Winter Bass

Anyone have any go to baits or techniques for fishing bass under the ice? I have a little lake that I have wanted to try, but have always had poor luck catching them in the winter.

Thanks for any tips or comments.

WS

I like using jigging raps with a minnow head the same way nous fish walleyes but constantly keep the rap bouncing. Also using tip ups with shiners is a fun way to catch a bunch of bass. I’ve always had better luck away from the weed lines 20yds or so I’m not really sure why but every lake I winter bass fish is like that. Ps the little ones under like 14″ are pretty good eating anything bigger than that tastes like… Bass

Bambino:

Alot of the smaller lakes and ponds I fish have some great bass bites, esp. early season. For the most part, the bite tends to die off in these lakes post Jan 1st. Bass are pretty sensitive to dissolved oxygen getting low, so this follows. Once the weeds start to die off and the snow piles up, light penetration decreases pretty drastically, so does D.O. and their metabolism. You’ll still catch bass, but they’re not as common except in areas where they’re extremely abundant.

Before this effect sets in, they feed aggressively in schools along weedlines. We had a lake where tip-ups and suckers/shiners were used till the fish came through, after which we opted to sit in the same holes and jig fish them. You’d catch a few and things would die for awhile, until a school would roam the weedline again and provide the same action. Rattle baits are great options then.

This time of year I don’t have much experience fishing them, but they show up in traditional panfish spots off of weedlines and deeper breaks as Tim mentions.

Late ice they start roaming around with the panfish again, getting active. We filmed a late ice show you can find here that had lots of bass following panfish into and around the last remaining vegetation of the year. Lots of bass mixed in with quality gills!

Good luck!

Joel

Thank you both very much! I appreciate the time you both took to respond. As I said I have wanted to give it a whirl through the ice, I just wasn’t sure what to do. I will see what happens as the week moves along and maybe give it a shot before the season ends.

Thanks again for the tips!

WS

I got a bunch of them early ice by hopping around laydowns and weed lines with a #6 ratso. The pond I fished is full of bass so it wasnt too hard to catch them.

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Anyone have any go to baits or techniques for fishing bass under the ice? I have a little lake that I have wanted to try, but have always had poor luck catching them in the winter.

Thanks for any tips or comments.

WS

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Winter LMB are what give Chubby Darters a place in my tackle box. Worthless for everything else in MN (besides calling panfish in) but my go to for bucket mouths.