Weird Bass Weekend

[Monster]

Hi Gents

We went fishing over the week end at a PVT water in Witbank. The fish where holding close to the shore and there was a abundance of little fish of about 15mm.  

We fished most of the morning and could not buy a bite even though we could sight fish most of the bigger bass. We made sure the bass could not see us when moving to the water by staying low and dropping the baits ( mostly Flukes and brushhogs) very far away and then swimming these baits about half a meter ahead of the bass. No takes, not even interest.

My one friend tied on a Money minnow and started in plain view jigging the minnow up and down just infront of one of the bass. It struck it probably about three times. Without toughing the hook. On the forth bite the fish hit the hook and was landed about a (1kg bass). 

Then the game was on with the money minnows, they nailed it but it needed to travel just below the speed of light to be effective. No big fish seemed interessted. Later in the day a couple of big carp made their apperience and I tried to dip for them with a bass rod, no takers on the carp a bass nailed it.

Any Ideas on how I could have improved our fishing chances? 

 

[E-Bird]

Hi Monster we had the same problem yesterday at Rust de winter untill we started using flies and tiny flukes on a very slow retrieve.An interesting thing was when you sight the bass the bigger ones was just lying 2-3m futher.We caught about 25 for the day.

 

[Zane]

Dear Forum,

This is interesting because we had exactly the same behavior at Clanwilliam dam here in the Cape this last weekend.

There were lots of smallmouth and largemouth bass around but the bass would either follow the lures and fail to strike or they would inhale and immediately spit out the bait.

The weather was perfect but the fishing was really difficult!

 

[Billaridoo]

Heita Monster,

Try Ryan's kurper rig with the Sada Curly Tails. This rig has done wonders for me when nothing else worked.

You can even move the splitshot to right up against the hook and lure, dropshot style, you'll get an excellent action out of it that way.


Good luck bud!!!!

 

[Monster]

Hey Billa

I dit get a bass like that on a lead head, like you dip for carp. So this may just work. Thank you for the advice!