# How would you find bass in a super weedy pond?



## kevinw (Apr 27, 2020)

So I live north of a little town that has a public park on the south side. One of the closest places I can go to fish. Can get there in about 5 minutes, and all my other haunts are 20+ away.

Anywho, the pond itself looks fantastic. There are a lot of old trees and broken stumps with roots growing out into the water and creating little wooden structures all over the edges, just begging for fish to be hiding out. about 5-6 feet off the bank, throughout the entire pond, there's a really thick bed of weeds. I'm not sure what the weeds are, but they're dark and don't seem to have any above-water growth to them. It's like seaweed. The water around the edges is also odd, like a milky blue-ish color. Not sure what that's about.

There are fish in that pond though. We used to catch bluegill there when I was younger and heard the usual stories you hear of every body of water in Ohio about some "pretty big cats in there"... but the only big things I've seen in this pond are carp. I was there a couple weeks ago and saw one in the very early morning near one of those tree stumps, rooting around in the muck right up next to the water's edge. When I walked around the tree and saw it, its tail was sticking half out of the water. The thing was probably a solid 18-20 inches. There are still bluegill in there too. 

So... how would you go about scoping it out for bass? When I was there last, I decided to do some weightless texas rigging with a green pumpkin craw on there and only felt a nibble once, which I assumed was a typical bluegill with a mouth bigger than its brain. I went around the entire pond, casting at wood and rocks along the bank, as well as the edges of the thick weeds in the middle of the pond and didn't catch anything. I did see the carp gulping at the surface in the weeds though, before I saw them spawning like crazy in the Blanchard last week.

So what would the rest of you try next?


----------



## Lewzer (Apr 5, 2004)

Super fluke it rigged weedless. Right through all those weeds.


----------



## kevinw (Apr 27, 2020)

Lewzer said:


> Super fluke it rigged weedless. Right through all those weeds.


Yeah, that's why I was texas rigging a craw. 

I don't have any super flukes, but I do have some zoom minnows... I don't use them much. Had to double-bag them because they leaked fish oil all over my old tackle box. lol


----------



## walleye willey (May 29, 2014)

Weedless spoon with some kind of trailer or a scum frog , I have a very old weedless spoon called a Barney Spoon ..... Great for slop fishing. They are hard to find


----------



## FrankTheGrimes (May 22, 2020)

Frog, texas rigged senko, spooks, buzz baits in the evening. The right spinner should burn through some if it as well. Rewlly just avoid subsurface baits with treble hooks and you should get into a few.


----------



## sherman51 (Apr 12, 2011)

I just fished a pond filled with weeds. I was using culprit fat max 6" grape shad worm. I would cast out and do a 6-second count then start reeling. I would reel just fast enough to stay out of the weeds. I only caught 4 bass in 2 hrs but I missed a few hits, had one nice one hooked that did a nose dive getting in the weeds, and hung me up. the fish was gone when I got it loose. I had a great time. the weeds came all the way to the shore. so it was a challenge fishing the weeds. another option would be topwater baits.


----------



## Bluegillin' (Jan 28, 2009)

If there are that many weeds, I would try a top water, weedless frog. There are a number of different choices: Booyah Pad Crasher, LiveTarget Hollow Body Frog, Strike King KVD Sexy Frog


----------



## kevinw (Apr 27, 2020)

Bluegillin' said:


> If there are that many weeds, I would try a top water, weedless frog. There are a number of different choices: Booyah Pad Crasher, LiveTarget Hollow Body Frog, Strike King KVD Sexy Frog


I only have one frog and it's pretty small. I've only used it once at a place that's notoriously difficult to fish, and it wasn't this pond. For some reason, I don't break it out all that often. Maybe I should.


----------



## PapawSmith (Feb 13, 2007)

I'm totally with the top water guys, and their choices, in the right conditions and time of day. If it is still water and/or mid day I'm a huge very lightly weighted or unweighted trick worm fan. I fish them just like an unweighted senko but they have a smaller profile and different drop pattern that really fishes heavy cover well IMO. One of my very favorite ways to bass fish, and about the slowest presentation I ever use.


----------



## polebender (Oct 29, 2011)

Definitely a topwater frog. There’s also Norman’s WeedWalker. It’s like a buzzbait for fishing weeds and moss! Makes it easy for the fish to track it down under the heavy mats of grass!


----------



## sherman51 (Apr 12, 2011)

another great topwater bait that gets overlooked is the jitterbug. they have some frogs at Walmart that looks great.


----------



## FrankTheGrimes (May 22, 2020)

sherman51 said:


> another great topwater bait that gets overlooked is the jitterbug. they have some frogs at Walmart that looks great.


I have never been able to get a bite on a jutterbug. I have slammed bass with the hollow body frog and then thrown the jitterbug in the same pond with no results. That lure just hates me.


----------



## Yeada (May 21, 2013)

kevinw said:


> So I live north of a little town that has a public park on the south side. One of the closest places I can go to fish. Can get there in about 5 minutes, and all my other haunts are 20+ away.
> 
> Anywho, the pond itself looks fantastic. There are a lot of old trees and broken stumps with roots growing out into the water and creating little wooden structures all over the edges, just begging for fish to be hiding out. about 5-6 feet off the bank, throughout the entire pond, there's a really thick bed of weeds. I'm not sure what the weeds are, but they're dark and don't seem to have any above-water growth to them. It's like seaweed. The water around the edges is also odd, like a milky blue-ish color. Not sure what that's about.
> 
> ...


https://panthermartin.ca/weedwings/ this in chrome or gold has been good to me especially around big lily pads-splash and retrieve


----------



## Outasync (Mar 5, 2016)

Moss boss or even a weedless rigged swimbait. Let it drop in the open areas and pull it over the heavy stuff


----------



## sherman51 (Apr 12, 2011)

even a worm rigged weedless can be an awesome tool in a weed filled pond. a jitterbug can be hard to fish until you get the speed down. another lure i just ordered for fishing my friends pond that has weeds everywhere is a seedless johnson silver minnow spoon. i haven't used one since i was a kid but I'm looking for something that's worked for me in the past in a weed choked pond.


