So I have no idea what I am doing

[cassidyta]

Here is the situation. I did okay prefishing on Wednesday but come tourney time (Saturday) I couldn't get a fish to the boat. If it was just me, I would write it off as a bad day. This was the theme for my entire club. Out of 17 guys on the water, only 3 guys weighed in fish. 4 total fish for a club! 1 crank bait, 2 shakey head, and 1 fluke.
Everyone of us had the same story. The fish just wouldn't commit to the bait. The strikes we I did get were very passive. This happened on every bait I threw.
I started with top water and they just ticked at it. Even when I just twitched it in place. I switched over to a fluke and had followers but no real strikes. When the sun finally came out, I threw a frog in the slop and pitched a senko into the weeds. I had 1 fish run with the senko, but when I went to set a hook there was nothing.
There really isn't a technique that I didn't try and the results were the same.
I downsized baits, but they showed no interest in the 3 inch senkos nor IKAs.
The differences between prefishing and tourney day a drop in temps of 30 degrees. It stayed cloudy all day on Saturday.

So any ideas why they wouldn't commit? What do you all do when you are only getting soft bites.

[carolina-rig-01]

We have all had days like this buddy. You were getting bit so you were obviously on the right track. Did you try a different color of the baits that the fish wouldn't commit to, and did you try speeding up or slowing down these presentations?

[keithdog]

Originally Posted by carolina-rig-01

We have all had days like this buddy. You were getting bit so you were obviously on the right track. Did you try a different color of the baits that the fish wouldn't commit to, and did you try speeding up or slowing down these presentations?

Ditto. I've had days like that as well and I try to find one lure the bass seem to be interrested in and then experiment with that one type of bait. Sometimes though they just arn't interrested enough to take anything.

[gonefishin3]

I usualy go drag with something small drop shot or carolina rig you said they wernt hitting hard on something small mabe your senko ? with an exaderated extremely slow presentation ?

[cassidyta]

I varied speeds and sizes but it didn't really matter. If it was just me, then I would chalk it up to a bad presentation, but this was the same story for the whole club.
When I read one of my local boards, everyone is saying the same thing from this past weekend at that lake.

[Raul]

That´s why it´s called "fishing" and not "catching" Cass.

We all have had days like those and sometimes the answer to your prayers is where & when you least expect it, many times you find it out by accident.

A couple of weeks ago something similar happened to me, I tried everything as in theory it was supposed to be to the conditions, after an entire morning and well into the mid day of going practically fishless ( only a couple of fish ) I found out by accident what and how they wanted, I was fishing at that moment a weedless rigged 5" single curly tail grub, made a bad cast, instead the bait landing at the edge of a weedbed the bait landed in the middle of it, so it was a bad cast, I reeled in to retrieve the bait and cast again, as I reeled in a fish hit the grub ..... uh .... what if ? ..... so I began casting and swimming the grub ... caught another fish, hey, interesting ..... so what else do I have to loose ? so I kept doing the same, swim the grub, I won´t say I caught tons of fish, I caught a total of 11 fish in the afternoon, not bad, swimming a weightless grub sure wasn´t in my book of techiques for the day, didn´t even think about it.

[bamabassman]

the drop in temp was what happened cass. jsut one of those things. at least you weren't the only one that came up short.

[CaptO]

Three things.

S-L-O-W it down, I mean from the fall rate to the amount of shaking on the shakey head.

Change it up, I'm sure you and all the other guys have favorite baits for that lake, change them 180 degrees.

Weightless Grubs is a must. Also try a Float'n fly.

Make it really weird. http://www.basspro.com/webapp/wcs/st...ctType=article

Good Luck

[AUFred]

I suppose I am odd man out. If they were following your bait & eyeballing it or picking up your bait & dropping it. I probably would have picked out a couple of likely pieces of cover and cast at them hard & fast from every angle trying to get a reaction strike. Using spiinnerbaits, crankbaits & lipless crankbaits. At least I would not have been bored.

[DaveW731]

Such a huge change in weather usually = fish lockjaw in my experience. I'm impressed that you were getting so many bites. Sometimes a trailer hook on a spinnerbait or a stinger hook on a soft plastic will catch short/light biters.

[BassBandit]

Originally Posted by cassidyta

The differences between prefishing and tourney day a drop in temps of 30 degrees. It stayed cloudy all day on Saturday.

So any ideas why they wouldn't commit?

They aren't as commit during and after as they were prior to the cold front approach. It happened to me and my partner in team tourney last June. Day 1 and 2 we bag out limit then day 3 temp drop and we only managed 1 fish but rest of em nip at our baits.

[screwballl]

This is when a trailing hook may help on a spinner, or a secondary lighter hook (like a 12 instead of the main 5/0) towards the tail end of the senko.... sometimes it may help to just go lighter all around, lighter line, lighter lures, very slow presentation.