“It’s a different way to approach those fish that are
feeding heavily after the spawn in zero to 10 feet and
really chasing the bait,” he says. “the neat thing about a
jerkbait is it allows you to cover a lot of water and find
those places where the shad are spawning, be it around
grass, rocks or hard spots on shallow flats. these are the
same places where you can catch them on top, but a jerk-
bait might catch you a few more fish that won’t rise on a
topwater for one reason or another.”
Dove likes to start out working the bait with a fairly
aggressive cadence using a couple of quick twitches on a
slack line, followed by a one- to two-second pause, but
he’s always mindful of how the fish are reacting.
“you have to keep an open mind with jerkbaits and
adjust your cadence to find the one the fish want,” he
says. “It can change over the course of the day.”
3. schooling bass
4. dock-Fishing
scanlon says the jerkbait has year-round potential on
any lake that has an abundance of boat docks, particular-
ly the large, floating-style slips like those often provided
by lakeside marinas.
“bass won’t leave those types of docks,” he says.
“there’s always food and cover around. you may just
have to adjust to different areas around the docks with
the season of the year. Go shallower during spring and
deeper in the summer.”
scanlon generally begins dissecting a dock by working
his jerkbait parallel with the deeper, shadier corners.
“I’ll also keep an eye out for any extras they can sus-
pend around like anchor cables, brush piles or maybe a
tree that somebody has strung up to the side of the dock,”
he adds. “It doesn’t take much to attract a few fish.”
5. deep brush
FLW tour pro Casey scanlon of Lake ozark, Mo., has so
on clear-water savannah River impoundments such as
much confidence in subsurface jerkbaits that he keeps
lakes hartwell, Keowee and Russell, FLW tour pro brian
one tied on all year long.
Latimer of belmont, s.C., says anglers frequently use top-
one of scanlon’s favorite times to tempt bass with a
water lures throughout much of the summer to call bass
jerkbait is when they are actively chasing or schooling on
to the surface from underwater brush piles – some as
baitfish at the surface from summer through fall. the
deep as 35 feet. then, for whatever reason, the surface
action frequently occurs over large flats with deep water
bite begins to wane once september rolls around.
nearby, near big channel swings or around the perimeter
“the fish are still relating to the deep brush piles, but
of floating docks.
for some reason they get off the topwater and you have to
“schooling action can happen just about anywhere,”
use some kind of reaction bait to draw them up,” he says.
he says. “It’s a situation where they’ll also bite topwater,
“that’s when a suspending jerkbait can really shine. they’ll
but they might bite a jerkbait better. you won’t miss
come up and grab it 6 to 7 feet beneath the surface.”
near as many fish on a jerkbait, either. A lot of times
Latimer says employing the proper retrieve is important
they’ll hook themselves even if they swipe at it and don’t
for the jerkbait to produce over the deep, gin-clear depths.
eat it.”
“this is warm-water, clear-water jerkbaiting,” he says.
scanlon points out that a jerkbait will sometimes catch
“the fish are going to be pretty aggressive, so I like to
the bigger fish in a schooling situation, too, thanks to its
work the bait as fast and erratically as I can to maximize
ability to dive beneath the fray.
the flash and create those reaction strikes without giving
“the bigger fish sometimes trail along down there
them opportunity to get a good look at it. that is really
beneath the smaller fish that are surfacing,” he
important in super-clear water.”
explains. “they’ll ‘sit down’ to get the
easier pickings – the wounded or
dying baitfish the others sometimes
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summer 2019 I FlWFIshInG.com
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