by Bruce Middleton, August 10, 2007

There are some big bass out there that feed only at night…

I have heard and read a lot about night fishing for big bass for years and years now but until just recently I’ve never given it a chance. Well all that changed just a few months ago when I finally went out on my first couple of night bass fishing excursions. And let me tell you, it was a real eye opener.

Firstly, don’t go on one of these trips without a head mounted flashlight or a really big black light system. A couple of hand held models just doesn’t get the job done. Secondly, bring extra batteries for the headlight. I fished until my batteries went dead the first trip but forgot I still had to load the boat when I was done and doing that by just the tail lights of the truck is no fun at all. Third, use your life jacket, as you never know what or when you might hit something and flip yourself out of the boat. Now there is a lot of ambient light from the houses around the lake but in between the houses it is quite dark indeed and that includes the boat ramp. This makes it hard to judge the exact distance to the shore, docks or whatever objects you are casting to. A light of any type helps you judge how far you have to cast and helps you control the reel and line should you cast too hard and too far. The sense of touch really comes into its own at night.

The next thing you have to realize about night fishing is that you are going to suffer the same small mishaps during the night that you don’t think about much during the day. And these small things are a real nuisance during the night and they just stop you all together until you find or fix the problem. Things like twisting your line around the end of your rod, dropping something small on the bottom of the boat and getting a backlash to name a few. Now these may seem trivial but at night they stop you cold from casting or from hitting the mark you aimed at. Also, hitting the mark, in the middle of the night, is a real challenge too, believe me. A headlamp makes all the difference in the world if only because it frees up both hands to check on everything before you cast your lure. It is a disheartening feeling to whip the rod in a great cast, have the lure go almost nowhere and listen to the bait caster spinning away.

I would advise that you bring several extra pre-rigged rods with you on a night fishing trip simply because of the hardship of trying to tie a knot in the dark especially if you wear glasses and are trying to hold a flashlight at the same time. That and if one reel becomes so badly snarled, you can put it aside and not be short a rod.

Now as to which lake to try night fishing on, I would suggest one that gets a lot of fishing pressure during the day or has a lot of water skiers on it all the time. One of those lakes you hardly ever fish because of the number of boats that always seems to be on it. This type of pressure causes more bass to feed more at night as well as the big bass who feed at night just out of habit so they won’t be caught. The lake water can be clear or dingy but clearer water seems to be better according to what little experience I have so far.
Tools of the trade. The lures to use for night fishing are just about as varied as fishing for bass during the day. Good search baits like spinner baits, crank baits, buzz baits and top water lures work well. But the addition of a rattle in the jig makes a lot of sense to me as the bass can hear it and move to find the bait in order to attack it. I also like the use of crawfish patterns on the worms (with rattle imbedded in them). Jigs with rattles, tubes, and plastics are some great choices as well. A buzz bait with a clacker is recommended as well as a frog or rat with a rattle. In fact any top water lure is highly useful in taking these big night feeders. They produce a lot of commotion on the surface and that is exactly what you want.

I used the moon phase on all my night fishing trips too. Two trips were within two days of the full moon (one two day before and one two days after) and one trip was right at the new moon. I do believe that a full moon helps the bass feed more effectively as they can see better and have to rely less on their lateral lines to hunt with. I also believe that a bass needs to see what it finally will intake just as it strikes. I don’t believe they strike blindly at food in hopes it’s edible. But then again a bass has huge eyes as apposed to its body size. This suggests that they are very used to seeing quite well where very little light exists naturally. I think a bass sees more at night than most people give them credit for seeing by a great margin.

At night the bass reposition themselves from the deep water to the very shallow parts of the lake. They are searching mostly for crawfish along the shoreline and along the weed lines, docks, rocky areas and points. When I say shoreline I mean right up to the water line because the crawfish will move up to here to feed on items blown or washed up on the beach or at the watermark. Bass are also looking to spot small prey fish that are sleeping and catch them unaware of their presents. They are also looking for those ever-noisy frogs too. Now this is just a guess on my part but it makes sense if you think about it. But since I haven’t done a complete study on the subject I can’t definitively say that I’m 100% correct though. A bass has a great sense of smell and a great sense of eyesight as well as hearing and lateral lines and I’m sure he uses them to their fullest potential. And since bass are successful night hunters I’m pretty sure I have gotten the big picture pretty close to being right.

As for the retrieve on whatever lure you opt for, I’ve found that slow and steady is the way to go. That and making several cast to the same area so the bass can zero in on the lure makes a big difference. That and hit prime areas several times during the night as not all bass move into the shallows at the same time.

