How and where to catch middle Georgia Winter Bass

A Chinese proverb says it is better to light a candle than curse the darkness. It is also better to put on warm clothes and go fishing than curse the cold weather. If you sit around and complain about the weather you will miss some good fishing.

You don’t have to be cold while fishing, no matter what the weather. A good snowmobile suit, insulated underwear, snow boots, a stocking cap and a hood will help keep you warm. Add some chemical handwarmers in strategic places and even a propane heater and you can be comfortable.

The best thing to keep you warm this time of year is catching bass. Hook a hog and you will forget the weather. Limit out on three pounders and it might as well be a spring day. And even if you don’t catch much, who would rather sit around in the house than be out fishing?

Cold weather does affect bass but they still have to eat, so you can catch them. Since bass are cold blooded they slow down and don’t eat as much, but they do eat. If you adjust your methods and use the right lures, you can get them to bite.

There are just as many ways to catch bass in January as there are in June, but one thing you must do is slow down. Bass are less likely to chase a fast moving lure this time of year. And they often prefer a small bait over something big in cold water. But you can catch them from the shallows out to the deepest structure if you fish it right.

In the middle of our state three lakes offer excellent bass fishing right now. Jackson, Oconee and Sinclair all have some things in common for catching bass this time of year but each has its own special qualities, too.

Bobby Ferris grew up in Monticello and went to college in Milledgeville, fishing with the Baldwin Backlashers Bass Club during those years. That club fished Jackson, Oconee and Sinclair regularly. After college Bobby has worked in the middle Georgia area for two EMCs and continues to fish this part of the state a lot.

Now Bobby fishes with two Griffin bass clubs, the Flint River Bass Club, where he won seven of 12 tournaments year before last, and the Spalding County Sportsman Club. He also fishes some pot tournaments on middle Georgia lakes and knows them well.

Bobby sold boats at Piedmont Outdoors part time and his affiliation with them and The Sports Center in Perry, as well as his ability to catch bass, got him on Team Triton. He was willing to share some of his tactics for winter bass on the three lakes highlighted here.

I joined the Spalding County Sportsman Club in 1974 and the second tournament I fished was at Sinclair. The third tournament I fished was at Jackson. Four years later I joined the Flint River bass club. Oconee was not even around back then but I watched it being built and both clubs I fish go to those three lakes often. We almost always fish them in the winter.

Last year I won the point standings in both clubs. I have learned some good patterns on these lakes for winter fishing, too, and usually fish in different places than Bobby fishes.

Jackson Lake

Jackson is one of our oldest lakes and has changed over the years. The illegal stocking of spotted bass in the lake means you are likely to catch more but smaller bass there now. Its days of being known for numbers of big largemouth seem to be over. But you can still catch some quality largemouth there and the aggressive spots mean you can catch more fish.

By January the bass have pulled out of coves and set up on main lake points. Rocky points are Bobby’s favorite places to find them now since the rocks hold heat and give the bass a place to hide. Rocks can range from chunk to boulder size, can be found all over the lake and all hold bass. Jackson is small enough that most of the lake is the same in January.

Bobby’s best points are those in the outside bends of the old creek and river channels. He looks for bass holding on them in about six feet of water and feeding at that depth. The colder the weather the better the fishing is on these points for Bobby. A sunny day warming the rocks, with some current moving, is the best.

Tie on a crankbait and a jig and pig and you have what you need to catch winter bass at Jackson. Bobby likes crankbaits like the Rapala DT6, the small Fat Free Shad and a #5 Shadrap for point fishing at Jackson. He will fish one of those crankbaits on the points for more active fish, making several casts across them from different angles.

For clear water choose a shad colored bait and in stained to muddy water go with a bright color. Tennessee shad, natural shad and silver and black are good clear water colors. Chartreuse plugs with orange bellies and blue or black backs, the firetiger color, or crawfish colors are all good when the water is not clear.

