Which techniques are most important?

[wackyworm66]

Keep working on mastering the soft plastics.  Soft plastics will cover ALL gammets of fishing. You can fish them shallow, deep, or anything in between.  You can fish them extremely slow, very fast or anything in between.  If you can master soft plastics, you will catch fish anywhere.  Once you are comfortable with soft plastics; then move on to the things that use soft plastics in their makeup; such as jigs, spinnerbaits, etc.  Good luck, and Great fishin.

[FFF-150]

Which technique is most important? Depends on your water clarity, type of structure, type of cover, time of year and type of fish. For example, most of my water is stained, pretty much reservoirs with not much structure (other than points), with laydowns, stick ups, cattails and some grass beds and I'm fishing for largemouth in the Spring, Summer and Fall.

For what I've just described, I'd say flipping and pitching is the most important technique. The most important technique would be different in say, clear lakes with lots of bottom structure in the Winter fishing for Spots or Smallmouth.

I think you need to be more specific about what you'll be doing.

[BigEbass]

I am a pharmacist geek by profession and I started bass fising about 1.5 years ago - and spent much time reading readin reading...I still read books for fun and information when I travel - take what you read with a grain of salt I would say cause most of it is quite anectdotal and frankly stuff can blatently contradict - but it seems to me that many things can work on the opportunistic feeder that is the bass!  But certaintly, you cannot go wrong with soft plastics, spinnerbaits, topwater (pop-r and weightless trick worm are my favs). Jigs are something I am myself starting to learn just now, but I know of tons of people that swear by the jig-n-pig!! 

[The Capn]

It looks like several responses ahead of me have covered this, but it can't be emphasized enough. Learning a specific lure or technique is fairly low priority compared to understanding bass behavior, seasonal patterns, and the ever-changing environmental influences. It's easy to see how finding the perfect lure is the first thing that most people (myself included) focus on when they start bass fishing. But if all it took to consistently catch fish was knowing which lure to buy, then it really wouldn't be much of a sport. Don't get me wrong, I love to buy lures, and I have my own personal strengths and fishing style, but you can save yourself a lot of time, money and frustration by studying and understanding bass first. Personally, I have found no greater resource than the book, Knowing Bass by Keith A Jones, Ph.D. While it's true that Dr. Jones did most of his research for this book while employed by Pure Fishing, I have no doubt that he provides accurate, scientific, non-biased information. This book opened my eyes to how much misinformation is floating around out there, and improved my bass fishing success ratio forever. I have no affiliation to this book or Pure Fishing, but I would strongly recommend that you check it out. I know it's available at Amazon.com. I know this kind of plan is way less exciting than having me tell you that a green-pumpkin senko always works, but I promise you that you'll catch more fish, more consistently, by focusing on the fish.

[K_Mac]

Nice post Capn. Welcome aboard. I haven't read the book, but will do so. Thanks.

[RoLo]

The most deadly technique is the technique that YOU devised.

The "wrong" lure in the right hands is a thousand times more effective than the "right" lure in the wrong hands

It goes without saying, every angler has his own favorite lures.

but the savvy angler stays aloof of lure worship.

Our angling efforts are best concentrated on technique, versatility

and experimentation, but not the slippery slope provided by pet lures.

Roger

[INbassMAN]

Thanks again for everyones input. I will check check out the book Knowing Bass. Is there any other book that anyone recommends. I already have Bass Strategies by KVD.

[Paul Roberts]

This is a really good thread. Great stuff from everyone. Most recently, Capn, RoLo -very wise.

RoLo wrote:

The most deadly technique is the technique that YOU devised.

When you know what you need, this is what follows.

[Raul]

Thanks again for everyones input. I will check check out the book Knowing Bass. Is there any other book that anyone recommends. I already have Bass Strategies by KVD.

There are 2 videos that will teach you more than any book about bass behavior and biology: BigMouth and BigMouth Forever. Yup, they are old but the basics are the same 30 years ago than they are now.

[Catt]

http://espn.go.com/video/clip?id=4923872