First time out for bass ....

[greenlander]

Well, got the "new" boat out for the first time and tried my hand at bass on the fly for the first time w/o luck.

Fished Newton Creek in Collingswood, NJ. Fished from 7pm till around 9:30.

I'm hoping that it was the water we were fishing, and not me. My buddy on spin gear caught nothing, as well as everyone else we saw fishing from the shore.

Anyway, just curious how quickly I should change approach. I stayed on top almost exclusively, except going down below with a steelhead streamer and a woolly bugger briefly. I would've fished sub-surface more often, but had only tiny split shot with me.

Fished on top with frogs, mouserats, various deer hair and hard body poppers, and a couple divers.

Nothing happened anywhere.

If surface flies aren't producing, how quickly would you normally abandon them?

 

[PatriotFly26]

It depends, time of day, depth of water, what water I was fishing. Fish the poppers, and deer hair bass bugs, in weeds from a boat towards shore or from shore into the weeds.
Fish the streamers when you have deeper water and rocks. Thats what I usually play by, woollybuggers are great around large rocks sticking out of the water.

Good luck

 

[afishinado]

Greenlander,

Sorry your maiden voyage in your new boat didn't go so well. I check reports from all over and the bass, for the most part haven't turned on yet anywhere. Maybe the temps, maybe post spawn blues, who knows. Any week or day now I'm hoping it will change.

 

[PatriotFly26]

Bass have been nailing bass bugs for me, lakes and rivers. Smallmouth and largemouth. No luck with poppers yet, but bass bugs, my variation of a perch bucktail, and goldBH black woolly buggers.

I don't know what to tell ya other than try different places.

 

[mystillwater]

i've been doing well with poppers... early am and evening especially but i've gotten hits all day long. caught a 5lb+ on a Sneaky Pete in broad daylight (maybe 4-5pm). plus, if you fish a small-medium sized popper you'll catch sunnies too. it'll keep you busy all day long. i've got no complaints about a 50+ sunny and 6+ bass day. my hands and net still smell like fish and my back is still sore the next day!

 

[greenlander]

I wonder if my technique with the poppers is correct.

Basically I'm just letting them plop onto the surface and giving the rod tip twitches (or stripping line) to make them pop. Usually I'll do it fairly intermittently, but I have tried varying the frequency of popping the fly. Sometimes very intermittently, other times faster.

Anything else I should be doing?

 

[wgmiller]

Maybe you're fishing 'dead' water???

 

[greenlander]

wgmiller wrote:
Maybe you're fishing 'dead' water???

Oh that was most likely the case on my first time out the other day, I just want to check on my approach before heading out again.

 

[mystillwater]

i think its the initial splash that attracts the fish. i usally let it splash and sit for 15 seconds. if nothing hits, i'll usually recast. sometimes i'll twitch it a time or two. 90% or more of my strikes are on the original splash and not the pops.

 

[greenlander]

mystillwater wrote:
i think its the initial splash that attracts the fish. i usally let it splash and sit for 15 seconds. if nothing hits, i'll usually recast. sometimes i'll twitch it a time or two. 90% or more of my strikes are on the original splash and not the pops.

Good to know. I wonder if that 90% is similar to what other people are used to experiencing.

There were numerous times I wanted to let it sit longer, but my boat partner (and the one controlling the boat) is a spin fisherman, and wants to continuously troll along the shoreline rather than stop and fish certain spots. At the trolling speed, the longest I can let it sit is 4-5 seconds before the line slack runs out and the fly starts dragging on the surface.

Not being a bass fisherman, I think the constant trolling is a bunch of BS, but maybe I'm just not in the know. I'd assume it is no different than how I fish for trout: look for "fishy" water, stop, fish it, move on.

 

[midgeman]

I've been fishing many smallie rivers in MD and the bite is sloooow. The fish are there and I've been catching them on Chartreuse Zonker and white zonkers. I've been fishing them fast behind island drop offs and along mud banks. Another place is to focus on major riffles where oxygen levels are higher. I did very well last weekend at Dam 5 on the potomac behind riffles. All my go to honey holes are not holding fish around the Lander/ Point of Rocks area. Also, the heat has been a major issue and has slowed the bite. Focus fishing in the AM or PM. Poppers are not the way to go right now, maybe in another month. Smallies are focusing on minnows and crayfish....imitations of those patterns will work best.

Lefty Crey said, "if it ain't chartreuse, then it ain't work'n"...

Hope this helps you guys out!

 

[Fishidiot]

Here's another claim that bassin has been very slow so far this summer. Just speaking for myself, I think the warm weather and low water conditions had me a little too gung-ho a little too early for bass this year. The pre-spawn was fantastic this year and I suppose I thought that summer bassin would start early and fish great too but it seems I was over optimistic. I have had some good days but overall it's been slow. Yesterday evening I took a couple buddies to a favorite bass creek and we only got a couple fish when I would have expected to catch dozens.
I'm expecting it to pick up in another week or two.

 

[greenlander]

How much does it change things when we're talking smallmouth vs. largemouth. My questions in this thread were all in regards to largemouth (which I should have specified).

I've always understood largemouth tactics to be sort of their own set of methods, while smallmouth tactics fell in as sort of a hybrid between trout tactics and largemouth tactics. This is just my ignorant impression from reading various things online (mostly here) and drawing my own conclusions.

 

[PatriotFly26]

Largemouth right now= Weeds
Smallmouth right now= Rocks

Later the Largemouth will move out deeper to the rocks. Smallies stay deep until very late in the day when they run the banks. Great time to fish for them.

 

[GStan]

Greenlander,

Eight, nine years ago I used to fish Newton Creek very regularly with the fly rod from the bank and did fairly well using bass bugs in the #2-#6 range. What worked best for me was a slow but regular retrive. It is my belief that with the relative turbidity of the water the bass were more able to track and locate the fly. It was also my experience that very sharp hooks and a rod with a stiff but was helpful in effectively setting the hook. This may sound crazy but Newton Creek largemouths seemed to have tougher mouths than bass that I've caught in other waters.

 

[bassistjon112]

So far this year, in one pond i was taking bass by stripping in a Clouser minnow in really fast. And in another pond they weren't interested in ANY THING. I saw big one eating flies under the surface but she wouldnt bunch for any thing else.

I totally agree with Mystillwater, though there are times when I don't recast it out right away. Ill twitch it and let it sit because they will follow to the very end. I do that until the fly reaches me. But if you really want to catch fish toss any thing into some floating vegetation and just let it sit twitching in every now and then. They will explode on it.

 

[greenlander]

Is this typical that largemouth haven't been active/aren't taking much yet at this point in the year? If so, when do they normally turn on?

 

[mystillwater]

the experience i was relaying is specifically for largemouths on lakes.

the bass are definitely biting in my experience. and i'm only really fishing poppers for them. you've just got to fish the right time of day... when the light is indirect (i.e. not right overhead... about 4pm and later or 5am to 10am). also, as i mentioned, i use the same techniques/gear for fishing panfish in similar water to where i'm catching the bass so i'm not particularly impatient about the bass biting. i'm pretty busy with a little guys until the big boys come out and scare off the round ones!