Ask several professional bass fishermen about fall fishing strategies, and quite a few will answer the same way. Many bass abandon reservoirs’ main bodies every autumn and head up creek arms, and anglers are wise to do the same.
The reason for the bass’ migration is simple. Shad move up creeks, and the bass follow their food source. The key to finding bass, therefore, is finding groups of shad. The bass might not be among the shad. However, they won’t be far away. Once you find the shad, you can then begin probing nearby structure and cover to figure out what’s going on with the bass.
Shad typically are easy to spot during the fall. Schools tend to be large and dense, and they often come almost to the surface. You’ll either see the baitfish rippling the surface or you’ll notice an area where the water looks darker because of all the shad schooled up just beneath the surface.
Of course, the best way to locate a school of shad is by spotting a bass ripping across the surface and baitfish fleeing in every direction. When that happens, you need to be armed and ready to cast to the action with fishing lure that imitates a shad.
Great first choices include a Heddon Super Spook, Cotton Cordell Super Spot and BOOYAH Flair Hair Jig. All three can be cast long distances and worked quickly to imitate fleeing baitfish. Stick with white or shad-imitating color patterns.
If the bass don’t crush the fast-moving offerings – which often they will – try the opposite approach. Cast a weightless pearl white YUM Houdini Shad or pearl silver flake YUM Dinger as close as possible to where you saw the last fish strike and let the bait fall through the water column. If the line races off, set the hook hard.
Even if no fish are busting on top, work a Super Spot vibrating fishing lure or a Flair Hair jig through any big school of baitfish you find cruising near the surface. Even if the bass aren’t schooling, at least a few fish often will be nearby and quick to nab a fast-moving, shad-imitating offering.
If bass don’t hit among the baitfish (or if you’ve caught all you think your going to), it becomes a searching game. The fish are somewhere nearby, and your job is to find them. Begin with obvious stuff, like laydowns, docks, stumps and grass. Bass often feed shallow during the fall, with one or two on every piece of cover.
From there, start searching with your map and graph, looking for breaks or brush along the slopes of points, creek channel turns and confluences, roadbeds, humps or anything else that provides structure and cover for bass.
As you search, keep in mind that the bass are feeding on shad. Fish shoreline cover with a BOOYAH Blade Spinnerbait or a Bomber 4A and deeper structure with a Bomber Fat Free Shad or a YUM Muy Grub. Fish with shad-imitating colors, move your baits quickly and hold on tight!