it eliminates a good part of the country and those that fish there so let me put forth a concept. I live in a state that has had for some time a LM record of 11-10 and other places like Minn. have just recently seen their LM record go up to 8-14. Other areas in the Northeast and Northern tier of states have similar records and by connection opportunities for big fish what this translates into is a whole different set of parameters. Let me share a concept.

In California with a state record of about 22 pounds one seemingly has to be hooking up to a 16-17 pound fish before they are considered to be in the realm of the giant catchers. Now if the state record is approximately 22 and it take s a 16 to be considered then we are talking a fish of approx. 75% of the weight of the current record. Ok then if my state record is 11-10 and I should be shooting for a 75%er or better to meet my self imposed guide then I am talking a fish in the 8-9 pound range. And if you look at Minnesota level numbers. an 8-14 record would translate into about a 6.5 or better 75%er. Now these figures are all rough ones but they are in the ballpark enough for me to show what I wish to show. Folks I have talked to in Minn. seem to reflect that a LM over 6 is something to write home about and I can state that my experience up here in the great state of Maine fishing that goes back to my first bass on July 4, 1954 and now pushing 16 years of tourney fishing I have seen less than 10 fish better than 9 pounds brought to the scales  and never one better than 10. Does not mean there are not new records out there or some more 9's or 10's but the whole size pyramid thing says there are not many. This has been how I have set my own bench marks and I would be curious if some of you folks in your states have similar numbers. RW I know you have taken some fine LM in your area are these numbers workable with you as well?

So if we are saying we want to target big bass in our areas that would constitute fish equal to approximately 75% of the current state record what then would constitute deep. Ok, kind of like asking how high up is but for some of us it is probably a number that can be determined. For some of you others I'm not even sure it is a question worth asking. You Florida chaps catch some wonderfull fish but from every thing I read or hear you talk about I don't see where this depth question is a factor. For a Doug Hannon to be able to make blanket statements about big fish being shallow and then doing most of his fishing in Florida or the deep south is disingenuous at best.  And even for some California anglers to say they are catching their fish in under five feet of water when they don't tell you that it was really 5 feet deep over 60,70 or way more water is equally out of the equation. I frequently catch smallies and even LM acting in a pelagic manner out over the deepest water in the lake and catching them nearly on the surface but I think what we are discussing is LM that are close to or relating to the bottom.

So if we take Southern tier weedbed fishing out of the equation (don't take this as a knock guys because our way North boys don't do all that well frequently in your weedbeds a fact that was reinforced with the recent Federation championship when a lad that can eat your lunch up here on any given day was run through the Florida wringer and was far from the first but this is a discussion of depth. So I am going to limit myself to that which I know or at least thing I know.

Which all probably means we are talking LM lakes that may be Oligatrophic or early Mesotrophic over other forms. Now if we are even more limiting and take Oligatrophic lakes out for some of the same reasons we might remove some southern water but on the opposite end of the scale (too deep, too cold and too barren and not generally where one would go hunt big LM) then we are probably going to need to just talk those lake and resivoir types more common to the majority of us, or early to late mesotrophic.

If we get the size defined and the lake type defined we still have issues of forage base and seasonality or climactic varriabilities. What this means in general is that there are probably lakes where a given predominant forage base can and will to some extent dictate optimal depth at which good fish may be found. So too would factors such as length of the season. Those of you with water that does not freeze for 4-5 mounths of the year are going to find bass doing things I can not relate to any more than you can relate to my fishing the edges of ice sheets as a form of cover. So those of you that have significant thermoclines for a considerable portion of the year have a built in depth limiting factor to start with those of us that have short term thermocline issues generally don't except in certain situations.

So if I narrow all this down where do I find what I consider good fish in water that at least a number of you can relate too? Well I suspect there will always be some good fish caught shallow because that is where often they must come for good feed and that is where most of you spend your fishing time so chance factor of a hook up increases but is not probably indicative of where the largest number of big fish in any body of water are at any given time. I have the paradox of my PB having come out of 2 feet of water last year and the fact that most of my good fish of the last few years having come out of 10-12 feet my next most productive depth has been 12-18 feet with 15 having been quite good. The commonality has been accross the board that 2 feet or 18 feet I have always been within little more than a cast or a cast and a half of some of the deepest water in any given body of water.

