Baffling experience, What do bass want?

Went out to Buckhorn last Wednesday with 2 friends. Day was a bit cloudy, light breeze and comfortable temperature. Lake was quiet with only a few boats in sight.

We started with our usual spot at around 6-8 FOW, weedy area at 8am. Landed a couple of 1.5-2lb LMB with spinner within the first hour. Then no bites for a good 5-6 hour. We tried all our setups grub on carolina rig, wobble worm on dropshot rig, senko on texas/wacky rig.

Feeling hopeless, we just let our boat drifted on the lake freely.
We had some luck again at around 4pm using senko in a totally expected area (4-5 FOW) where it was extremely weedy but with a lot of withered weed. Landed 3 decent LMB within 30 mins and no bites at all for the next 2 hour.

Planning to go again some time this week but still can't figure out what setups to use and where to go! I thought by late summer most bass would have migrated to at least 8 -12 FOW and stay along HEALTHY weedlines?

Any tips from seasoned anglers here would be much appreciated!

Tony

You did not bad at all having caught a few nice largies.

From my experience LM stays shallow all summer long and into fall.
I would spend more time shallow : 3-6 Fow : shoreline , fallen trees, Lily pads, docks , dense weedbeds .

Another area to try is very dense isolated weedbeds adjacent to deeper water (they are usually shallow - 4-6 FOW).

Heavy Texas or Tokyo rigs. Experiment with lures to see what works: plastic worms, creature baits, crayfish, leeches etc.

Fishing mainly walleye this year in 8-12 FOW in weeds I caught very few largies there, so the vast majority of them are likely not there.

Good luck on you next trip.

PS. Another couple of tips.
Try larger senkos in 6-7" range
The food for fish is abundant now , so that's why there are shorter biting windows.
Don't sit too long on a spot - cover more spots and you will land more bass.

Time of day can be very important. When I fish all night The large mouth start getting hungry around 5am as well as small mouth and crappie like to feed before the sun comes up. You might want to try starting earlier. One hour before actual sunrise time is a good start. This week is brutal hot. The fish will be more active between 5am and 9am that's it. And the last post by jerkbaiter is right on the money for locations and water depth and baits etc. The evening feed and on into the dark is another option. Good luck... stay safe if you choose to fish before sunrise or after sunset.

Spent a week on that lake in early Aug , we were able to dial them in deep in the slop and floating weed beds , we punched heavy flipping jigs trough the weeds to get to the fish ,
Good luck

been doing very well with 6" senkos and jigs with paddle tail minnows in shallow but staying away from shore about 40 feet seems if you get in close they keep there mouth closed they have seen so many people and boats try a few of the old baits nobody throws and areas you usually dont see alot of people fish. worked so far for myself

I've never fished the lake, and to be fair I'm no season tournament angler of any sort but I can speak from experience. This season, in general, has been really strange, largies especially have just been staying shallow anywhere I fish for em. When it comes to them holding up in really thick/matted weeds in the more shallow water I've been doing decent with ripping weedless ned style baits through them as you would with walleye in the deeper weed lines. Stick baits are the name of the game this time of the year (including grubs/curly tail worms).

Doesn't sound like you were doing a whole lot wrong, just fish being strange. Sometimes fishing just comes with long dry spells. Anyway long paragraph short, shallow has been the name of the game for me, and for others I've talked to as well.

Love watching Matt and Tim.Always ton of great info.

[YOUTUBE]https://youtu.be/9zxkklapd8k[/YOUTUBE]

hi . fished with nephew 4 hrs on cameron lake . landed 21 smallies, lost that many . pop r and crawfish coloured crankbaits. fished where rock,weed line meet and some offshore weeds breaking surface . just before sunrise . if calm popr once lake ripples up go sub surface crankbait or spinnerbait.

Nice, if I wanted to fish that early in the morning I might have to sleep overnight in my boat.

Well now I am really getting anxious to get back to the water hearing that. Sleeping or having a quick nap on a boat is the best. Just means you can keep fishing longer. I have fallen asleep at night while I am fishing. The sound of the drag woke me up as the walleye swam away with my minnow.

Yeah, fishing one hour before sunset is really tough for me too .
I used to be an early person but no more...

Nice haul, fshwk! Congrats!