Reaction Innovations Big Dipper
Reaction Innovations
Sweet Beaver Poor Boy’ s Erie Darter right size and numbers of baitfish coming into the river mouth and, of course, that means weather plays a big role in whether the bite comes off hot or slow.
“ It all depends on how fast the season changes,” says Nelson.“ Some years we’ ll have a long, drawn-out, gradual transition, and other years winter moves in quickly.”
Generally, the worse the weather, the better the bite, as bad weather causes baitfish to pour into the sheltered water from Lake Michigan, with big bass right behind them.
“ If you get a lot of rough, cold north wind it provides an unstable environment in the lake,” he adds.“ That’ s when you get a big push of both bait and bass coming in. On the other hand, if the weather turns mild, that bait starts filtering back out of the river mouths. You can pretty much predict when the bite’ s going to be on just by the weather.”
Nelson says in years when bait migrates en masse into the river mouths the smallmouths can be found pretty much anywhere, from shallow sandbars in just a few feet of water, to ledges in 12 to 20 feet of water.
“ When there’ s a lot of bait those bass will‘ wolf pack,’ and you can see them chasing bait on the sandbars. When it’ s like that it can be some of the best fishing of the year. It’ ll definitely make you get out of your tree stand.”
pattern and baits
To find fish, Nelson first finds the bait, utilizing his Lowrance electronics to mark baitfish schools on the ledges, bars and shoals that are the predominate features in river mouths. Once he finds them he uses a number of baits, including silver-colored blade baits, umbrella rigs, swimbaits and what he calls“ glide baits” – in this instance soft photo CouRtesy oF RoN NeLsoN plastics with a planing surface that causes them to glide through the water as they sink.
“ I love starting the fall off by throwing a Reaction Innovations Skinny Dipper on a straight ball-head jig,” says Nelson.“ The weight of the ball-head depends on the conditions. In the fall, when we have the weather-induced mass migrations, the fish come in and they’ ll hit the first sandbar they can find, and it could be in 2 or 3 feet of water. In that case, I’ ll use a 1 / 8- ounce jighead or something light. When baitfish movement is light and they’ re scattered out I tend to use heavier ballheads on the deeper ledges.”
Later in the season, once water temperatures start getting into the 48- to 47-degree range, Nelson starts throwing a mix of umbrella rigs and glide baits.
“ The A-rig is one of those magic baits that you just can’ t beat for schooling fish in the fall. I use a 6-inch Reaction Innovations Big Dipper in bad shad green as the middle attractor, with 5- inch Skinny Dippers as outer baits.”
He fishes the soft-plastic glide baits on light ball-head jigs of 1 / 16 or 1 / 8 ounce.
“ I use pretty much anything, whether it’ s a Reaction Innovations Sweet Beaver or a Poor Boy’ s Erie Darter, that I can fish on a light ball-head weight that lets me glide it through the water column,” Nelson says.
To accomplish that, Nelson sets up on a ledge, casts toward the fish and lets the bait glide to the bottom.
“ No shaking or hopping it; just sweeping the rod and letting the bait pendulum back to you is how I fish it. That is an ideal cold-water presentation, and the fish will just jump on it,” he says.“ It’ s very similar to a Ned rig in that it’ s a bait that’ s designed to wobble in the water column and just glide its way forward.”
Ron Nelson tracks fish up into river mouths off Lake Michigan from early fall until mid-winter.
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