How to Catch Bass!
Now we know were we can find Bass, and looked at the tackle we need,its time to try and catch them.We will look at different lure types,how we can use them to try and catch a bass
Hard Lures!
Floating Lures!
Floating lures come in a couple of different variations.
Walk the Dog style lures (sliders) are designed to zigzag across the surface, by twitching the rod as you retrieve, the lures zigzag from left to right causing a disturbance in the water, it is highly effective during the summer months when the water is warmer and bass are looking to smash baitfish near the surface. They come in various lengths, some have ball bearings that rattle, and some have flash plates like the Fishus Espetit Flashy Shad (picture).
Popper lures come with concaved fronts, they are retrieved straight and pop water in front of them, they are used on calmer days. They are shorter and fatter than (sliders).
They all come in various colors and are very useful when fishing on rough and snaggy ground.
Sinking Lures!
Sinking lures also come in different variations.
Shallow diving plugs can be used over shallow rough ground, they come with small diving lips, and they can be fished sub-surface with a slow retrieve and deeper with a faster retrieve.
Medium diving plugs have a larger diving lip, these can dive to depths of 1-2 meters, more suitable for deeper water marks, fishing above kelp beds where bass would be hiding to ambush small fish.
You can get deeper diving plugs which go to 3-4 meters for really deep marks,
They all come in various colors but depending on what depth you are fishing, you will need to pick a color that will be visible to the bass.
Metal Lures!
Metal Lures!
Metal lures come in all different shapes and sizes, various colors, and various weights.
We will use the Slingshot Surface Irons (picture) as an example.
These have a 3 sided wedge design, with a very shiny coating that reflects light and makes them flash under the water. These lures also have 3 glow ridges on the belly to entice fish and increase hit rates. They come in various colors and have 9g, 17g, and 26g weights. They are very good for casting.
Most metal lures come with treble hooks fitted.
Depending on retrieve speed these lures can be fished subsurface or deeper with a slower retrieve.
Casting Jigs!
Modern casting jigs are meant to be fished from a boat and jigged along the bottom.
Some are light enough to be cast from shore like the Seadra Aqua-bullet bait fish casting jig (pictured), with weights in the 20g and 30g it can be used with a spinning rod. It comes with a treble hook, but also a single hook teaser flies on the front as an attractor, along with various colors like the blue and green mackerel which looks like a small fish.
It can be fished using a sink-and-draw method or retrieved straight fast or slow.
Pencil Lures!
Pencil lures are pencil or cigar-shaped, the are made to look like sand-eels, being long and thin, and slow sinking, they are good for areas with stronger currants.
The Savage Gear sand-eel pencil (pictured) comes in various colors (cotton candy pictured) and sizes/weights 90mm – 13gm | 125mm – 19gm | 150mm – 30gm.
They come with a fitted treble hook and a single hook to swap over too.
Soft Plastic Lures!
Soft Lures!
Soft plastic lures are made to be flexible and move like baitfish in the water. They come in a wide range of colors, shapes, and sizes. Some common names are paddle tails, pin tails, pulse tails, weedless sand eels, weedless minnows, straight tails, shads, and many others.
Some come pre-hooked, which can be attached and fished like this, but many come without hooks, which can be rigged with hooks to make them weedless, we will look more at this in the next section below.
An example of a soft plastic is the Sidewinder Bass-Stick (pictured), which is a cigar-shaped straight lure that comes in 4″ 10g or 6″ 22g sizes.
Soft Lure rigged with weedless hook!
Here the soft plastic has been rigged with a weedless Spin lock hook, there is a little wire corkscrew, that is screwed into the head of the lure, the hook is passed up through the lure and the point is set flush with the top.
This is now weedless, meaning the lure can be fished in weed and rough ground and is less likely to catch in snags but is not 100% snag-free.
The hooks can be used unweighted or weighted to fish deeper water marks.
These can be fished straight adding some twitches or using a drag-and-draw method. A variation of speeds can be used.
When a fish bites on the lure it squeezes the lure down and exposes the hook, hopefully leading to a hookup and a nice bass.
Different Hooks!
Here you can see a few examples (pictured), unweighted and weighted spin lock hooks, 2 different jig heads, and a worm-wide gap hook. There are other options as well, these are a small sample.
They also come in various sizes to match the size of the plastic lures you are using.
As well as different hooks some lures come with built-in weights and rattles or the option of adding your own.
Other Lures!
Red Gills!
The original soft plastic was invented in the 1950s in Mevagissey, Cornwall, it has had a few modifications over the years and comes in various lengths, colors, and designs.
The lengths they come in are 70mm, 90mm, 115mm, 130mm, and 178mm, although you might be able to cast the largest size, most of the sizes are too small to cast.
Here comes the beauty of the Bombarda float, a pear-shaped with a plastic stem, that you thread your line through, attach a swivel, then a short leader, and attach your red gill.
It comes in various weights in both sinking and floating versions. This allows you to cast out light lures and retrieve them, it is a good method to catch bass.
Bass Flies!
Another method of catching bass that is becoming more popular is flyfishing for bass, anglers have taken their skills of catching, brown trout, sea trout, and salmon, then adapted them to catch sea bass.
You can use your flyfishing equipment, but bear in mind these will need a good wash-off as the salt water will corrode your equipment. If you are enjoying catching bass then you might consider purchasing specialized saltwater flyfishing equipment at a later time.
You can get a large selection of bass flies, representing baitfish, sand eels, and other marine creatures to catch a bass,
If you are not into flyfishing there is another way to use bass flies, as explained in the previous section(red gills) you can use them with a bombarda float, you use the same method but instead of tying on a red gill, attach a bass fly instead.
Creature Baits!
Creature baits are soft plastic lures that look like crayfish, shrimps, worms, etc.
Widely used in the USA for catching freshwater bass, these lures were adopted in the UK to see species like Pike and Perch, in turn, Wrasse anglers started using them, followed by Bass anglers.
Some come pre-rigged with hooks or can be rigged as a weedless setup for fishing around weed beds and rough ground to tempt a hiding bass to take it.
Live Bait!
Another method that can be used but is not so much as lure fishing, is live baiting.
If you can get hold of some live sand eels or catch a small mackerel (joey) you rig up a float with a monofilament trace with a hook, attach the sand eel or mackerel, and cast out, it can catch you some good bass if you are lucky.
