DrewFlu33 : Fishing Forum Posts

First post here as a relatively new BassU subscriber, so hopefully this is the right place to be asking this question. I've been really impressed with the content I've been able to absorb so far, and really looking forward to utilizing this awesome resource to improve further moving forward!

I'm a guy who is relatively new to current day tournament bass fishing, at least here in my home state of MN. I grew up in WV and fished a lot of tournaments with my dad through my childhood and teen years, but got away from it once I got to college and realized being gone every weekend wasn't compatible with some of the other things a college guy tends to take an interest in at that time in his life. After moving to MN as an adult and getting back into the bass fishing thing full swing, I've been tournament fishing fairly seriously for about 5 years now. I've learned an absolute TON during that time, and continue to learn more every year.

As I've transitioned from re-learning the tournament fishing game into being a guy who competes more regularly and wins one from time to time, the biggest thorn in my side has been getting over the hump in really figuring out how to focus on big fish. I am fairly comfortable in saying that I've become pretty good at catching good numbers of fish (keeping in mind that Minnesota is a different state than most when it comes to quality of bass fishing). Because of this, it seems that the days I shine are usually the days where it's tough--I can usually find a way to put fish into the boat, and when they're not biting very good, this pays off in good tourney finishes. The flip side of this is on days where they ARE biting a little better (and keep in mind that this is most of the time in MN), I often find myself rolling in with 13-14 lbs while the winners find a way to put together 17-20+ lb bags.

This has been something that has bothered me for several years now. Because I know you're all thinking it--yes, I consider myself a good finesse fisherman, and I do throw a lot of finesse techniques, but I've also spent a lot of time working on traditional "big fish" techniques like dragging a jig or flipping milfoil. Even so, it still seems that I'm only running into the 2-3 lbers than finding a way to stick a couple of the tournament winning 4-5 lbers.

I get it....This is probably the $1 million question in tournament fishing, and we'd probably be pros if we had a good answer. That said, does anyone have any advice that helped you learn to get over that hump? Is it just a metal thing, developing a mindset of finding a pattern where you're going out for 5 bites? Or is there something more to it? Any videos in the BassU library anyone feels like really helped them over the hump here?

Thanks everyone! Happy to be here!

I'm fairly new to BassU and I'm certainly no expert, but as a Minnesotan that fishes a lot of the same type of things you're fishing, I have found that watching videos from guys who are generally from our part of the country is super, super helpful. We don't have shad in a lot of our bodies of water, and we're not usually fishing reservoirs or other large impoundments like a lot of our bass fishing breathren across the country just to use a couple examples. Seth Feider is one pro that comes to mind right away as being someone that is super helpful for Upper Midwest type stuff. Chad Pipkens, Jamie Hartman, and the VanDams are other pros that are from generally our neck of the woods and guys that I've picked up some good advice from.

One other generic piece of advice that someone gave me as a transplant to the area is that for our largemouth, it's (almost) always about the bluegill. Find the bluegill, find the bass, and if you're looking for baitfish to imitate, that should be your first, second, and third choice before trying anything else. Smallmouth are a tougher nut to crack, but one big thing that I've noticed about the fish here vs. the smallmouth I grew up chasing on the east coast is that they are often following the perch around.

Feider was the first one I mentioned, Pete! LOL

That’s a really good idea! Like you said, you’d lose sensitivity but I have to believe it’d snag up a lot less.

Im not sure how heavy lead core is in short lengths, so a couple additional ideas I have along those lines come from the fly fishing world. They sell “sink tip” leaders that people use to get flies down that are pretty heavy. You could cut one of those up to get some weight, or otherwise simply cut up a sinking fly line (though those can get very spendy). Another idea is the weighted putty type stuff fly anglers sometimes use that gets molded around the tippet to get a fly down. If that snagged, it’d just pull off and you wouldn’t lose your rig. Price may be a concern though. Depending on how well it stays put you might end up spending as much on that as sinkers and/or tube jigs.

Thanks for the advice and suggestions!

I’m almost always fishing deep in the summer, but I think the tidbit about thicker cover close by has some juice to it. Good insight Jon!

What you mention about the mindset, Jason, I think is probably the change I’m going to need to make. Related to that but I think slightly different are the days where I’ll be on school after school of fish, some decent ones mixed in, just tellIng myself there HAS to be some kickers in there. There just almost never are. Yep, I’ll maybe even scratch out 5 3 lbers doing that stuff. Not gonna cut it, though. I really need to ask myself the question, “what good is scratching out 5 3 lbers when you need 18 to contend?” Easier said than done, but the mindset is gonna have to be the way to start. I’ll definitely also check out those other videos.

Regarding the Feider videos, I’ve definitely taken in everything I can from him. Unfortunately most of my tourneys are dominated by largemouth so those specific ones are a little outside what I’m looking for, even as useful as that info is when I take trips to smallmouth lakes. That said, his milfoil flipping stuff is absolute GOLD and has directly contributed to me winning some derbies!

Thanks for the updates and insight!