King.Of.Anglers.Jeremiah
Fishing ? Instructor!
Hey y'all, getting ready for a trip this morning and crossed my mind to do a quick rundown of a technique I use that nobody hears about anymore. It's about the time of year for it as it's a late spring thru fall technique and we have the last bits of dying grass and bass are feeding up. If you have a grass lake or a small pond, this is for you. If you're fishing a deep clear lake like Lanier, Allatoona or Carters, it's a nice trick to have up your sleeve, but it won't work there. This is more of a shallow water largemouth bass technique. So what is it you ask? Read on....
Most folks are taught to fish a worm slowly on bottom. Nobody ever talks about fishing a worm FAST. You're always told from the time you become a bass angler that worms should be worked slowly and carefully on bottom, picking apart pieces of cover, or slowly fished deep and over rocks. You're also taught that a worm is not a good bait to cover water with because it's so slow and methodical. The Florida guys figured out decades ago with all that grass they have in their lakes there are other ways to fish worms with a technique called speed worming! The rig is simple. Ideally it's just a pegged texas rig or weighted swimbait hook with a screw lock in the nose of the bait. If you haven't tied a pegged texas rig or "Florida rig" as it's called, you just put a bobber stop on your line, slide on a bullet shape worm weight, and tie on the hook, then just Texas rig a paddle tail, ribbon tail, or speed tail worm or a curly tail grub. You can also rig them weightless and fish them fast and some even as a topwater! Can't get your buzzbait or whopper plopper in that grass along the bank without fouling? Throw a weightless speed worm and reel it fast with the rod tip up. The tail will sputter and spit like a soft buzzbait! This is a technique I call "buzz worming" which is really a great summer time technique I may get into later. There are some particular things to take into account though that I will get into here:
Weight composition: Your regular lead worm weight is a great general sinker to use for this technique, and will ride in the middle of the water column the best. A Brass weight is not as dense and will want to work shallower. If you a have shallow, grassy pond, you'll want to use brass. Tungsten sinkers on the other hand are very dense and want to stay down. They work best working deeper water.
Hook style: A round bend worm hook is ideal for thinner body baits but if you use a Magnum version, an EWG model hook is the better option.
Rods: a 7ft-7'6ft rod in a medium heavy is ideal here. Anything you would throw a chatterbait, spinnerbait or worm on. If you have heavy cover though and you like to fish braid, a 7'4 heavy power is for you.
Reels: a medium speed reel of at least 7:3:1 is a great starting point for gear ratio and I feel the best all around option. If you're using a heavy weight it may be necessary to use an 8 speed to keep it out of grass. You can go slower and use a 6:3:1 or something in the 6 range, but those options are typically better for a little deeper water over the tops of grass or through the last dying stalks of grass we have now, since we have more sparse vegetation and we aren't pulling in pounds of grass every cast anymore.
Baits: speed worming does well with any worm that has a built in action. Ribbon tails, curl tails, grubs, paddle tails, sickle tails and more can all be fished in this fashion.
Technique: Remember, you're still worm fishing. It can be skipped, flipped, pitched, and cast anywhere you want it to. The difference is the retrieve, and honestly it's no different than you would fish a swim jig or spinnerbait. Cast it out, keep it high in the water column and give a steady retrieve, burn it, shake it with a medium retrieve speed, or slow roll it just off the bottom. The key here is to keep it moving instead of slowly fishing it on bottom. The beauty of this though is the versatility. At any time you see fit you can still fish it as a regular texas rig on bottom. One of the best things is to choose a target, say a dock post or tree on the bank, cast well past it, swim the worm right up to it and then kill the bait and let it fall to bottom right next to the cover. Often times this triggers some downright vicious strikes from bass who watched that worm come up to where he was sitting and then swim it's way to the bottom.
That's all for this technique for now y'all! I may expand on it later and give some specifics, but this was more spur of the moment and more general information. Till next time!
Most folks are taught to fish a worm slowly on bottom. Nobody ever talks about fishing a worm FAST. You're always told from the time you become a bass angler that worms should be worked slowly and carefully on bottom, picking apart pieces of cover, or slowly fished deep and over rocks. You're also taught that a worm is not a good bait to cover water with because it's so slow and methodical. The Florida guys figured out decades ago with all that grass they have in their lakes there are other ways to fish worms with a technique called speed worming! The rig is simple. Ideally it's just a pegged texas rig or weighted swimbait hook with a screw lock in the nose of the bait. If you haven't tied a pegged texas rig or "Florida rig" as it's called, you just put a bobber stop on your line, slide on a bullet shape worm weight, and tie on the hook, then just Texas rig a paddle tail, ribbon tail, or speed tail worm or a curly tail grub. You can also rig them weightless and fish them fast and some even as a topwater! Can't get your buzzbait or whopper plopper in that grass along the bank without fouling? Throw a weightless speed worm and reel it fast with the rod tip up. The tail will sputter and spit like a soft buzzbait! This is a technique I call "buzz worming" which is really a great summer time technique I may get into later. There are some particular things to take into account though that I will get into here:
Weight composition: Your regular lead worm weight is a great general sinker to use for this technique, and will ride in the middle of the water column the best. A Brass weight is not as dense and will want to work shallower. If you a have shallow, grassy pond, you'll want to use brass. Tungsten sinkers on the other hand are very dense and want to stay down. They work best working deeper water.
Hook style: A round bend worm hook is ideal for thinner body baits but if you use a Magnum version, an EWG model hook is the better option.
Rods: a 7ft-7'6ft rod in a medium heavy is ideal here. Anything you would throw a chatterbait, spinnerbait or worm on. If you have heavy cover though and you like to fish braid, a 7'4 heavy power is for you.
Reels: a medium speed reel of at least 7:3:1 is a great starting point for gear ratio and I feel the best all around option. If you're using a heavy weight it may be necessary to use an 8 speed to keep it out of grass. You can go slower and use a 6:3:1 or something in the 6 range, but those options are typically better for a little deeper water over the tops of grass or through the last dying stalks of grass we have now, since we have more sparse vegetation and we aren't pulling in pounds of grass every cast anymore.
Baits: speed worming does well with any worm that has a built in action. Ribbon tails, curl tails, grubs, paddle tails, sickle tails and more can all be fished in this fashion.
Technique: Remember, you're still worm fishing. It can be skipped, flipped, pitched, and cast anywhere you want it to. The difference is the retrieve, and honestly it's no different than you would fish a swim jig or spinnerbait. Cast it out, keep it high in the water column and give a steady retrieve, burn it, shake it with a medium retrieve speed, or slow roll it just off the bottom. The key here is to keep it moving instead of slowly fishing it on bottom. The beauty of this though is the versatility. At any time you see fit you can still fish it as a regular texas rig on bottom. One of the best things is to choose a target, say a dock post or tree on the bank, cast well past it, swim the worm right up to it and then kill the bait and let it fall to bottom right next to the cover. Often times this triggers some downright vicious strikes from bass who watched that worm come up to where he was sitting and then swim it's way to the bottom.
That's all for this technique for now y'all! I may expand on it later and give some specifics, but this was more spur of the moment and more general information. Till next time!
