smallmouth clues/learning?

[Iglow]

I was thumbing through Tony Bean's smallmouth book yesterday and he wrote about a situation where you have a young smallmouth hanging out on a ledge and a wobbling rattling thing comes by and he nails it. That wobbly thing sticks the fish in the mouth and won't let go so he panics and jumps out of the water to shake it loose and does then he heads to deep water to hide and sulk. A couple of months later a wobbly rattling thing comes by and he grabs it again but this time he is hauled to the surface and before he can jump something grabs him and pulls the rattly thing out of his mouth and looks at him then puts him back in the water and he takes off for deep water to hide.
The next spring he's back on the ledge and a rattly wobbly thing comes by and he turns away and gets away from it.
Point being that the baits that give off the fewest clues catch the biggest fish because they don't do things that the fish remember that lead to trouble, baits like hair jigs, grubs,tubes, ned rigs etc. He said there are always exceptions and old fish will hit most any bait but the chances go down with tipoff baits. It sounds sensible but I'm not a smallmouth, what y'all think?

 

[Crappieaddict]

Interesting…

 

[Sako]

Honestly I try not to buy a crank bait that rattles... always thought the fish got use to this and they would do exactly what you stated...

 

[WTM]

largemouth do so i would imagine smallmouth do as well. there are some LMB that will never be caught.

Prairie Research Institute News

blogs.illinois.edu

 

[Iglow]

The more I think about this the more it make sense. If you put pressure on any wild animal they will adjust be it overhunting a deer stand or overshooting a dove field. Bass are wild animals and fishing lures are pressure.

 

[Setterman]

They've tested it with tank bass and it was proven true. I don't fish the reservoirs but on our rivers that get pounded the bass get super tough really fast

 

[redblood]

We just got off the river. We caught a about 2 dozen today. All were caught on 3" grubs. All were released. All were in current

 

[Iglow]

My neighbor has a big pond and I know it goes stale if he fishes it too much.

 

[rsimms]

Mixed feelings from me. I hear TONS of people complaining that Chickamauga bass have become harder to catch due to the amount of pressure on the lake in recent years. Yet I also personally witness a HIGH percentage of bass and catfish which clearly show evidence of being caught previously when you reel them in. (See photo of a recent catch). NUMEROUS bass my clients and I catch clearly show evidence and having been caught before. I lean toward, "Fishing pressure doesn't make a huge difference." That is especially true if you factor in special circumstances, similar to trophy bucks who are NEVER seen - until the rut comes along and they turn stupid.

 

[Crow Terminator]

I could say yes and no. Any of us that fish a lot, can say for certain we've caught the same exact fish on at least a few occasions. I know I've done it several times, and several times, have caught the same fish the same day, throwing the same lure. But at the same time...anybody that has ever fished a heavily pressured body of water and then fished a place not as pressured, can definitely see the difference in how much easier the fish are to catch on the less pressured place. I've had several trips to Chickamauga where I didn't get a single fish and then on a place like Indian Boundary lake, I feel like I'm cheating when I would fish there because of how easy it was to catch fish...and big ones. I think the thing about pressured lakes is that fisherman fish the same exact spots all the time. You can sit and watch community holes on the popular lakes and every few minutes a different boat will come fish the same exact spots almost from the same positions and angles.

 

[UCStandSitter]

In my experience with smallies, I've had better luck with silent baits that move quickly. Reaction stuff. Silent crank baits and the like. I used to slow roll until I'd caught enough when reeling in quick to make a move. I finally realized you can't outrun these guys and the faster it moves it makes it purely reaction and the conditioning usually doesn't factor in. Know for a fact I've caught the same fish in successive weeks on the same bait using this method (granted those couple could've just been Democrats). Seems crazy but works for me.

 

[XCR-2]

Yep, no big fish have ever bit a crankbait, spinnerbait, jig, etc.

 

[TNReb]

What you're describing is what I think of as the baits "signature".

Buzzbaits, crankbaits, jerkbaits.. they all have them.

I think fish will still react when one goes by. I think they're less likely to see/hear it, think about it, and eat it.

That's why baits without signatures (senkos, drop shots, etc) work so well in heavily pressured areas.