Adapt or stick to your strengths

TravisH · Post by **TravisH** » Tue Jan 08, 2019 8:17 am

Do you adapt and fish the moment or do you stick to your strengths... I had a fun outing on lake Don Pedro recently, the thing that made it fun was adapting to the moment for me. I’m more a power fisherman than a slower finesse fisherman but hey I had to do what I had to do to put them in the boat. I caught fish in 3’ of water on a jig far an few between but throughout the day and then had another pattern of video game fishin with my Humminbird Electronics out in 35-45’ deep of water resulting in solid fish as well.. In the past I would have just ground it out all day with my jig in hand and in all honesty don’t think I ever had more than 1 spinning rod in the boat and now I have 4...Lol

NateGardner · Post by **NateGardner** » Tue Jan 08, 2019 11:49 am

That is the age old question in fishing! Old timers tend to stick to what they know and the younger people like me tend to do everything a little. What works works better? If you just want to catch fish you cater to the conditions and adapt to what the fish want. If you are going for the largest sack, the old timers usually have been doing the same thing on the same waterway for many years and they know how stick em. That is why they always win tournaments! It just depends on your experience and persistence to me! What do you think?

Turkeyman · Post by **Turkeyman** » Tue Jan 08, 2019 2:37 pm

You have to be versatile to fish here in my opinion. You can drop shot fish in 50 -75' of water on our lakes or flip fish in 1' of water on the delta. If you are going to fish all the water California provides then adaptability is going to be key.

TravisH · Post by **TravisH** » Sun Jan 13, 2019 8:54 pm

It all depends on the Angler... Weekend Angler or competitive Angler.. I use to fish only jigs an swimbaits as a fun fisherman but as things escalated an I started tournament fishing I started realizing you have to catchem consistently then when I made the move up to Pro/ams that were NoN shared weight it became a new ball game of putting together multiple patterns and All the pressure was on you to catchem. So that when I was like Man I guess it’s time that I put a couple spinning rods in the boat, which I never would have said a couple years back but I will admit since I made the adjustments an stopped trying to force feed the fish the good ol spinning rod has been a key player on cutting a few checks..This past weekend was a great example, I caught fish from 3’ to 65’..

Pat · Post by **Pat** » Mon Jan 14, 2019 8:28 am

I am a fun fisherman these days, no tournaments. I love to fish jigs and reaction baits. That said, lately I have been spending time learning new techniques. Basically I like to catch fish, and I have accepted the fact that sometimes jigs and reaction baits are not the most effective way. So lately I have been practicing Keitech style swimbaits, A-Rigs, dropshots and Neko styles. My confidence is building for some of them, but others are going to take more time. Sometimes I am being a little too stubborn and my fishing partners have been out fishing me, but that's OK. Gotta put in the time to learn and gain confidence.

Robb R · Post by **Robb R** » Mon Jan 14, 2019 5:12 pm

learning new stuff is key . 40+ years of chasing bass ---if I didn't learn anything I would still be throwing a 6" Black Grape Jelly Worm on a straight sprout hook with blue Stren line .
Many years ago I had ZERO confidence in throwing a spinnerbait ----. I would throw one for 10 minutes then give up .
One day , I decided to try throwing it until I caught one . That evening , I ended up catching about 20 bass in a hour , all went from 2 to 4 lbs . Now I throw versions/sizes/colors all year . What was once my weakness is now my strength .
Today my big weakness is throwing deep diving cranks --- hopefully I can fix that .
tight lines ,
Robb

Kelly Ripa · Post by **Kelly Ripa** » Mon Jan 14, 2019 10:42 pm

I am always updating my skill sets and I try to do it when the fishing is easy and are reacting to something that is not my specialty So I jig fish when it's on fire, such and such when it's on fire yada yada yada But now that they have changed the rule book here in SoCal most of us don't fish anything but the same lake throughout the year. I have ended up selling off awesome pristine 9”rainbow trout patterned pupfish and and essentially 90 % of my hard bait swimbait collection because I had no more need of them. True I'm older and some of them where major loads to throw it's just my lakes ecosystem has evolved into something total unrecognizable from just 10 years ago. I could have just simply dead stick a big trout bait in years past for some giants but between the drought and the Casitas water boards mismanagement I have had to rely more and more on plastics and less on my power fishing. If you know me you'd know I'd rather have the trolling motor moving right along while I power fish or flip or work on the big ones with my big trout baits but alas part of evolving as an angler has led me to acknowledge that those circumstances that led me down many different successful paths on my journey are now no longer viable and if I stuck with what was tried and true last year I would not have the same results. The evolution came about with my particular waters changing system{lake level now less than 30%} and the habits of the fish adaption to an abrupt change in forage base( the ending of regular trout stocking 10 years ago). On the day I am fishing I have learned to keep an open mind even back to when I fished tourney's. While I always had a plan it was never written in stone. Hell I have caught buzz bait fish in January just because they were there and waiting for it and I sniffed out the fish's attitude and actually tied one on to find out if it was possible...that in my book is how I got here. As a So Cal angler fishing on used water all day I use every club in my bag before I move along....even if I'm not at my best with it. Take the good with the bad do all I can and do see where the chips fall at the end of my day. We all started by trying to catch a bass , then another, then a limit, and then a trophy and then...we evolve by adapting.

Rip

ash · Post by **ash** » Tue Jan 15, 2019 11:41 am

The hardest thing to do is learn a new technique when there is a solid bite going on that is in your strengths but that is the time to learn new techniques. We tend to pull out the new stuff when our go to arsenal isnt working - it's kinda asinine when you think about it. The bite sucks so ill try something new - nope that sucks too so Ill never use it again

Adapting and changing with the fish is what separates out the pros from the joes and knowing when to switch these gears separates out the winners.

Kelly Ripa · Post by **Kelly Ripa** » Tue Jan 15, 2019 8:28 pm

Those last observations of yours Ash totally nailed it....I'm still laughing....

WRB · Post by **WRB** » Wed Jan 16, 2019 3:07 pm

Learning something new when the bass are active is Oldschool advice.
Catching bass instead just fishing for them should always be every bass anglers goal regardless of their age.
Being an old timer I have my preferred presentation to use like hair jigs with pork trailers, my favorite lures. Force feeding bass something you like rarely works, but your are a genius when it does. Agree that being cabled onto 1 lake puts a damper to my bass fishing and miss being able to go where the bite is

Tom