Bobby Garland’s Itty Bit lures provide highly dependable summer action from several kinds of fish and lend themselves to a variety of presentations.
“This one must be a bass,” my son, Nathaniel, called out as fish he was battling surged against his ultralight gear. I paddled my kayak nearer to get a better look and photos. “Actually, it’s a giant bream!” he said when he got the fish in sight.
A few minutes later he slid his hand beneath a pound-plus shellcracker (officially, a redear sunfish), lifted it into the kayak, and the tried to figure out the best way to get a grip around the fish’s big body. We got some pictures before he returned it to the water and then returned to casting a tiny bait toward shoreline cover to see what else he could catch.
I had been telling Nathaniel about Bobby Garland’s new Itty Bit Slab Hunt’R and showing him photos of bluegills, yellow perch, largemouth bass and more – even including another big shellcracker that I’d caught from a different spot on the same lake a week prior. Finally, he was getting to see for himself and was enjoying the fast action. His big shellcracker was one about 50 fish of a handful of species we caught in a few hours of casting Itty Bits from kayaks that afternoon.
Learn the favored teaching approaches of the author, who is long-time fishing guide, plus perspectives from a professional crappie angler and a fishing industry veteran.
If you want to hook a kid on crappie fishing, you only must do two things: Keep it simple and catch crappie. Sounds easy enough, but where do you begin?
Over the years, as a guide on Beaver Lake, I have guided hundreds of young anglers out fishing with their parents. The key to having a successful day out on the water with young anglers is to keep moving and finding actively feeding fish.
Bomber minnow plugs are time-proven striped bass producers in the surf. Learn how to tap into the best coastal action.
No fish in the United States commands the passion of the surf angler like the striped bass. From Maine to New Jersey, surf fishermen plan their lives around the spring, summer and fall months for the chance to tap into hot striper action.
Going back to the advent of surf fishing for striped bass, large, long swimming plugs have been designed to mimic natural forage baitfish, including as menhaden, mullet, herring and mackerel. One lure has not only the pedigree from the old school to be considered the godfather of manufactured surf plugs, but to this day remains the top offering for any surf striper angler – the Bomber minnow plug.
Look through any old fishing magazines, and you’ll quickly see the word Bomber was omnipresent through the text. That pattern still rings true. The Bomber plug is a surf striper angler’s best friend.
The Carolina rig is highly effective for catching bass in a broad range of situations. Here’s what you need to know for Carolina rigging.
Jimmy Mason doesn’t fish the same areas across the calendar, and his bait selection certainly varies by season. However, there is one bass fishing rig he knows he can count on every month of the year — the Carolina rig.
“It works year ‘round, and I always have a minimum of two in the rod locker,” the Pickwick/Guntersville guide and tournament pro said. “This is a very versatile rig that can serve many purposes.”
Noting that he’ll vary his Carolina rig action with different styles of baits for active and lethargic periods, Mason summarizes his seasonal preferences.
Brush piles produce summer crappie. We all know that. Two top crappie anglers explain how to catch the most crappie out of each brush pile.
The formula is simple. Using the correct presentations equals success catching more and bigger crappie from brush piles.
“When I say presentation it means a number of things,” said professional crappie angler Dan Dannenmueller. “Everything from distance from the brush pile to the boat, casting distance, lure retrieve, lure color, lure size, angle of cast from the boat and everything else I can change to incite a crappie to bite.”
Before fishing a brush pile, Dannenmueller will use his sonar units from a distance to see if it has crappie in it and where they are located. He likes to stay at least 50 feet from the brush pile to avoid spooking the crappie before moving closer.
As hot as the summer sun can be, the crankbait bite can be even hotter given the right conditions! In today’s blog we will go over three tips for summer crankbait fishing to help you find fish, pick out the right plug, and stay on a school of fish for as long as possible.
Learn about the most recent addition to Bobby Garland’s Itty Bit series and its unique offerings for crappie fishermen who want to downsize.
Bobby Garland’s highly popular Itty Bit series of crappie baits just got bigger. Not the baits, of course. They’re still Itty Bit at only 1.25 inches in length. Instead, the series has grown with the introduction of the Itty Bit Slab Hunt’R.
