I really like site fishing for largemouth. It's tough but I like how you can see them react. I notice that when I see one and I present my bait too close, they spook. If I pitch it a few feet off to their left or right they go and eat it often without hesitation.
This begs the question.... When you are pitching a jig or any bait, does it make sense to throw the bait exactly where you would think a bass is positioned? For example a reed point that has wind blowing into it, Or does it make sense to pitch your bait a foot or two left or right of where you think the fish is positioned?
After doing some site fishing the last couple years, I find it hard to believe that people aren't spooking a ton of fish by pitching to the wrong spot.
do you guys think about this, or do you just roll down the bank flipping and pitching at any irregularity you see?
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I am new to WA and yet to throw a line into the water here. Yes, that new. In fact all my gear is still being packed to meet me out here. Hopefully by year's end. I am coming from Florida. The majority of my flipping and pitching was in extremely heavy vegetation and cover. Then when you would flip and pitch isolated spots with much thinner cover and even beds it came down to technique. Even on flips/ pitches of distance the biggest thing came down to landed the bait with little to no "noise" and using the lightest weight possible for the fishing you were doing or the cover you were fishing. We could land directly on a fish but if the bait barely touched the surface and gently entered the water you would get the bite more times then not. In fact this is when you'd get it on the drop and not on the bottom. If your flipping and pitching is crashing into the water then yes, I think proximity to the fish can spook them for sure. However, even using giant weights and giant baits, if your flip gently slips into the water and enters the water quietly you can get some of the fastest and most aggressive bites you will experience landing right on top of the fish.
Ronan,
Welcome to washington.
I agree that quiet entry certainly is the way when pitching/flipping blind, although that still doesn't explain why I've seen a gently placed weightless finesse worm spook the heck out of a bass when dropped over the top of it.
Water clarity is the #1 variable in bass fishing. It trumps water temp, lure size, lure color, rod, reel, etc. If you see bass, they've already seen you. A bedding bass is extremely wary of danger from above. They are at their most vulnerable while on a bed and something flying in from overhead is their biggest foe. A feeding bass has a much different attitude than one spawning and may in fact be triggered by a splash or a visual stimulus of something moving (falling) in from above. So I don't buy into the "quiet" lure entry. Does the quiet lure entry outweigh the trolling motor noise that allowed you to get into that location? How do you explain a buzzbait?
The real trick is trying to assess a fish's general attitude and reason for being where they are. There are many phases, moods of spawning fish in general and even varying temperaments of ind. fish to add to the puzzle. Feeding fish are a different puzzle. So when you are going along pitching/flipping which fish are you fishing for...or are you just "fishin"? That should dictate where you throw to and how quiet you go about it.
I feel like fish in sparse cover/ open water are generally more alert and "spooky" simply because they are exposed; spawn or no spawn. Obviously there are always exceptions to the rule but almost all animals are like that. Everybody has seen how quickly a deer in a field spooks even from 200-300 yards yet a deer tucked into heavy cover will let you walk right by at 20 yards. I don't think bass are that different.
I have plowed through dead willows on Potholes and had the head of the trolling motor bound up; looked down and see the nose of a bass and catch his ass right off the head of the trolling motor. Conversely I've spotted fish on flats in clear water from 50 yards and made a decent cast only to spook the fish. I personally believe cover, which can be water clarity or lack there of, has a lot to do with the catchability of a bass.
I think the next time I see a buck tucked in heavy cover I'm gonna pitch a jig to him and see if he bites. Haha
In Florida we have two spawns or what you could call one ridiculously long spawning season. Sometimes a bedding fish just smashes your bait because it doesn't want it anywhere near it's bed. I prefaced my statement with Florida conditions because again I know things could be very different from where my experience is based.
Sorry guys, shoulda been more clear. I'm not talking about bed fishing. I'm talking early pre spawn and summer fishing.
Right on it...unless I have a reason not to. For every bass I spook, I can make one react. I don't know how to distinguish between the two when I can't see them so I'm just going with what's working and then later telling a story about how my "method" was the best one.
Jake I have found the more I tournament fish the case often turns out the more productive water I fish the better I do. So to be honest given what I know about your stretch of reeds I probably wont fish the whole thing. I'll fish the areas with current breaks, and shade, and points maybe places with contour changes and wood... If its a small lake and I'm just dinking around then heck yeah I'll probably give that whole stretch a solid try. I really don't get the chance to sight fish Largemouth pre or post spawn that much. I have done it at Potholes a few times in the last 5 years and at some smaller lakes, but I never try to land right on their heads when I can see them. If I'm just fishing at Potholes in the late summer around tight cover and isolated pieces of structure I don't really think nope cant pitch there I might hit one on the head... Not sure if that response makes any sense but I gave it a whirl.
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