Bass fishing tactics for clear shallow water?

[-dave]

I recently had the opportunity to fish a small dam in the midlands that apparently has great bassing potential (dam record of 5+kg). After 2 hours of fishing I only managed to catch one baby bass, lose a medium sized one when it threw the lure as it jumped and two bites that produced nothing.

The dam has a large reed-bed and shallow area at the one end. The deepest spot that I could cast to was around 2-3m and the water was really nice and clear. Most of the shallower parts had thick green water weeds/underwater grass covering the bottom and the banks had patches of long water grass and reeds.

I tried a popper and weightless worms around the vegetation and shallow diving cranks in the deeper water (to avoid getting hooked up on weeds) without too much luck. I'd like to know what sort of tactics I should be using to get more bites and catches from a dam like this.

 

[Bigmouth]

1. Natural Colours
2. Thin Flourocarbon line
3. Fish very slow
4. Do not spook the fish (stay low)
5. Fish from behind a bush or shelter if possible.

 

[-dave]

Thanks for the tips Bigmouth... I think the problem was that I wasn't very well hidden - standing with my back to the sun casting a big shadow over the water...

 

[Marthin]

As bigmouth said...

I also had an oppertunity once to fish crystal clear water that was pretty shallow.

Slow down... i mean jerk the bait once or twice and then just let it lie still on the ground.... The bass are used to hunting very very slow otherwise they spook the bait, so they won't chase anything that is moving, and they themselves will spent up to 60 seconds "stalking" your bait....

Secondly find out what they are eating and try and get as close to that... the dam i fished in was chock and block full of platannas/frogs, but they were hiding under leaves.

As soon as we changed to soft black frogs and jerked it about 2m and then just let it settle on the bottom we started getting fish. You could actually see it swim to about 1m from the frog, and then take FOREVER to edge closer at about 1cm a second and then suck up the bait.

 

[100% African]

Also try a double willow leaf spinner. Works the magic in shallow water. Go for a chart/white colour. Wear dark colour clothing or camo. Sounds stupid but it will help. And try a top water frog on the weed...

Which dam was this and is it open to the public? Would like to give it a try.

 

[-dave]

100% African wrote:

Also try a double willow leaf spinner. Works the magic in shallow water. Go for a chart/white colour. Wear dark colour clothing or camo. Sounds stupid but it will help. And try a top water frog on the weed...

Which dam was this and is it open to the public? Would like to give it a try.

Hmmm... unfortunately I do not own a double willow leaf spinner... I'll have to put it on my shopping list for the next time I go to the tackle shop I do have some floating plastic frogs but I was a bit reluctant to use them because they're really big and I don't think that any fish large enough to take the frog would be able to swim in the shallows where the reeds are.

It's the dam at St. Ives, just past Midmar Dam on the R103. Fishing is R30 per hour or R100 for the day, bassing is catch and release. It's quite a nice set-up with a pub/restaurant, thatched lapas, braai spots, etc - no bush-wacking required

 

[Even Flow]

What has worked well for me in shallow clear water, and taking into consideration the weed beds, is fishing a Strike King 5" Z-Too Fluke weightless. Simply cast the lure as close to the strike zone as possible and dead stick for a few seconds. 1 or 2 quick twitches and repeat.

The Z-Too's are well impregnated with salt so it floats. Jerking the lure twice with correct timing gives it a "walk-the-dog" action and makes the lure dive 20-30cm, just deap enough to bring the bass out from cover. The key however is patience. I have deadsticked this lure well over 30sec before and on the very first twitch had the strike. Excellent seeing a big Dawg taking it topwater. 

 

[Little Green Fish]

Even Flow wrote:

What has worked well for me in shallow clear water, and taking into consideration the weed beds, is fishing a Strike King 5" Z-Too Fluke weightless. Simply cast the lure as close to the strike zone as possible and dead stick for a few seconds. 1 or 2 quick twitches and repeat.

The Z-Too's are well impregnated with salt so it floats. Jerking the lure twice with correct timing gives it a "walk-the-dog" action and makes the lure dive 20-30cm, just deap enough to bring the bass out from cover. The key however is patience. I have deadsticked this lure well over 30sec before and on the very first twitch had the strike. Excellent seeing a big Dawg taking it topwater. 

Don't mean to be nasty or anything of that nature Buddy, but salt in soft plastics make it sink way faster the more the salt content is, now floating I've done with adding micro balloons (nitrogen filled glass beads, a powder that acts like water that's how small the beads are) this is the only substance that I know that gets soft plastics to float, salt deffs a weight adding sinking additive.

 

[Shannon]

LGF is right salt makes a lure sink.

The SK Z-Too is made of Cyberflex not plastisol, Cyberflex on it's own floats like a cork, it's also just about indestructable. The Z-Too is actually the sinking version, the SK Zulu is the floating version, but with a small light wire hook the Z-Too will float. If you play with various hooks you can actually get it to suspend in the water column. Deadly lure and is the only lure that can take multiple hits from a Shad without being torn up. (Just don't mix them with normal lures, they react with each other and disintegrate into a sticky clump of goo).

 

For very clean water downsize everything, hook, line, swivel, junior super fluke is hard to beat in this situation in plain watermelon seed. Slow way down and look for good cover. Bass will sit in shady areas when there is bright light from sun or clean water. And don't for a second think that large bass won't hide in very shallow water, as long as there is cover for them they are happy in water that is just deep enough to cover their backs. If you have floaded vegetation pull a fluke, frog or even a buzzbait over the top of it, making lots of noise, you'll be surprised at what comes through that vegetation

 

[Even Flow]

Little Green Fish wrote:

Even Flow wrote:

What has worked well for me in shallow clear water, and taking into consideration the weed beds, is fishing a Strike King 5" Z-Too Fluke weightless. Simply cast the lure as close to the strike zone as possible and dead stick for a few seconds. 1 or 2 quick twitches and repeat.

The Z-Too's are well impregnated with salt so it floats. Jerking the lure twice with correct timing gives it a "walk-the-dog" action and makes the lure dive 20-30cm, just deap enough to bring the bass out from cover. The key however is patience. I have deadsticked this lure well over 30sec before and on the very first twitch had the strike. Excellent seeing a big Dawg taking it topwater. 

Don't mean to be nasty or anything of that nature Buddy, but salt in soft plastics make it sink way faster the more the salt content is, now floating I've done with adding micro balloons (nitrogen filled glass beads, a powder that acts like water that's how small the beads are) this is the only substance that I know that gets soft plastics to float, salt deffs a weight adding sinking additive.

 

No worries, I accually meant to say "Z-Too's are well impregnated with salt AND it floats". Can see how the SO could have been misleading.

 

[100% African]

I've seen that place many times, didn't know they had bass there. Have you fished Lavender Trout down the road?

 

[-dave]

100% African wrote:

I've seen that place many times, didn't know they had bass there. Have you fished Lavender Trout down the road?

Nope... I'm still kinda new to the bass fishing scene so I'm slowly finding new places to fish. Do they have bass and how much do they charge? Could you provide a bit more info about the place? (Their website doesn't say much)

 

[Little Green Fish]

@ even flow, sorry for the huge enlargement bud, and no probs, you must see some of the typo's I make sometimes, we all do since Ryan introduced us to the two-finger typing method.some time back.

 

[100% African]

Haven't fished there. think they only have trout. Plan on fishing there soon. Will keep tou updated.

 

[Ryan]

SHot LGF