If the bass don’t hit a crankbait Bobby will throw an Ol Nelle jig with a Zoom Super Chunk on it. It can be worked slowly in the rocks for the inactive bass. In clear water he picks a green pumpkin jig and trailer and in stained water he goes with a black jig and trailer. He also dips all his jigs in JJ’s Magic clear dip to give them a garlic scent.

At Jackson Bobby fishes crankbaits on 12 to 15 pound Big Game line and his jigs are tied to 25 pound Big Game line. There is always a possibility of a big largemouth or spot at Jackson, and the water is usually stained enough to get away with heavier line.

I like to fish deeper water in the winter and will often jig a spoon or Little George on long points at Jackson. Ride the points from the bridge in Tussahaw Creek to the dam and up the Alcovy River to the Highway 212 Bridge and watch for schools of shad.

The shad are often out over 16 to 20 feet of water, suspended about half way down. If you see fish on the bottom under them, stop and fish. Even if you don’t see the bass they are likely there if the shad are present. Drop a spoon like a Hopkins Shorty or a Little George down, hop it a foot off the bottom repeatedly, and you will find out if the bass are there.
If you see the bass and they won’t hit try deadsticking the spoon or George on the bottom. Let it lay there and barely slide it on the bottom. Don’t raise it off the bottom. That pattern has paid off several times over the years.

I like a short 5.5 foot rod with a fairly light tip but lots of backbone. A fast taper rod allows you to jig the spoon and George easily and feel it but you need the backbone to set the hook and control the fish. I spool up an Ambassadeur 5500c with 15 pound PLine for most of my jigging.

Lake Sinclair

Sinclair has two characteristics that together set it off from all other Georgia lakes. The power plant on the lake dumps warm water into Beaverdam Creek, warming the lake water in that area. And the pumpback at Lake Oconee makes current flow both ways in the lake most days. Both those factors affect bass fishing.

The warm water is so important that Bobby says he always fishes within about a mile of the mouth of Beaverdam Creek in the winter at Sinclair. If he is not in Beaverdam itself he will be on the river near it or just inside the mouth of Rooty Creek, and he fishes Little River up to the bridge. All this area is warmed by the discharge.

On Sinclair Bobby will fish crankbaits on seawalls and docks in shallow water. He stays on the main creek and river runs and does not go way back into coves, sticking with main and secondary points. He is looking for the active bait and bass feeding on it.

Favorite crankbaits are small and Bobby likes a #5 Shadrap, 100 Series Bandit or a DT6. In clear water he goes with Gable Green or natural shad and likes the firetiger color if the water is more stained. He will stick with 12 pound Big Game spooled on a Shimano Calcutta reel on a six foot rod unless throwing the #5 Shadrap under docks, when he will switch to a spinning outfit and lighter line.

If there is some current moving in either direction fishing is better and the moving water will position the bass on the docks and seawalls. Bobby looks for eddies where the bass can hold out of the current and ambush baitfish moving with the current. He says if you run your crankbait by a holding spot, moving it slowly with the current, you should get bit.

If there are several warm days in a row like we sometimes get in January but are more likely in February, Bobby will fish the old dead grass beds. The dead grass holds heat and draws shad to it, and the bass will follow. A spinnerbait run through the grass will draw strikes from those bass.

Jigging spoons work well at Sinclair, too. They tend to be better in clearer water so I will often head to Island or Rocky Creeks at the dam and ride points in them. Long tapering points are best. Watch for the shad down in 15 to 18 feet of water and jig under them for bass.

If there is any brush near the shad, try it, too. You will hang up some but you can usually get a spoon loose by shaking it up and down, working it free. A Little George will not come free so easily. Bass holding in the brush will eat the spoon when it is right in their face even if they won’t move far to chase a moving bait.

On clean bottoms it is hard to beat the Little George. I like a 1/2 ounce George in silver with a silver blade. I drop it to the bottom, tighten my line with my rod tip about a foot over the surface then jig it up and down a foot to two feet.

