With winter here the bass bite can be a little tough, especially if your shore fishing, but if you have some ideals of what to look for you can have a blast!
Right now the water level at my local lake is very low, so low that I cant launch my Champion there and with the price of gas plus the charge to launch at other lakes, Welcome to California, its pretty expensive so I’ve been doing some shore fishing for bass up in the Owens Valley and having great success.
Even though the water is still cold in the Owens river, there are still several spots that have been productive for me lately. I have found that the smallmouth bass in the river have been more active than the largemouth but that stands to reason seeing how they seem to prefer colder water.
One of the good spots for smallmouth is where a reservoir dumps into the river, the current is moving so the water has plenty of oxygen which of course equals life. For me, I get most of my bites along the eastern shoreline. I figure it’s because the eastern shoreline gets more sunshine therefore it’s a little warmer water. Another added bonus is that the native trout are moving up also. We have been getting some nice Bows and Browns.
Some good lures to use while bass fishing in the winter include jigs, which happen to be one of my favorites. While I know that the crawfish are still dormant, I guess the bass see the jig as a special treat, who doesn’t love a lobster? BTW, the trout are also hitting the jigs.
My favorite jig would have to be a custom Yamamoto Grub. What I do is buy the twin tail grubs, and Mini skirts. I then put them on a Revenge Jig head. As to which size, it really depends on how fast the water is flowing. To fish them, right now the best advice I can give you is to fish it slow, just drag it slow, like a lethargic crawfish crawling along the bottom. The twin tail will provide subtle action even while it’s sitting still. While at times the bite can be aggressive, most of the time while Bass fishing in the winter ts going to be a slow bite.
Other good lure choices are Rip Baits, worked very slowly as well as inline spinnerbaits like Mepps, Panther Martins and Roostertails. I’m not sure why but they really seem to prefer ones with black in them.
Another good spot while Bass fishing in the winter is warm water spots. Over the years I found a couple spots that are fed by warm water springs so even on the coldest days, even with snow on the ground, the water is actually steaming and the fish are very actively feeding, especially the bass. The spots that I’m speaking of fall under general trout season regulations so while fishing for bass, if you happen to catch a trout you have to let it go. Recently I took a couple friends up to on of these spots, we caught at least 30 bass and one of my friends caught a nice hook jaw German Brown. We took pictures and released it to get bigger, what a beautiful fish it was and yes, it was caught on a bass lure.
I hope this gave you some new tips to try, just be sure to remember, while Bass fishing in the winter, more often than not, fishing very slowly will produce more bites.
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Until Next Time, Good Luck and Tight Lines To Ya!
