There is a lake I known that holds very big largemouth. However, I can only catch them in the winter because in the summer all I catch is small bass. I have tried jigs and Texas rigs which usually catch bigger bass. So my question is, how do I weed out the small fish to get to the giants?
Often Big Girls bury in the slop-not sure what this lake looks like but in the winter you do not have to deal with slop. If you are getting them on tip ups you are offering them a big meal that they do not have to chase. Offer them the same thing in the summer-live bait or larger plastics, cast to a prime target and try dead sticking. Top water could be good too. Good luck!
In the summer try to find rock or hard bottom areas. I like throwing a bigger 1/6 oz Ned rig with the bigger 4inch zman worm. It doesn’t look like much, but it does catch big fish. Chatter baits and Swim Jigs work in Spring. Don’t be afraid to fish the chatterbait like a jig and let it drop to the bottom at times.
I use big 6 inch long streamers or jerkbaits
Two things I do when I’m catching mostly smaller bass:
1) Move deeper.
2) Upsize your presentation.
Bass, like other fish, often school up according to size. So if you’re only catching 12 inchers, you’ll likely continue to catch fish of a similar size. When you pile into a bigger one, there will likely be more around of that size.
What size lake are you on and how deep is it? Are you located North as in Minnesota, or are you further South as in Iowa farm pond, Southern reservoir, etc?
I would also recommend fishing deeper with jigs or more finesse tactics. Neko Rig, Shakey heads, etc. If it’s a weedy lake with pads and mats, flip or punch those mats. I caught some of my biggest tournament fish last season punching pads and mats. Surprisingly with a T-rigged tube! Just upsized the weight to an oz.
Great advice 14 (wanna try that tube thing) Just don’t like the assumption that big fish are deeper-the opposite can be true. Big bass like great structure close to forage, deep, shallow or in-between.
I was in the mindset that the big fish are shallower up until I really worked at getting better at fishing deep structure last season. I’m still not great but what I found was more numbers of big bass. There are definitely big bass up shallow but I now feel that you have to cover more ground to find the same number of big bass that you could pull from ONE off shore hump, brush pile, or rock pile.
It all really depends on the lake as to whether fish are shallow, deep or both, each one is different.
Deep also doesn’t have to mean fishing 20-25ft on some offshore hump or point. Sometimes deep is only 5-10ft, maybe just off the bank 30-50yds. This is especially true on dingy water lakes. Seems like at times this is were the gills hang out and the bass follow.
If you assume the bass are eating small bluegills then think about where you have caught ‘gills, 1′ 7′ 15′ 20’? Yes, yes, yes, and yes.Lake trout NEED to go deep for the right o2 and temperature, a bass is fine in shallow hot water. Yes it is hard to cover shallow water because their is more of it, you also have to think about what areas are pressured, might be the shallows, might also be deep. If I am in a clear lake and want to fish shallow I look for deep water nearby.
Good luck
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