Move it steadily, not in a jerking motion, and you can feel the blade spin and it rises and falls. Set the hook if the blade stops turning. Most bites will come as the bait falls, so set the hook if the bait does not go back down as far as it should. Keeping your rod tip down near the water allows you to set the hook better when a fish hits.

Lake Oconee m

Oconee is one of our newer lakes and it was dammed in the 1980s. It has become one of our most popular bass fishing lakes, too, with lots of quality bass. The 14 inch size limit with the slot allowing anglers to keep six to 11 inch fish has helped and would be even better for bigger fish if anglers would keep more of the smaller fish.

Since the upper end of Oconee can muddy up fast and the lower lake gets colder water when the pumpback system is running, Bobby concentrates his winter fishing near Brantley’s Marina in the mouth of Lick Creek and the river around it. That area is the most stable on the lake and the bass are easier to pattern and catch consistently.

Most of this area of the lake is lined with nice houses and they all have seawalls. If you look you will see rocks at the water line of many of the sea walls and there are rocks on most others that you can not see. Those rocks are Bobby’s targets at Oconee this time of year. They hold heat and are good cover, too.
Seawalls with deeper water around them, like on main and secondary points, are Bobby’s favorites. He will throw a #7 Shadrap and really likes the jointed version since it is plastic and runs a little deeper, and has a rattle in it. He fishes the crawfish pattern since crawfish call the riprap home and are just about the favorite food of bass.

Throw the Shadrap on 12 pound Big Game line, a six foot rod and Shimano Calcutta reel. Try to bump the rocks as you work the bait across the rocks. If you consistently catch bass very shallow on the rocks, concentrate on making casts right to the bank. If the fish seem to be hitting out on the base of the rocks, make parallel casts to keep your plug in that area longer.

A warming trend at Oconee will pull bass shallow faster than at Sinclair. If you have a few warm days, especially toward the end of the month, shad will move to the very backs of short main lake pockets. Check the pockets if it has been warm and if you see shad activity fish it. Afternoons are usually best, after the sun has had all day to warm the water.

Throw a spinnerbait on the sandy flats in the backs of coves. You will catch bass, hybrids, crappie and even catfish that are back in there eating the shad. You can catch some big bass on this pattern. Bobby likes an Ol Nelle white and chartreuse spinnerbait with one silver and one gold blade for most water conditions. If the water temperature is 55 degrees or warmer in these pockets the shad will be there.

At Oconee I usually head for the dam area this time of year and look for shad on main lake points. Many of them have brush piles on them and the current will move shad across the points. Bass wait in the brush and on clean bottoms to ambush them.

Get right on top of the brush or fish and jig straight up and down. Sometimes bass want a spoon that moves in one place repeatedly. Don’t give up until you have jigged it up and down dozens of times. Try to hit the same place on the bottom, holding your boat in one place and watching your depthfinder. With a transducer on the trolling motor you can often see the fish straight under you and stay on them.

Give these three lakes a try. Fish the patterns in the areas mentioned here and you will catch bass. It it much more fun feeling the fight of a bass on your line than it is sitting at home watching somebody else catch them on TV!

How to Fish New Waters
from The Fishing Wire

Yamaha Pro Steve Pennaz makes his living finding fish on new waters. Here’s how he does it.

Yamaha Pro Steve Pennaz says finding fish on new lakes is fishing’s greatest challenge, despite today’s great sonar and GPS systems.

The challenge for most anglers today is not catching fish, it’s finding them.

“As the old adage goes you can’t catch a fish that isn’t there,” said Steve Pennaz. “Fishing’s greatest challenge has always been locating fish. That’s true even with today’s superb sonar units and mapping software.”

Pennaz is in a unique position when it comes to locating fish. For the past two decades this Yamaha pro has traveled extensively in search of multi-species fishing action, both as a television host and magazine editor. He has developed an uncanny ability to find fish, a skill he shares each week on Lake Commandos television series.

