Methods and rigs about bass fishing

Generally, bass refers to largemouth bass and smallmouth bass, which is a kind of carnivorous fish living in freshwater areas. The bass has a fierce character and likes to attack and prey on other small fish, so it is one of the target objects for the majority of anglers. So what are the skills needed to fish freshwater bass? The following I will come with you to understand something!

If you know both the enemy and yourself, you will fight a hundred battles without danger of defeat. Fishing is also the same, we have to talk about how to fish freshwater bass from the bass habit, fishing time, lure baits, Texas Rig, fishing locations, and fishing method.

一. Bass Habit

Freshwater bass is an omnivorous fish with meat as the main food, aggressive, adult fish mainly prey on small fish and shrimp for a living, although more docile than saltwater bass, but also a hegemon of the river, extremely sensitive to the movement of objects, like to take the initiative to chase and hunt. In the spring and summer seasons, the desire to feed is the strongest, eating lots of fish, snakes, frogs, crabs, crawfish, lizards, baby birds, and even smaller bass.

二. Fishing Time

Freshwater bass can survive in the range of water temperature from 1 to 36 ℃ (33.8 ~ 96.8℉), above 10 ℃ (50℉) to start feeding, the optimal growth temperature of 20 ~ 30 ℃ (68 ~ 86℉). The most suitable growing water temperature for saltwater bass is 16～27℃ (60.8 ~ 80.6℉). Therefore, the best time for fishing is in spring and summer. The time can be used both in the morning and evening, but the prime time is after 3:00 pm and before it gets dark. However, if the weather is gloomy, the activity of smallmouth bass will be reduced, and fishing is a bit difficult.

三. Lure Baits

1. Small hooks are suitable for light power rods with fast action, big hooks for medium heavy or heavy power rods with fast action; big bait for big fish, small bait for small fish. The length of the bait is best around 10cm (3.94in) for big bass, while it can be 5 to 7cm (1.97 ~ 2.76in) for small bass.
2. In the clear water, sunny noon or shallow, dark baits or baits close to the watercolor should be used. In muddy water, evening, rainy days, deep water, try to use eye-catching lures, and gold baits on cloudy days. In addition, the color of the bait should be as close as possible to the color of the food.
3. Use a sinking minnow, 18g (0.63oz) can guarantee the casting distance. If you have good skills, you can use soft worms, such as Texas Rig.
4. The bass bait for beginners is recommended to use 7-15g (0.25 ~ 0.53oz) minnow, crank and spinnerbait, which are easy to cast and retrieve.
5. Freshwater bass fishing can also be used with soft worms, VIB, Jigbait and other baits, especially soft worms are the best.

四. Texas Rig

One of the best and simplest methods for presenting a soft plastic bait is Texas rig. Texas rig uses soft bait, the cost is much lower than Minnow and other hard bait, and the fish that hard bait can catch, it can also catch, and the effect of fishing for bass is also good. It has a stable center of gravity, good balance, and the most natural swimming shape, and it is suitable for places with many obstacles on the water, bushes, and more rotten mud, especially in unfamiliar fishing locations, where it can be used to detect the terrain.

In addition, it can be cast far to search a wide range, suitable for slow and dragging way, specifically for searching the bottom and obstacle area, because of its low center of gravity and low wind resistance.

The rig is composed of bullet weight about 10-20g (0.35 ~ 0.71oz), buffer bead, offset hook, and soft plastic bait, micro swivel.

五. Fishing locations

Bass mostly hide in complex waters, such as rock walls, dead wood, rock piles, under the shade of trees, in water plants, or next to man-made structures in the water. Generally, there will also be many bass along the shore because there are more small fish along the shore.

The location of shore fishing water cannot be too shallow, that kind of sharp slope and cliff wall is the best; secondly, the place with water plants, but the water plants cannot be too dense, otherwise it will affect the bait swimming and also easy to cause misjudgment; again, the place with shallow shore nearby, the smallmouth bass prefers higher water temperature environment, and there are more small fish in the shallow shore.

六. Fishing method

Bass mainly live in the lower and middle layers of the water, sometimes they also dive into the bottom to feed. Therefore, after the bait is cast out, do not rush to retrieve the line, let it sink for a short while, and retrieve the line after about 5 seconds. If you use a wirebait, you don’t need to jerk the line when retrieving it, just retrieve it smoothly. Try to keep it at a certain depth, but you can test the bass by varying the speed and frequency of retrieving the line.

If the bait is bitten and then unhooked, it is possible that the angler did not master the timing of raising the rod; or the speed and frequency of the bait twitching is too fast, resulting in the hook not hitting the fish mouth; or slipping and control fish is not mastered.

The following are some common baits for bass fishing.