One thing I did learn that surprised me on all my trips was the fact that I didn’t do very well fishing under docks. Fishing around them, yes but not under them. Crawfish like a rocky to gravely bottom so have those places in mind when you are using a jig with a rattle to mimic them. I think they avoid the docks because this is a bass hang out so they are found some distance away. The same thing seemed to apply to woody structure. No crawfish were found in them but they are around them. Maybe it is because the bass have already eaten all of them from under the docks and logs and the only ones left are out in more open areas.
It is a known and well-documented fact that big loner bass feed mostly at night, as do smaller bass that are under a lot of fishing pressure. It makes sense to go after them during the times that these big bruises feed. Whether you start late in the day and fish into the night or start in the night and fish well past dawn is a matter of choice. But either way you’re sure of catching bass that don’t normally get caught by any other fishermen. It also makes sense that the use of lures that make a little bit more noise that usual are needed so the bass have an easier time finding them. But this is not to say you can’t use soft plastics. Swim baits with a dark under belly work ok at night, as do weightless rigged tubes. They just have to be on the surface or they have to make some sort of noise or both.

What does make sense when using plastics though is to make them smell good so a bass can follow a scent trail to them and to add a rattle if possible. With the light of a full moon and the ambient house lighting there is quite a bit of light that penetrates the water of a lake at night. More than you might think. Your job is to make sure that your bait seen. Many night fishermen use fluorescent dye to paint plastics fluorescent green and oranges so they can be seen better by the bass. This is one way to up your odds of catching a bass at night.

Most anglers would automatically think that the color white would be the best color to use during these nighttime hours but just the opposite is true. A black surface lure is much easier to see against the surface. Under water the use of crawfish colors and patterns works the best because that is exactly what the bass is looking for and expects to find. So stay away from any color that isn’t natural to a bottom dwelling creature.

Now anyone who has been out at night anywhere near a lake or pond knows that you can hear the sounds of frogs for miles. This makes a plastic frog a great bait to use at night. Use a slow twitch retrieve around any weed line and vegetation that lies on the surface. Lily pads out in the middle of the lake don’t produce well for me at night like the ones near shore.

There are two basic types of plastic frog lures you can buy today. One has a single hook underneath with a weed guard and the other has two hooks on top of the frog set close to the body so as to be just about snag free. Of the two the double hook plastic frogs are easier to set the hook on a bass with. However the plastic frogs with the single hook underneath are build to go places the double hook just can’t go. Those bunched up lily pad areas and the like. This single hook frog can roll over and never snag. They too however can be great hook setters if you apply enough leverage. Leverage is obtained by reeling down on the bass and the using your entire body, swing the rod tip across your body so as to move the lure as far as possible in the least amount of time possible.

Silence is golden when fishing at night. Because you are probably the only boat on the lake it is important, vital even to be as quiet as possible. Sound travels at night and you are the only thing out there making noise. This goes for you’re casting too. A quiet entry is vital. No big splashes to spook the bass and no rattling around in the boat if you can help it. Use the trolling motor as little as possible and I don’t use the sonar a lot if I can help it. I see it as just added noise I don’t need to introduce into an otherwise quiet nighttime world.

The one good thing about night fishing for bass is that you can’t anticipate a top water strike like you can in the daylight. You are fishing by touch and that automatically makes you set the hook after the fish is on the line. Fighting the fish in the dark is another matter though. You can’t tell where the bass is going or sometimes, how close or how far away he is from you at any given time. The headlamp is all-important for helping you land a bass at night. I also recommend the use of a net at night verses using your hand to mouth a bass like you would during the day. It’s a whole lot easier on you and the bass.

There is one other point I need to make clear to you if you decide to try night fishing. You stand a good chance of loosing some tackle. This is because you have a very hard time telling how far the lure is going to travel with each cast. A lot of the time it will go a lot farther than you want it to and this causes it to land in the brush or on the shore. If you cast a lure and it lands up in a tree limb it is almost impossible to see and get back. I know, I lost a good top water lure but I went back a few weeks later and found it hanging in plain sight and got it back. Sheer luck on my part I assure you.

A list of the lures I used during my night fishing included a frog, a silver suspending (deep) 6 inch Long Bomber A lure (with rattles), a Booyha spinner bait with tandem silver Indiana blades, a Spittin’ King top water Lure, a black buzz bait with a black skirt and clacker, a chugger top water lure, a jig and pig with rattles in black and blue with a black and blue worm, a floating crayfish colored 6” weightless worm and a Rapala original floating minnow used as a top water lure. I also used a Bumble bug ™, a couple different Zara Spooks and a Pop-R because the top water lures worked so well. But you should not take these lures as gospel when you go out. Use them as a guide and adjust them and other lures you own to fine-tune the lures you need to maximize the best catching lures you can make work.

Yes there are some pitfalls to night fishing and yes it is a bit more difficult than fishing during daylight hours. But the numbers and the shear size of the bass you catch more than makes up for this. It is an adventure and should be looked at it as such. It’s something not a lot of bass angler do but something a lot of bass angles need to try a few times just to have a chance to go after the really big ones in a lake. Night fishing will better your chances of reeling in a truly huge bass. I caught 5 bass the first night with 4 pounds 1 ounce being the biggest, 4 bass the second night on the same lake with 5 pounds 3 ounces being the biggest and on the last night on a different lake I caught 8 bass with 4 pounds 13 ounces being the biggest and 2 ponds 12 ounces being the smallest. Now that isn’t bad for my very first night fishing adventures. You really ought to go out one night and give it a shot. Try it once and see if you don’t agree.



Bruce Middleton
bpmiddleton@peoplepc.com