“It all starts with the fish,” said Pennaz. “The more you know about your target species the better you become at predicting their behavior. Guys like Berkley’s® Dr. Keith Jones have written extensively on fish and fish behavior, and I thank them.

“All fish exhibit behaviors common to their species, yet there are members in a given population that behave uniquely. With bass, you have fish that tend to orientate to shallow cover, but there are also fish that roam open water.

Pennaz says larger fish of a given species often live in different areas and prefer different water temperatures than the juveniles.

“In some cases, larger adult fish act much differently than juvenile fish of the same species. Northern pike are the perfect example. Those weighing 10 pounds or more seek out much colder water (55-60 degrees) than smaller pike (65-70 degrees), which is the reason anglers fishing shallow weeds in mid-summer may catch a lot of pike but may fish a lifetime without ever landing a trophy.

“The second piece of the puzzle is understanding the seasonal movement of fish,” said Pennaz. “The spawn dominates fish behavior either spring (bass, walleye, crappie, etc.) or fall (certain trout, char and salmon). Knowing a fish’s preferred spawning temp and habitat are important clues; they provide clues on where the fish will be prior to, during and after the spawn.

“Water clarity is also a factor in determining fish location. In extremely turbid waters, low light penetration limits weed growth to shallow water. This typically means you find weed-relating fish like bass and bluegills will be shallow as well. In very clear waters, finding fish deep is often the norm.

Predicting fish behavior is a matter of understanding how they migrate with the seasons, and how they relate to cover and water clarity, Pennaz says.
“I’ve come to rely on water clarity on almost a weekly basis when trying to break a lake down quickly on Lake Commandos. The lower the water clarity the shallower I start my search, and rarely has this approach let me down. The deep weed line, when available, is usually the key to determining just how deep you’ll find most active fish.

“Forage is another piece to the puzzle,” said Pennaz. “Every gamefish is a predator, at times they will key on specific forage; other times they feed opportunistically or eating whatever they catch. Knowing what the fish are eating will help you not only narrow your search, but also help you select presentations.

“Trout anglers know better than most the importance of matching the hatch. To a lesser extent, the same can be true with other species, but typically not to that extent. However, if bass are keying on shad, give them shad imitators.”

Pennaz offers one last tip. “Whenever you are fishing with another angler or a group of anglers,” said Pennaz, “I suggest each of you fish a different presentation until you hone in on what the fish want that day. It’s stunning how even little things can impact success.

A smooth, quiet Yamaha is part of the package of many successful anglers whether they’re chasing southern largemouths or northern pike and walleyes.
“Last winter I fished bass on a Texas reservoir. My fishing partner and I were both throwing black/blue Berkley® Chigger Craws on a Carolina rig, yet he quickly went up on me five fish to zero! I was dumbfounded. Our casts were landing just inches apart. He would get bit and I’d get nothing.

“We compared rigs after he released his fifth bass. His featured a fluorocarbon main line, a ¾-ounce sinker, bead, and 15-pound fluorocarbon leader running nearly two feet. My rig featured a braid for a main line, ½-ounce sinker, no bead and 16-inch leader of 15-pound fluorocarbon. I don’t know what made the difference, the weight difference, leader or mainline, all I can say is when I switch up to what he was using the bites started to come immediately.

“Whenever I am fishing with someone else I ask what bait they are throwing and then select something else – a different color, size, whatever. I also play with speed, line type and weight – anything to see if the fish display a preference. I found this approach helps with not only locating fish as quickly as possible, but also helps create a base pattern that can be tweaked as needed.”

Summer Jig Fishing Not the Same as in Winter

from The Fishing Wire

Summer or winter, pro-angler Bill Lowen prefers a jig for deep water fishing.

Jigs have long been acknowledged as some of the most effective lures for winter bass fishing, but Yamaha Pro Bill Lowen considers them just as effective during the hot summer months, too. The only thing Lowen changes is how he presents the lure.