I have found fish the last couple of years that I would like to catch at depths to 25 feet and more but have not reached the point where I am consistantly able to catch them. Fish that stack up off main lake humps and points will frequently be found during periods of the day at the transission point of drop to lake bottom or drop to secondary shelf and if these depths coincide with prefered depths for a given forage base then can be quite good spots for bigger fish but like I said I have not founf it to be consistantly productive as often times these fish seem to be inactive or in a neutral mood. I'm sure it is more a lack of skill on my part over what the fish are doing but can't say I understand it all yet.

If I had to gamble it all right now on most of the water up here that I hunt the big ones on I would be fishing deep weed edges right next to major drop offs to deep water. Yes I know comments on here have raised questions about some of Buck Perrys concepts but it was his book that got me to the point where I started to catch bigger fish and I still think many of his concepts are at least starting points in the chase for big fish. I just don't beat the bank anymore for big fish. The odds are just not in your favor. I don't always go D E E  P but the farther I can get off the bank and find the conditions I want the more better fish I catch and where probably 70-80+% of my 70-75% trophy bass come from.

[Matt Fly]

Folks, shallow vs deep bite,  there are times when big fish are caught shallow and deep.  

If you go back and read Tom Reddingtons reports, Why would he bother to mention the deep bites between 25-40 ft.    Its is a fishing report, and obviously he fishes that deep or he wouldn'nt make that up in his reports.  

[Maineiac]

Matt not sure your last post served the purpose you intended. It did seem to shut down a rather productive and informative thread. The whole point has been or seems to have been that good fish can at times be caught shallow or at other times deep depending on the lake or region. It looks like the question remains as to why one can do what they can when they can. I have really enjoyed this and have found myself hooking up my partners to this discussion. I still have some questions for the esteemed panel.

RW, do you see this depth thing and smallies as I do? The LM only lads don't even suspect the depth factor and our smallies and I have days I'm not sure I do even after all these years. Do you get the thermocline issue and smalie success as we do at times? With some of our oligatrophic smallie lakes and a predominent forage of rainbow smelt in some of our lakes the chase the thermocline thing can play into this.

With the LM is this driven as much by forage as anything else? Sorry Matt some of us don't live in Texas and this is helping. Want to get every last drop of info out of it.

[roadwarrior]

No, there is no thermocline in the Tennessee River system. The river and reserviors of the system have too much flow to allow for this to develop. Thermocline is a result of differential temperatures within a water body. The Tennessee River system is too shallow for this to occur.

Some of the reserviors are unique, like Guntersville and Wilson which support vegetation in shalllow water. With the exception of some major arms, Pickwick has no vegetation, only structure. Although I rarely fish the lake, I still catch smallmouth on structure in the lake, not cover. The lake produces Kentucky bass, largemouth and some smallmouth, but the monster smallmouth are caught in the upper portion of the lake where it is really a river. I fish below the dam.

Smallmouth are attracted to structure and current. Their lazy cousins generally stay in the slack water, whether it is the lake or the river. Although we often catch catch largemouth when fishing for smallmouth, you rarely (never) catch bronzeback fishing for largemouth.

[RoLo]

Maineiac,

Maineiac, I probably owe you an apology because I took the liberty to delete my own post.

If it's appreciated, I don't mind revealing hard-won experiences and knowledge that took me

years to gather, in fact it's one of the greatest joys of fishing. I'm not unaccustomed to fishermen

approaching me for advice, usually because the lodge owner (who success depends on their success)

told them that we were doing well. Unfortunately, that always makes me feel that their success

has just become my responsibility, so I always Spill My Guts.

When I re-read this thread I felt that the post deserved a little better resting place,

that it shouldn't be buried here. It's not that it wasn't appreciated because Roadwarrior was kind enough

to give it a 5-star rating. Surely we'll get the opportunity over time to rehash all the same facts

and information in other more appropriate threads. Opposition is healthy, and that's what a forum

is all about, but not when it's mean-spirited.

