Spent some time with my Dad fishing a new pond this Easter. More or less we were just trying out his new rod, an 8 weight TFO TiCr X, that my family gave him for his birthday. The rod was way more than required for these fish, but it is always fun to cast a new stick. 

Visited a local farm with my cousin, threw line for a little bit until the temps fell below 40*, for which we were unprepared. Didn't have much luck, but we weren't skunked, so I will take it for what it is. Generally this pond is great at producing both Bass and some monster Bluegill, caught one of each over the course of a few hours, nothing remarkable or really even postable, but what the heck, I thought I would share anyhow. Overall the conversation was better than the fishing but sometimes those are the best days. 

An absolute dink of a Bass… 

Decent, but pretty 'Gill

As we near the end of this year I took a moment to reflect on my experiences growing up fishing. Needless to say this included looking through dozens of old pictures while at my parents house over Christmas. I thought I would share them with you guys, as it is interesting to see what our origins are as anglers. The pictures skip a few years… as I couldn't locate those photo albums and purposely stops about 4 years short of my starting the blog: right about the time I went from being a casual angler to it becoming a serious hobby and passion. The pictures are a mix of me and my relatives and taken in Iowa and Minnesota. Enjoy! 

Night fishing for summer bass can be a highly productive, albeit underutilized tactic in an anglers belt. In fact, In-Fisherman's Critical Concepts Largemouth Bass, notes that upwards of 90% of all feeding takes place at night during the summer heat. However, most bass fisherman rarely fish at night. This is unfortunate, if you are not fishing for bass at night you are missing out on a lot of fish. Starting at dusk fish will often be in shallow water near cover, as the dusk turns to night fish tend to move deeper towards the edge of structures. I have noticed from personal experience that the dusk bite extends about 30 min after sunset then slows, at which point I tend to adjust towards deeper structure. In-Fisherman provides a great diagram of typical movements below: 

The three most common dusk patterns for me are jigs, topwater, and finesse plastics. Again I notice

dusk patterns continue 30 min after sunset. As dusk moves to night, silence becomes my mantra, particularly if the water is flat and calm. Swimbaits are my go to lure. I impart little additional action and simply cast, reach the appropriate depth, and slowly retrieve. I may also use large texas rigged style worms. For color, darker is better. Black, dark blue, and dark purple all work great. If the water is choppy I may add a little vibration in my approach either with a crank bait (rattleless) or a spinnerbait. In fact a few years ago I had an awesome night fishing La Cygne in some fierce wind using spinnerbaits on deep fallen timber. 

Last week I went out about 45 minutes before sunset and stayed until midnight. I caught a few bass for sure, here are my results: 

Another on the T-Rig Worm. 

Since it was particularly weedy at the lake I was fishing I texas rigged my swimbaits rather than the traditional method with the hook exposed.