We don’t have many tournaments in September because fishing can be tough. But for old timers like me, it’s a good month. The fish are so close to the bottom (they keep their bellies right on the bottom) that you can’t see them with forward-facing sonar. But I can still find ‘em with my baits, even if they get to hugging the bottom.”
The key to success in September is being able to keep up with the movement of bass, both back into creeks and from deeper to shallow water. And I’ve won tournaments, back in the day, on Buggs Island, Gaston, Wylie, High Rock and Tuckertown, all in September, doing about the same things every time.
So here’s the blueprint.
Fish are starting back in the creeks, depending on where you’re fishing, they can be moving back real good. It’s a matter of keeping up with fish. You’re going to pay special attention to creek channels and ledges, wooden cover and hard bottoms. You have got to find the places they’re stopping as they move. If you know where they are, that’s a key to success.
I like to find a creek channel and work along the edge, looking for stumps or brush piles, rock piles. I love to find a creek channel that’s close to a road bed or a long point that has a good break; fish love those breaks. If I can find a spot that’s holding a bass, I’ve got a good chance to catch it.
Find ‘em
The first thing you need is to find out how deep the fish are, and that can depend on when and where you’re fishing. Around Labor Day, at Lake Wylie and the South Carolina lakes, fish are still going to be deep. They might be 20 to 22 feet deep – whereas by the end of the month, they might be 10. If you’re fishing farther north or east, they might be already starting to move a little – back and up.
You are going to start at the mouth of creeks and start working back, maybe a quarter of the way. As September progresses, they move farther back, because the majority of the bait is going back there. The fish will really move.
Work the edges of that creek channel, looking for stuff that will hold bass. If it hits a long point, a road bed, a rock pile – brush is really good in September – that’s even better. I don’t know why bass like wood in September, but they really live in it.
Starting out, a crankbait that will run 15 to 18 feet is pretty deadly. A crankbait and a big worm will be my No. 1 tools. Sometimes, I’ll catch a big fish on a jigging spoon, a Hopkins 150.
When you can find a brush pile on a creek channel, especially late in the month when they’ve moved back far enough to be up about 12 feet deep, they can be really good. Bass are going to be on pinpointed, isolated cover. Big stumps, brush and rock piles are hard to beat.
The cover doesn’t change, but where they are in the creeks and how deep will change a lot. By the end of September, they can be in 10 or 12 feet of water – they can come up that much in a week or 10 days. Depending on weather and current, fish can move up 10 feet in two weeks, easy. And if you’ve got a situation where the water isn’t moving very much, they may get even shallower because there won’t be any oxygen in the deep water. So you have to follow them. That might be the hardest part.
I won a tournament on Clarks Hill one year in September, fishing in trees along a creek channel. You just had to find the right piece of cover. Where you catch one, you might catch two or three, or you can keep coming back to that spot and catch one every time.
I’ll start with the crankbait, but before I leave a spot, I’ll usually throw a big worm a time or two, just in case there’s a fish that’s not ready to chase.
Something not many people do is fish a 1½-ounce Hopkins spoon, a 150. It’s a big spoon, and you can catch big fish, but mostly around hard bottoms, not any real cover. Often, you’ll catch stripers and big bass together on those kinds of places by jerking that spoon off the bottom.
Stick ‘em
I use a 7-foot-6, Lew’s Custom Pro flipping stick. I want that heavy action, because when you get big bites, you need to get that hook in them good, and that big rod doesn’t have much give. You don’t need a line with a lot of stretch for the hookset, and to get them away from any cover there might be. I stay away from fluorocarbon, because it’s got too much stretch. Braid that’s 50/15 would be great – 50-pound test, 15-pound diameter. But a good, low-stretch monofilament in about 20-pound test is good, too.
The way I work the bait is to jerk it 2 or 3 feet off the bottom. I’m probably jerking my rod tip up 4 feet, but I’m only raising the spoon 2 or 3 feet, because as you’re raising the rod tip, you’re pulling the spoon toward you as much as up.
The tough part is, you’re making big swings with your rod, and a lot of times, the bite is just a little tick, because he’s hitting it on the drop. You also have to throw a few times to figure out how they want it – falling toward the boat or straight down. If you want it to fall back toward the boat, keep the line tight and the spoon will swing back toward you as it drops. If you want to drop it straight down, just give it some slack and you won’t be pulling it back to the boat as much. Of course, either way, when he hits it, you have to stick him.
On the move:
During September, bass are moving constantly, so you need to move with them. What worked today may not work two days from now, but as long as you’re willing to find them, you should be able to catch your share.
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