----------



## rickerd (Jul 16, 2008)

I used to fish Spencer Lakes when it was 50% weed covered, maybe more. During daylight we would use the Culprit worm in Mocassin color rigged texas style and drop it into every weed hole or at the edges. We were in a canoe. Once sun was over trees, a few nights the jitterbug was a killer. Bass were coming up and slamming them but it took me a while to figure out when to set the hook. Found out I had to wait until they were back in the water. Bass were jumping out of water with jitterbug in mouth, then twisting and landing. Once underwater, set the hook. Its so tough to wait for that moment. Floating rapala minnows also did the trick. Of course we were casting along the weed edges and dragging parallel to edges.
Rickerd


----------



## rickerd (Jul 16, 2008)

I just picked up the Ned rig kit from Dick's online. Learned how to use them yesterday at a pond and our marina. I bet they would work if using the weedless style. Man that was fun. It reminded me of using the Culprits on a texas rig. That Ned Rig bait stands up under water and moves like a hula dancer. Really a cool lure.
Rickerd


----------



## kevinw (Apr 27, 2020)

rickerd said:


> I just picked up the Ned rig kit from Dick's online. Learned how to use them yesterday at a pond and our marina. I bet they would work if using the weedless style. Man that was fun. It reminded me of using the Culprits on a texas rig. That Ned Rig bait stands up under water and moves like a hula dancer. Really a cool lure.
> Rickerd


Yeah, ned rigs are pretty neat. Caught a nice rock bass on one the other day at a reservoir, but I was swimming it, not letting it hit the bottom. Pausing once in a while.... it struck on the fall.


----------



## nick220722 (Aug 27, 2015)

If there’s no floating weeds I’d go with a whopper plopper at dawn or dusk. If you happen to miss a fish on Topwater, throw your Texas rig back in there as a follow up. As the sun goes up, I’d switch to something like a fluke (jerk bait style) or a finesse worm.


----------



## kevinw (Apr 27, 2020)

So, I finally got around to going back to that pond yesterday evening. It wasn't as milky blue and the giant weed bed wasn't as visible... it was mostly just a murky brown color. 

At any rate, I ended up circling the entire pond again, just throwing a texas rigged senko. I ended up confirming two things. 

1: There are definitely bass in that pond. 
2: There are definitely some BIG bass in that pond. 

I started out fishing the northern side of the pond and wasn't getting a whole lot. Ended up reeling in a small dink of a bass around 6 inches or so. I got a second of those a while later. While still on the north side of the pond though, I had two instances where something big enough to pull line off my reel grabbed my bait, but then ended up getting tangled up in the weeds and off the hook, so I ended up reeling in a big wad of weeds. 

I continued around to the south side of the pond and started fishing where some other guys were before (we moved around the pond in opposite directions) and had another of those big bites... but this time it didn't get off the hook. 

And this is where I learned my lesson to ALWAYS bring a net, because I have no proof of how big this fish was. I got it to shore and it was mad as hell. Every time I tried to lip it, it shook. Finally, it shook hard enough to get the hook out and I didn't have a firm grip on its lip, and down into the mud it went. The pond is low right now, so there's a muddy spot about 12 inches or so around the edge just below the grass line, and that's where the fish fell. I stepped down over the edge and tried not to slip into the pond as I attempted to grab its lip again, and of course, it flopped around some more, I lost my grip, and it fell down between a big tree root and the muddy bank. So in the interest of not wanting to wrestle with the fish and potentially harm it by dragging it out of these tree roots, I lifted the roots and it swam under and out to open water. 

If I had to guess (which I do, obviously), it was around 18-20 inches.


----------



## yonderfishin (Apr 9, 2006)

Putt a glass rattle in just about any soft weedless bait and get a little extra attention


----------



## sherman51 (Apr 12, 2011)

I fished a friends pond that had floating moss all over it. I rigged a 6" worm weedless and caught bass. the only drawback was setting the hook with it buried in the worm. I had to set the hook at least 3 times to get a good hook set. I missed a few but caught enough and had some action.


----------



## Bucket Mouth (Aug 13, 2007)

I'm with the weedless soft plastic people on this one. Throw a paddletail swimbait or a creature bait on a weighted 3/0 or 4/0 hook. In a pond, I'd say use a 1/8 oz, and try a 3.5" bait. A couple suggestions I would give is a Berkley Havoc Grass Pig or Pit Boss Jr. You could also try weightless worm rigged weedless and fish it super slow as to keep it lower in the water.


----------



## kevinw (Apr 27, 2020)

So here are a couple of the catches I've had from this pond. All of them caught on texas rigged worms. Mostly senkos.















The carp was not caught by me. My boss likes to fish for carp and I told him there were some pretty decent sized ones lurking in the grass in this pond, so he finally decided to check it out and managed to pull that respectable fellow out of there on some corn and homemade pack bait.


----------



## rickerd (Jul 16, 2008)

After all this, I'm surprised no one offered to show you the big fish in the pond if you give them an invite. Great story though and persistance will pay off.
Once I know a place has good bass in it, I am going to keep going until I figure them out.
Rickerd


----------