“I believe the presentation you use is actually more important than your jig choice,” explains Lowen, “and the reason is because in winter you’re going after lethargic, inactive bass, while in summer those same bass are far more active and willing to chase a jig. In winter, you’re usually hoping for a feeding-type response, but now in July and August, you can also generate totally different reflex-type strikes.”

Thus, while his primary jig presentation in winter is slowly dragging the lure along the bottom, Lowen’s summer presentation also includes a lot of hopping and even a technique known as “stroking.”

A football jig with a creature trailer does the job for most of his tournaments, says Lowen.

“Stroking is a faster, stronger hopping presentation in which you literally rip the jig off the bottom with a hard upward sweep of your rod,” the Yamaha Pro explains. “The sudden change of direction and speed in the jig’s movement just triggers an instinctive strike. I may drag the jig on the bottom for a few feet, stroke it once and let it fall, then immediately rip it off the bottom again. I can do this three or four times during a single cast, too. It really depends on how the bass do react to it.

“During the summer, at least 75% of my jig bites come from hopping or stroking the lure like this.”

Lowen’s summer jig is the same as his winter one, a ½ or ¾-ounce football head style, and his preferred depth of 15 to 20 feet is also the same for both seasons. He also looks for breaklines where shallow water drops quickly to this depth.

“The major change for me in summer jig fishing is that I really want to have current consistently washing into that structure,” continues Lowen. “In the winter, I don’t want any current whatsoever, but it’s important this time of year. That water will be slightly cooler, it will have more oxygen, and it will be moving both forage and nutrients downstream with it.

Both largemouths and smallmouths like the “stroking” action that hops a jig off bottom in summer.

“The most productive places are often the outsides of channel bends, and frequently, these will also contain some type of logs and brush that current has washed in. In other lakes, rocks or shell beds may be present. If you can find anything different like this on that structure, that’s nearly always the spot that attracts bass.”

To find current, Lowen frequently motors to the upper end of a lake where more river-like conditions usually exist, or far up large tributary streams. Normally, however, he does not fish the actual tailrace waters immediately below dams, primarily because he doesn’t have to.

“Sometimes, if a lot of water is being released from an upstream dam, all you need to do is get behind an island or main lake point that breaks the main water flow and re-directs it, and you’ll be able to catch bass,” the Yamaha Pro adds.

“It’s always better to cast upstream and let the current wash your jig down naturally. As you guide the lure with your rod tip, you can add the hopping and stroking action you need. Current usually positions bass behind rocks, logs, and other obstructions, so it’s not difficult to determine just exactly where to guide your jig.

“The fun part of all this during the summer is that every place where the current does wash into the structure you can find one smaller spot along it that will be better than the rest. It might be an area just one or two feet long within the entire bend of the channel, or perhaps just a single stump along that bend, but whatever it is, more bass will be on that small spot than anywhere else.”

Kentucky DFWR Biologist Suggests Targeting Offshore Largemouths
from The Fishing Wire

Fish offshore for post-spawn largemouth bass

Crankbaits are a favorite once bass go deep on big lake chains like those of the TVA system in Kentucky.

Frankfort, KY. – Chris Hickey, black bass research biologist for the Kentucky Department of Fish and Wildlife Resources, said the cool weather this spring delayed the largemouth bass spawn a couple of weeks, but now everything is on schedule as we head into the heat of summer.

He said anglers report largemouth bass gathering on the channel ledges on Kentucky and Barkley lakes.

Summer fishing for largemouth bass frustrates many anglers, although anglers themselves are usually the source of the problem. The anglers often don’t change the presentation or places they fish from the spring season, although their summer catch often consists of a few small male “buck” bass.

Forget fishing the visible cover along the bank and instead concentrate on off-shore structures such as channel ledges, submerged islands, humps and long points to catch bass during the day in July and August. Studying a map of the underwater features reveals these fish-holding structures. Anglers should plan on probing several during a day of fishing.