[Maineiac]

Ok RoLo but I have no idea why you would see the need to appologize to me. Nor anyone else for that matter. I look forward to getting home in the evening and checking out BR and what new gems are in the offing for that day. Becoming a better fisherman as has been so often pointed out on here takes time and effort and particularly time on the water. For those of us that live in areas that are seemingly tucked up to the next ice age that time on the water thing gets a little skewed and that is where a forum such as the ones we have access to on BR become so important to us. Trying to keep the learning process going in the winter is hard. But here I sit on a day when the outside thermometer hovers at near zero with a blizzard on its way and I have my book of marked up lake maps beside my chair and I find myself setting up for the tourney season by comparing threads on here to conditions that I know or suspect.

I haven't seen anything on here that has been disrespectful to considered input. Even when folks have wandered off where their minds have taken them folks have pretty much gone with the flow and just nudged things back into forum line (something other sites can't always lay a claim to). I have days I almost *** Matt and George and the others that have a more stable fishery and have even found input from the South I have filed away for those moments up here when it actually does warm up (hey I saw water temps hit 80.5 once last year, for about 3 hours) (ok 2 days later it was 75 but that is warm water fishing? Right?) Anyway RW had it right on a 5 star rating for some of your stuff and I would say the same for much of this thread. Hats off to Matt for starting it.

RW I didn't stop to think about the riverine nature of your fishing world. Had I done so it would have been obvious that the current factor would have a serious effect on any kind of thermocline factor. D U H. I think you are right on though about structure and smallies. I can count a few lakes where deep weed can mean quality smallies but for the most part it has always been drops and rocks. I have just returned to spending much time on rivers for bass and the resivoir as a fishing pond so I'll probably be a pest on that issue too. Anyway thanks for all the info and allowing a frozen out fisherman a place to muse on what he thinks he is learning.

[shorefisher]

Incredible thread. Thanks

[firefightn15]

Agreed shorefisher. Another old thread that I've been fortunate to read. This is GREAT learning. Brian

[Sam]

Matt,

Interesting post, especially with all of our new members.

Thanks for the time and effort to research and type that data, even if you were fortunate to cut and paste it from another document.

No matter what anyone says about Keith Jones and his publication, his book is a study he performed at Berkley and I do not believe he had any reason to skew the results in Berkley's favor.

As a Ph.D. he has to publish or perish and his book is excellent although we all have some problems with some of his scientific findings as they do not balance with our experience on the water.

I suggest everyone purchase his book for a very interesting read this winter.  I will review it this winter along with the posts I have saved and two other bass books I just purchased.

I could not get the basshouse site to open. Will try later.

Thanks again and I sincerely hope you will continue your posts and use a Word Document to type and spell check them and then paste them within the forum reply box.  Otherwise you could lose the entire post wtih one typing misstep.  

[AStallings]

I've always wondered if Bass were intelligent enough to realize they were intentionally tricked into biting a fake lure with a hook in it  :-?

[Harold Scoggins]

On ‎1‎/‎31‎/‎2006 at 3:21 PM, roadwarrior said:

Raul,

What do you think about shallow vs. deep water discussion?

Although this is a long thread and I ended up reading it 4-5 times already, I hope the discussion on deep fishing continues. I think the polls would lean towards the shallow anglers for the very reason Roadwarrior mentioned earlier, more anglers are in their comfort zone when hunting hawgs in shallow water. I remember a time when I felt intimidated fishing deep, but with help from a couple of experienced old timers, I forced myself to go deep. I failed really bad at first, (lost a lot of jigs and cranks) but once I mastered topo maps and sonar and targeted those areas mentioned earlier (deep structure adjacent to points, etc) my luck changed. During the summer of '06, I landed 262 LMB between 5-8 lbs in 15'+ water. (McGee Creek Lake and Broken Bow Lake in SE Oklahoma for those who want to experience deep water) Although landing those big ones along the shore is fun, there is nothing more satisfying than pulling them up from the deep. I've really enjoyed reading this thread and I hope it continues.

[Brew City Bass]

Back from the dead!

[12thManStanding]

13 years late to the party, but the content did not disappoint.  This was my first summer bass fishing and I'm so glad I came across this forum and post.  Bass fishing is unlike any other fishing I've done before and I love it, and am (un)fortunately addicted...