Need help finding bigger fish

[Frogman]

My last few weigh ins have been pretty sad.  6.1 and 6.11 lbs.  I wore fish out.  Caught them all day long.  I am fishing what I believe to be old bedding grounds in the morning with fast moving baits (buzzers, cranks and jerkbaits) then once the sun gets a little higher I move to isolated structure in about 5-6 ft of water.  I was hoping someone would tell me what I am doing wrong and why I can't find the bigger fish. 

[BassThumb]

When I'm looking for bigger fish, I often move to deeper water and upsize my presentation.  That's at least what works for me.

[Frogman]

Yea that is one thing that I wanted to do today.  I went out there and found one 3 pounder but she was just sitting up under a pier, the rest were little.  I fished deeper water and points alot, but had trouble finding active fish.  It was a bluebird day here so that was probably part of the problem. 

[Chris]

What stage are the fish in? prespawn, spawn, post spawn?

[Bass_Akwards]

Read the book "In pursuit of giant bass" by Bill Murphy.  That should get you started.  I read that book and pretty much all I do now is catch big fish.

[WRB]

Everyone wants to catch larger fish. Bigger bass can be a different goal to a tournament fisherman verses a trophy fisherman for example.

The tournament fisherman should focused on catching enough weight to win the contest, not necessarily catching the biggest bass on that particular day on the water. Most tournament fisherman target aggressive active bass, due to time limitations. Since the population density of most bass lakes will have a greater number of bass under 4 lbs than over 4 lbs and most tournament rules have a minimum length of 12", then any bass over 1 1/2 lbs becomes a keeper, between 3 to 4 lbs become big tournament bass.

3 to 4 lbs bass are adult bass, no longer juveniles and this is important to recognize. Adult bass are more wary due to life experiences and can eat a wider range of prey. This means the larger bass can go just about anywhere it needs to be close to it's food source.

Your key is; find the prey and the bass will be close.

If your lake has both pelagic and dermersal bait fish, the bass can be nearly anywhere those bait fish are located. If the lake only has dermersal bait fish, the near shore or near cover that supports that type of prey is a good choice. Outside structure void of pelagic bait fish such as shad or crawdads, will not become a location for bass in that type of lake. If the lake has pelagic bait fish and aquatic matter, zooplankton, phytoplanton, then outside structure like channel ledges, humps, rock piles become excellent locations for adult size bass.

You find bigger bass near abundant food sources.

Take some time and study what types of bait fish your lake has and what other food sources are available for the bass and you will start catching bigger bass, because you will know where to fish and what type of lures to use.

WRB

[Frogman]

I am pretty sure that most places around me are in post spawn already.   I pretty much fish all the alabama lakes.  Martin, Logan Martin, Harding, Guntersville, Eufala.... I have never looked into shad that much but I do appreciate the info, I am going to check that out.   Deeper fishing is something I have gotta get better at.  It's been my weakness for a long time. Now I am off to do some research on shad.

[JellyMan]

Bigger presentations.

I upsized ALL my soft plastics and jigs. The only thing that changed was I caught the same number of fish, but more often than not, bigger bass.

This change up landed me my first double digit fish seen in my avatar. Big jig with the super big brush hog as a trailer.

[Chris]

Catching the larger fish right after they spawn gets interesting because they take some time to recoup. They are not in much of a mood to eat but it gets better over time. Once they school up and chase bait you want to find places that bottle neck the bait.

[Chris]

The good news is that bass don't all spawn at the same time so you might still find active fish schooling.