“I look for three things for deep ledge fishing,” said Ryan Oster, federal aid coordinator for the fisheries division of Kentucky Fish and Wildlife. “The first is the presence of bait, second is stumps and third is current. Mussel beds on the ledge are also a big help.”

Big-screen sonar is a huge help in locating summer bass on channel ledges and humps.

Oster, formerly western fisheries district biologist who helped manage Kentucky and Barkley lakes, prefers deep running crankbaits, 7- to 10-inch straight-tailed worms rigged on Shakey heads and heavy football jig and trailer combinations to fish ledges from 12 to 25 feet deep in these lakes.

“I like the Sexy Shad color for clear water and the chartreuse Sexy Shad for stained water in my deep crankbaits,” Oster said. “Typically, bass want it raking across the bottom. On some days, the fish want a slow and steady retrieve and on others, they want it fast. Mix it up until they hit.”

Boat positioning is important to keep these lures crawling on the bottom and across those underwater ledges and humps. Some anglers use marker buoys to visualize the ledge or hump.

Slowly crawl a Shakey head rig along the bottom, stop it every few feet and shake the rod tip to wiggle the worm and entice bass. Anglers fishing jigs may also work the bottom, but many “stroke” a heavy football jig by ripping it off the bottom with their rod tip and letting the lure fall on a slack line. Trophy largemouths often hit the jig on the fall.

Swimbaits can also produce when the head weight is keyed to the depth where the fish are holding.

Use at least 1/2-ounce of weight to get down on the deep structure. Many opt for 3/4-ounce or 1-ounce jigs. Shakey worms in green pumpkin, black or purple work well in deep water. Black jigs in combination with blue, purple, brown or chartreuse produce deep bass.

During the hottest times of the year, largemouth bass suspend over the ledge or hump and ignore lures worked on bottom. A swimbait works well for suspended bass.

Pearl-colored swimbaits with shades of gray, blue and light purple work well. Fish the swimbait just above bottom rigged on a 1/4-ounce or 3/8-ounce head as heavier heads deadens the lure’s action. Oster prefers 5-inch swimbaits.

Points that extend well out into the lake are high percentage spots for summer largemouth bass. Jigs slowly crawled across the point in water 15 to 25 feet deep draws strikes. Points with stumps or chunk rock on them hold the most fish.

The best ledge fishing is on Kentucky Lake, Lake Barkley and Barren River Lake. Most lakes across Kentucky have long extended points and many have underwater humps.

Get off the bank and catch huge bass on the hottest days.

Author Lee McClellan is an award-winning associate editor for Kentucky Afield magazine, the official publication of the Kentucky Department of Fish and Wildlife Resources. He is a life-long hunter and angler, with a passion for smallmouth bass fishing.

Media Contact: Lee McClellan 1-800-858-1549, ext. 4443

Rethinking Jigs For “Roller Coaster” Bass

How a non-traditional swim jig technique can help you crack conditioned fish

By Steve Pennaz

Like a lot of anglers, I grew up fishing bass jigs traditionally, pounding cover with an endless drop-lift-drop-lift routine. And while I caught fish, I didn’t fully grasp how truly versatile jigs are—and how they can be fished in ways that can crack conditioned bass when everything else fails.

My “Eureka” moment came on a trip with a saltwater guide who’d throw his jig out as far as he could and rip it back to the boat. Watching him catch fish taught me that we all have preconceived ideas about how we’re supposed to fish jigs.

During a TV shoot in Texas a few years back the producers asked me to burn the bait back to boat so they could get a shot of the reel handle rotating. So I start drag racing a jig through two feet of water and all of sudden an 8-pound bass grabs the bait. Here again, I never would have fished a jig that fast, but it produced a solid fish and once again opened my eyes to the efficacy of breaking conventions.

And why is that?

Bass are typically released after they are caught, which means a percentage of any bass population has been “conditioned.” Larger fish have seen it all. That’s why fishing new bait designs, colors and techniques are essential to staying ahead of the curve.

Like modifying your jig routine to offer bass something different.

