3 Tips to Catch More Summer Time Bass Schooled Up on Alewife

Last week, I fished a lake with an extensive alewife population.  The bass group up on these fish in the summer time, and are fairly easy to catch if you know what to do.  The process first entails finding the fish.  Obviously if you can't find the fish, you aren't going to catch anything.  There were two ways I would go about this.  First, if it was fairly calm, you could see fish busting on the surface.  On the other hand, when the wind would pick up, that surface activity would shut down, so you would have to rely solely on electronics.  I have compiled 3 tips that I think can help you catch more bass schooled up on bait.

Get 'em while they're hot!: On calm days, when you see bass exploding on the surface, it is often easy to catch these fish.  For one, they give away their location.  But secondly, and more importantly, these fish are fired up, and ready to eat.  If you can make an accurate cast into the ripples left behind by the feasting fish, you have a pretty good shot at catching some good bass. The technique I use most in this situation, is "deadsticking" a Zoom Super Fluke.  Simply cast into the area of the surface activity, and let the bait fall until you feel it get picked up.  If you don't feel anything after 10 seconds or so, twitch it a few times and repeat.  What happens is, the smaller more aggressive fish, will chase the alewife, and possibly injure a couple in the process.  The crippled fish will often hold motionless and slowly sink towards the bottom of the school, where the larger, less active bass are waiting for an easy meal to come down to them. "Deadsticking", is a great imitation of this scenario.

Match the hatch: I know, you're probably really sick of hearing this adage by now, but there's a reason it is spoken so often.  It works!  If you can successfully match the forage, you are going to catch more fish.  It's that simple.  The Albino Shad colored Zoom Super Fluke, is as close to an alewife replica as you can get, and that's what has proven to be most effective when fishing for these schooling bass, at least where I was fishing.  Water clarity in your local alewife lake, may not be as clear.  If that's the case maybe something with a little more white may do the trick.

Open Water: I know this may seem like "going against the grain".  I understand your reluctance to fish a bait subsurface in 30 + ft of water. I'm not saying you should avoid structure all together, because bass will relate to humps and points, when the schools of alewife are there.  More often than not, the big schools of bait, will be out in open water, and the bass will be following.  Perhaps this is what is so intimidating about this technique, the inability to eliminate water.  You have a much greater area to cover, but once you lock on to a school, it will pay dividends.

One of the biggest factors in catching these fish, is to make your bait stand out.  If you are amongst a massive school of bait, you have a better chance fishing the edges of the school instead of smack dab in the middle.  Just like any other day, play around with your presentation until you find out what works.  By no means do I claim to be an expert on this subject, I'm just sharing with you what has worked for me based on my experiences, and can hopefully help you to catch a few more fish.