The Itty Bit Slab Hunt’R has a different profile and action than the Itty Bit Swim’R or Slab Slay’R, two already proven baits for when conditions demand finesse or match-the-hatch approaches for success. All three are down-sized but full-featured versions of longtime Bobby Garland producers.
You don’t need to fish from a boat to catch snook. You can wade fish the flats and take the “dog” for a walk, too.
Can you walk the dog? No, not the four-legged kind. I mean a cigar-shaped topwater lure that launches like an arrow and walks and talks to gamefish on the way back. The walk is twitch left, twitch right, twitch left, twitch right. The talk is clickity-clickity-click. It’s a dinner bell for predators. Florida’s saltwater snook come a runnin’.
This is far from “deep sea” fishing. It’s casting light tackle in mostly knee-deep water. You can use your boat to motor to the a, then hop out and wade. But you don’t even need a boat. Drive your car to a waterfront park. Hike to the shoreline. Put on wading boots. Wade in. Walk the dog. Map and satellite imaging on your devices are terrific for finding places to park-and wade
Beyond helping you beat the heat and the crowds, summer night crappie fishing provides dependable action. Here’s what you need to know.
Seeing a few minnows in a pier light, you know it won’t be long. Soon more plentiful minnows will become part of the scene, and the dark shadows of crappie will start showing up. If all goes according to plan, the crappie catching action will soon kick into gear.
Night fishing for crappie has definite advantages through mid-summer. Two obvious advantages are an escape from the heat of the day and the chance to avoid crowds of pleasure boaters and other anglers. Fishing is about trying to catch fish, though, and the most important advantages of summer night crappie fishing are that fish tend to be congregated and cooperative, and the patterns are predictable.
Crappie are active at night, moving shallower than at other times and actively seeking food. They feed opportunistically on concentrations of forage, which is central why summer night fishing tends to be predictable.
Wisconsin smallmouth specialist Bill Schultz shares countless hours of learning about the lure that has produced more than 6,000 smallies for him.
In 1992 I bought my first Rebel Teeny Wee-Crawfish to fish bluegills and largemouth bass in a pond. I still remember my first cast with this little fish-catching magnet. I caught two bluegills, and I knew I had a winner.
It wasn’t until August 4, 1994 that I gave it a try for stream smallmouth bass, and since that day it has been one of my “go to” lures for river smallies. It’s possible that I have fished this lure for smallies as much as anyone in the country. Since catching my first smallmouth bass in May of 1994, I’ve caught and released 24,700, with more than 13,000 coming from my river outings. Conservatively, I’ve caught more than 6,000 smallmouth bass on the Rebel Teeny Wee-Crawfish!
A jigging spoon fills a critical niche in any angler’s tackle selection. Learn how to best use these highly versatile lures.
Simple and Versatile: those two words describe Cotton Cordell’s CC Spoon to a T.
This venerable lure consists of nothing more than a piece of hammered metal with a rustproof treble hook at one end and a metal loop at the other end. It comes in just two colors—silver and gold—and four sizes—1 1/2, 2, 2 1/8 or 3 inches. Despite having only basic options when selecting a CC Spoon, the angler who drops one of these often-overlooked lures into the strike zone might hook up with anything from panfish such as white bass or crappie to high-jumping black bass or trout to pole-bending saltwater species that could range from sheepshead and redfish to sharks and tuna.
The War Eagle Jigging Spoon offers similar functionality. However, different shaping alters the profile and wobble. It comes in two sizes – 1/2 and 7/8 ounce – and seven colors and comes equipped with a swivel.
Learn the best baits and presentations for calling bass from different types of vegetation.
Green vegetation in bass waters creates habitat-rich environments, which creates a common problem for bass fishermen: It all looks fishy. Rather than being overwhelmed by all the visible possibilities, anglers do well to learn to identify those areas with the highest probability of producing bass. Part of the solution is learning to accurately cast the appropriate lures to the vegetation that is most apt to produce a strike.
There are four major types of aquatic vegetation: floating, submerged, emergent and algae. Let’s look at several specific varieties and examine how to go about fishing them.