We’ve been taught to fish the three main jig styles according to head design. For example, traditional round-head designs are usually flipped to cover on heavy braid, while a football head is typically dragged over bottom. The keel head (swim jig) is designed to slither through grass and other cover, usually higher in the water column or even bulging the surface on a steady retrieve.

But a round-head jig can also be used as a punch bait to penetrate thick vegetation. Likewise, a football head can be fished on a steady retrieve, even burned back to the boat. The heavy weight typically keeps it down, and in situations like riprap, a football head will bounce from rock to rock like a crankbait. I’ve also used footballs in shallow water, burning them over weed tops like a silent spinnerbait—definitely not the norm.

Roller Coaster Swimming

Yet, of all three major jig head designs, the keel head (or swim jig) is probably the most versatile. Case in point, I don’t often fish them with the rod tip close to the water using a slow, steady retrieve. I like to activate the trailer tail by swimming it three or four feet and letting it glide back to the bottom on a semi-taut line, then repeating until the bait is back to the boat. I call it “roller coaster” swimming.

The bait spends very little time on the bottom, and this retrieve offers multiple triggering points on every cast—there’s strike potential during the sweep, the drop and the pause. The technique works in channel areas, flats, around stumps, and open areas off emergent vegetation like cattails—and a lot of other areas, too.

When you watch what happens underwater, the sweep makes a trailer like a 4-inch PowerBait grub or Havoc Beat Shad paddletail go crazy, then come to an abrupt stop on the pause, then beat again like crazy again on the glide. Get the cadence right it and the presentation seems almost magical. And it’s a lot more fun than the standard jig retrieve.

Fall Rate

The most crucial component of the ‘roller coaster’ system is fall rate. Head weight, skirt bulk and trailer all factor in. My go-to swim jig head size for shallow water is 3/8-ounce. Go too light and the bait doesn’t fall fast enough; go too heavy and you drag bottom at typical retrieval speeds. However, as bass orient in and around deep weedlines later in the summer you may want to go with a heavier swim jig fished with a slower ‘roller coaster’ retrieve to achieve maximum depth.

Another essential component of the ‘roller coaster’ program is the use of fluorocarbon line. I’ll typically fish 12- or 15-pound test, sometimes moving up to 20 if I’m on a body of water with big fish and lots of cover. Fluoro’s slow stretch means excellent sensitivity, solid hooksets and the line’s sinking tendency gives the bait a natural appearance on the retrieve. Fluoro’s near-invisibility under water can be key in shallow, clear waters. Most importantly, fluorocarbon helps keeps jigs near the bottom even at faster retrieves.

Next, a properly matched rod and reel can be a huge plus. I fish swim jigs on a fast-action medium heavy seven-foot and a medium-speed, low-profile 7.1:1 ratio baitcaster like the ultra-lightweight Abu Garcia Revo MGX. The reel takes in 28 inches of line for every turn of the reel handle; about the same as other reels geared 6.4:1.

More Tips

Besides using a soft plastic trailer that matches the color of the skirt/jig head and produces a gentle wobble, I’m a big fan of modifying stock weed guards. I like to remove about a third of the bristles to improve my strike-to-hook-up ratio. The addition of rattles is also a good idea at times, especially in more turbid waters.

Another thing: A lot of guys will immediately start reeling and let the rod load, letting the fish set the hook. When I get a hit I drop the rod tip and set the hook.

Final Word

My challenge to anglers fishing jigs is to think about how other anglers aren’t fishing them—then experiment with those methods. The ‘roller coaster’ swim jig routine is but one example of the myriad ways you can modify your jig game to catch more fish.

ABOUT
Award-winning fisherman/journalist, creator of Knot Wars, formerly with the North American Fishing Club, Steve Pennaz has launched Lake Commandos, a new brand that includes Lake Commando television/social media series on Pursuit Network and TuffTV.

Casey Martin On The Umbrella Rig

Alabama pro offers tips on multi-hook devices called “Umbrella Rigs.”

