Its Shad Time,,,,,,as long as the weather holds

From now on up to Christmas and beyond ignore the paddle tails at your Peril

  below is the highly successful combination of a 20g articulated jig head paired with a Holderness twin point carried by a 130mm delalande GT shad Pearl this set up in the later months can be lethal in the right hands

Below ,,,,Here's a great shot where the angler is fishing typical shad ground a fast run off over weed and rough ground ,typical Bass ambush area with back eddies and fast flowing run offs containing sand bars and the character of many underwater holding features,,,

The new Delalande buster and GT shads are now coming along too encountered a few fish in 2011 on this mover the thing i have found with these shads on the ground i fish the are very successful for the latter end Nov/Dec and the very beginning from march/April  small windows you say but you only need an hour on the fish with these things

                Long Trotting for Bass in Estuaries with soft plastic lures you must try 


          

     THE METHOD

The Method as I call it is my personal favourite way of fishing the fast moving deep water channels and the slower back eddies of Clearwater lagoons and estuaries for Bass,

The choice of rigs and plastics are endless in the world of fishing today, Paddle Tail shads are my personal favourites best when the sea trout are running the estuaries and the worm type plastics when the sand eel are around both very effective on their day.

For this description of method fishing for Bass I am relating to the paddle tail shad.

Find your estuary and work out the fish holding areas on both rising and ebbing tides and times,, first light coinciding with high water if at all possible is a magic time.

Look hard for where the most likely place for the Bass are going to lie ,on sandy underwater dunes , weed strewn margins, back eddy bait gathering areas and natural ambush points , especially on the ebb tide, this will come with experience and developing your watercraft and this bit is the fun part,, working it all out,
The approach to trotting is exactly the same as trotting an Avon float for Chub and Barbel species in freshwater a skill I worked out in my younger days that terminal gear is all important which then relates to the natural presentation of the plastic lure to the Bass.
Cast your lure at one o’clock keeping your line as high as possible out of the water by raising your rod tip check and mend your line getting all your line behind the lure keeping as much line out of the water as possible, feel for the paddle tail working, then you are in business, keeping your bail arm disengaged and letting line off between your thumb and forefinger of your left hand giving you controlled trotting of your swim with the odd time checking the line feeling for the shad tail working in the current this will tell you the angler that the bait is working weed free and in the zone.

Stopping the Trot will have the effect of lifting the bait off the bottom and restarting will have the effect of dead sticking the bait to the bottom and keeping the line slack, strikes are common in this phase

An upstream wind is ideal for this method, keeping your lure in the Bass zone for a considerable amount of time holding back your lure in an underwater balancing act in the current,
Water moving faster than the lure will make your paddle tail work even faster for you with a natural presentation,
Trotting as much as 120yds long down your swim and covering vast amounts of ground with your lure obviously increases your chances of a Bass Nailing your well presented lure.

TIGHT LINES