5 tips from a European angler for sharp shooting
At the turn of the millennium, European anglers went straight from antiquated live bait techniques to modern artificial approaches. And for a whole generation of anglers, the bank beating method was just lost. Offshore fishing became the norm and the only option. Many lakes over there are natural and have very poor shoreline features and habitats. All that combined have created expertise at offshore fishing, honed on zander fishing, a close relative to the North American walleye. Let’s see how that translates in bass and walleye fishing on US lakes and rivers.
#1 Pay close attention to your weight
No this is not a motivation to hit the gym more often! The presentation is composed of a jig head and a soft plastic lure. Think of it like a ratio, If your soft plastic is bulky and has a lot of drag it will require a heavier jig head. Since you will always watch your bait on your screen, you can avoid snags and get away with a heavier weight than you would otherwise. It’s especially true if you’re fishing with a 2D sonar straight under the boat, you can control the rate of fall and get away with a heavier jig head.
If you’re fishing with a forward-facing sonar, you might need to scale down your weight to achieve the proper rate of fall. This is particularly true if bass are suspended high in the water column. But again start heavy and downsize as needed until you have the right combo.
#2 The less you do the better
Bass fishermen love to jerk, twitch and shake their lure thinking it will aggravate bass into biting. And it’s true some of the time. But the purpose is to draw the fish from a distance. Here you already see the fish on your screen, there’s no need for drawing it from a long distance. And more often than not doing nothing is the best course of action. Get the bait close to the fish and just leave it there. I can’t count how many times I’ve been distracted while fishing by a text or a phone call, I’ve just held my rod completely static. And that’s when I got the fish to bite.
The simple presence of the lure is enough to get the fish to strike. They can’t stand prey sitting there willy-nilly. It might take a little while, much like bed fishing, but eventually, they’ll react. That’s why it’s important to select good-looking baits because now it’s only their appearance that’s fishing for you.
# 3 Spend more time dropping the bait than raising it
A falling bait is much more likely to draw fish than a raising. It’s a little counter-intuitive because you would think a prey racing away is more likely to draw a strike. And it’s true if the fish is chasing, committing to the bait. But I’m talking here about drawing it in. So I always lengthen my initial drop and then if the first drop fails to bring in a fish, I raise the bait quickly and drop it slowly.
In any case, always keep the bait over the fish and never under. They much prefer to swim up than down. In many cases, fish can swim a very long distance to strike a falling bait. If a fish swims several feet up to get the bait he’s more committed to strike than if you place it right on their face. You can always lower it later.
#4 bait selection
About 75% of the time I use a paddle tail swimbait. The Doz Shad has been designed specifically for this technique. It has a natural shape, with just enough bulk to say “I'm here” and a lightweight tail paddle moving even when held vertically under the boat. It comes in colors adapted to any water condition. For very clear water I will use a fluke-type soft jerkbait. It requires a lighter jig head.
Finally, one overlooked bait is a crawfish imitation. Essentially any beaver/flipping bait can work even though I would avoid kicking craws. Again, I just want the bait to sit there triggering bite by its mere presence. The Battle Craw has been designed exactly for that. Its wide surface area makes it glide and sink slowly with the right weight.
#5 Master your electronics
Maybe I should have started this post with this tip as #1! I’m not going to detail “how to” here, there are immense resources online to learn how to get the most out of your electronics. Off course the forward-facing sonar revolution has brought this technique to a whole new level. But for decades anglers have been catching fish offshore without that technology and you can still do it today.