By Frank Sargeant
frank@thefishingwire.com

It ain’t as easy as it looks.

Though he wins plenty of money with the umbrella rig, he says he’d prefer not to throw it any more than he has to. That’s the message from FLW pro Casey Martin about flinging the notorious umbrella rig, AKA the “Alabama Rig”, on the waters of the southeastern U.S. in pursuit of tournament-winning largemouth bass.

“It can be really effective and catch fish that other lures won’t, but you’ve still got to get in the right places for it to work,” says Martin, who lives south of Huntsville, AL, near his favorite lake, Guntersville. “It’s no miracle rig, for sure.”

Martin said that, contrary to popular belief, he doesn’t consider the A-Rig to be primarily a winter rig, either.

The five-armed wire rig allows creating the illusion of a baitfish school running through the water. It has proven amazingly effective on big fish in deep water.

“I throw it pretty much year around, except during the peak of the spawn,” says Martin. “If you’re fishing tournaments you pretty much have to have 5 pound fish to be in the money, and the umbrella rig gives you the best shot at those fish in most lakes most of the time.”

The big chore in success with the multi-lure rigs, says Martin, is studying charts and then idling along and watching your sonar. If you don’t put in your time finding the offshore areas likely to hold schools of fish, the A-Rig won’t bring you much success.

“There have been tournament days when I’d go all day long without putting one fish in the boat, and then find a school on a main river ledge and catch a limit in five casts-in fact I once caught a limit of five-pounders in two casts, three on the first cast and two on the second.”

Martin primarily throws the Picasso School-E-Rig Bait Ball, a five wire rig with added spinners, to which he adds jig heads from 1/8 to 3/8 ounce and shad tails 3 to 6 inches long.

He fishes this where he finds a set of conditions that usually spell success.

“I want to be on a hump that’s near the main channel or a deep creek drop-off, I want to see a lot of shad on the sonar, and I want some trash on the bottom, rocks or stumps or mussel shell. If you hit enough spots that look like that in 15 to 25 feet of water, you’re going to find a school of big fish sometime during the day,” says Martin.

Martin says that fish of this size are a must to place well in large tournaments, and the umbrella rig is one of the easiest ways to connect with them.
He said his side-scanning sonar/GPS units, two on the console and one up front, are an important part of his strategy.

“A lot of times you’ll see bait or cover out to the side that you’d miss completely if you’re just looking straight down with conventional sonar,” says Martin. “You really have to have the structure-scanning electronics to be competitive in tournaments these days.”

Martin said he lets the umbrella rig do most of the work once he heaves it out to where the fish should be.

“I let it sink to bottom, and then I crank it back steadily just fast enough to make the tails on the soft plastics swim,” says Martin. “You don’t have to add any extra action-there’s enough going on with all the spinners and shad tails.”

Unlike many anglers, he fishes the rigs on 25-pound-test fluorocarbon rather than on 65-pound-test braid.

“I just don’t like the way braid casts, so I stay away from it unless I’m fishing where there’s a lot of wood cover,” says Martin. “I lose a few rigs, but I think I get more hits than I would with braid.”

PROS AND CONS OF UMBRELLA RIGS

Casey Martin readily admits he’d rather not throw the umbrella rig ever again-but he has to if he’s going to make a living as a pro angler.

“If you’re fishing a tournament where it’s legal, 90 percent of the time you have to fish it or you don’t finish in the money,” says Martin. “I’d just as soon see it banned for all competition, but as long as it’s legal I’m going to throw it.”

He said he does not agree with some anglers who say the extra hooks on the rig cause lasting injuries to fish, however.

“It does stick them sometimes and you’ll see some fish with sores, but they’re minor and they heal up fast,” says Martin. “The reason I don’t like the rig is that it’s murder to cast all day, and it takes some of the interest out of trying to figure out a pattern that you’d be fishing otherwise.”

To learn more from Casey Martin, visit his website www.caseymartinfishing.com.