What is a good way to catch bedding bass in Florida?
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Ok so my grandpa and I go fishing on his lake in northeast florida and i see some fish moving in an area of about 40 feet 2 rows of lots of lily pads. When we get over there, there are atleast 25 different beds with a bass sitting on them. I hooked about 8 bass, and reeled 2 within 3 ft of the boat before they got off. i was using a plastic worm with a spinner blade on the end. The bass bedding in this area were atleast 3 lbs each. If u have any advice or tips on catching bedding bass please respond, Thank you very much
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I’ve done a lot of bass fishing and the best way that I have found is to hook a couple live minnows together lip to lip and cast right in the bed. It looks like minnows trying to eat the eggs. The bass will sometimes knock them out w/ it’s tail but eventually will eat them.
l prefer not to target bedding fish. don’t forget, they are building next year’s stock.
no one left to guard the eggs/fry once you have taken it. say bye-bye to about 3000 babies per nest.
I hail from North Florida.
Here are the lures I’ve had the best luck with for bedding Bass-
1. Texas-rigged Lizard- http://www.basspro.com/webapp/wcs/stores/servlet/Product_10151_-1_10001_50060____SearchResults
2. Texas-rigged Crawdad- http://www.basspro.com/webapp/wcs/stores/servlet/Product_10151_-1_10001_51894____SearchResults
3. 1/8-1/4 OZ Bass Jig with a Craw trailer- http://www.basspro.com/webapp/wcs/stores/servlet/Product_10151_-1_10001_20152____SearchResults
4. Any Texas-rigged 6-8″ worm that resembles a Black Racer or Water Moccasin- http://www.basspro.com/webapp/wcs/stores/servlet/Product_10151_-1_10001_2239____SearchResults
The key to bed fishing is “attractant, patience & good polarized sunglasses”.
Patience?- Having enough patience , boat control, casting skill to cast and KEEP your lizard, worm, jig IN the bed keeping it there until Buck or Mama Bass get tired of seeing it in there and move it.
Attractant- Make sure to “juice up”. Once Buck or Mama decide to move your lure the added attractant will make them hold on a couple secs longer- long enough to get a good hook set!
Polarized glasses?- Gotta have good sunglasses! Even cheap ones are better than none.
And NEVER keep bedding fish. After a trophy picture or 3 immed release any bedding fish back in the general vicinity of the bed.
Good luck.
A bedding Bass is not looking to eat, there fore most of the time when a Bass on a bed hit’s your lure it’s simply out of a need to protect it’s nest from the intruder, and a lot of the time the fish will not completely take the bait all the way as she just wants it out of her bed and will just pick it up and move it away. My best advice to ya is to get a good pair of polarized sun glasses not the cheapies but a quality pair that allows you to see into the water clearly. Use small plastic’s , Lizard’s are excellent, as are crawfish and many other types of creature baits just keep em’ small and there’s a better chance of a good hookup as there is less bait for the fish to pick up and a greater chance it will take the hook in along with the bait as it tries to move it away and with the glasses you will be able to see this as it happens and will have better hookup success as a result. If you can’t see it chances are you will feel very few strikes from a bedded bass resulting in less hookup’s due to the previous explanation I gave of a bedded bass is simply moving the bait away. Get the Glasses, Be extremely quiet, Fish small plastic’s, and fish with the sun in your face as to avoid casting a shadow over the water as it will spook the fish almost every time. Be patient and make repeated cast at the same fish and just let the bait lay in the bed working it up and down in a jigging manner til it makes her mad and when you see your bait disappear into her mouth reel down to take up the slack and cross her eyes hard in a 45 degree upward sweeping motion and you will get her nearly every time. Hope this helps, as it works for me it should work for you. stay at it as this can be a way for you to catch a real trophy Bass, just remember though that a bedded Bass is spawning so Measure, length, girth and take pictures then get yourself a replica made and release the big spawner’s back so our future generations may be able to enjoy trophy Bass also. Good Luck
Try using a creature bait in a color that you can see or a five inch lizard hooked through the neck. You can also take a small bullet slip sinker and flip it around so that the underside is facing forward. Peg it to a lizard, cast it beyond the nest, and drag it straight through. The weight will kick up a lot of debris and will drive a bass nuts.