By Randy Cnota
This month you’re likely to experience the most topwater bass action you’ll see all year. Fish have recovered from the rigors of the spawn, their metabolisms are speeding up with the increase in water temps, and they want to eat!
Let’s face it, there’s nothing more exciting than seeing a lure get smashed on the surface by a big bass. With the shape and size of their mouth, bass are engineered to be topwater predators. They can easily engulf large prey from the surface by flaring their gills and instantly flushing gallons of water through them in violent strikes.
They are vicious predators that are willing to eat a large meal, so when presented with what appears to be a small baitfish injured on the surface… it’s chow time!
The Bagley Spintail 05 and Bang-O-Lure are floating balsa wood jerkbaits with a prop at the tail. Balsa is very light, soft wood that provides incredible buoyancy and is the perfect material for imitating baitfish. Bagley’s been making these balsa lures since 1960, and they flat-out catch fish. The plastic Spintail has proven itself to me over the past few years to be just as effective at fooling fish.
I like to fish these lures on a rod less than 7 feet long to increase casting accuracy, because I often throw this lure into small pockets of open water among wood and grass. Pockets like this are often used by bass as ambush spots. They lie in the shade on the edges, so when your lure lands in the pocket, let it settle for several seconds. Don’t be surprised if you get a strike before moving it.
If a fish doesn’t blast the bait off the cast, move it with a short, sharp jerk to make it dive, wiggle and slosh the water without moving a long distance. This maximizes your lure’s time in the open water of the pocket and increases the odds of a strike.
I prefer to use 15-pound-test monofilament, but braided line can be a good bet depending on the type of cover. Keep in mind you will be hanging the lure and the bass up in the cover, but you’d be amazed by the size of fish you can haul out of cover with 15-pound mono.
To scour vast expanses of grass and pads for bass, buzzing frogs and buzzbaits will be hard to beat. I like the Gambler Cane Toad and the Zoom Horny Toad, which provide me completely different actions. The Cane Toad produces a louder gurgling sound while the Horny Toad gives a more subtle buzzing action. Rig these on stout rods with heavy wire hooks and 50-pound braid, minimum. I don’t work these baits slowly unless the fish tell me to. Fully recovered post-spawn bass strike with extreme speed and precision when they see a feeding opportunity, so burn it with a high-speed reel… and hold on!
Capt. Randy “C-note” Cnota is co-publisher of the Panama City/Forgotten Coast edition of Coastal Angler and owner of C-note Charters in Panama City, Fla. Check him out at www.cnotcharters.com.