Bass Fishing Forum - Westernbass.com

If high tide somewhere is at 12:00pm when does the tide/water actually start moving toward a low tide? Is it right away at 12:01pm or does the tide/water fall out slowly all the way up until the tide bottoms out 5 to 7 hours later? I have heard that the best time to catch Bass is the hour before and the hour after a tide change. So if high tide is at 12:00pm the "window" would be 11:00am to 1:00pm. Is this what most of you guy's experience? My other key question is if I get on a bite, how do I stay on that bite? I have heard that the tide moves at about 5-8mph. Is this true? Do i stop and fish the area or do I keep the trolling motor going at 5-8mph and try to stay on that same tide? Basically if I am fishing a falling tide12pm to 7pm and I get on a bite at 12:45pm do I run a few miles down tide or towards the ocean hoping to catch or stay on the same bite? Do I understand this correctly? Thanks Guy's I am having a hard time wrapping my head around this one.

Thanks
WHB

Cooch
any inputs? your tham man on this one and its a perfet question that I have always wanted to ask?

the one thing i know is thier is a slack tide anyware from 20 minutes to a hour, before the water starts to move ( in or out)

and the proper way to run the delta tides would be a eye opener for me.

I have tried it several times but living in Lancaster (high desert) i dont get to fish the delta enough, I am more concerned on locating fish and dont have time to effectivly learn the water
I stated down by the big bridge below antoch and fished for about 20 minutes and than I would run up about a mile or two and do it
again i hit areas i found eailer in the week all holding fish, I did pretty Ok but --- felt like I spent more time running than fishing.

anbodys input is welcome on this PLEASE!

Walt

My experiance has been, it depends. It depends on how much water is in the system in terms of rivers dumping out to the ocean, where you are, and how much they are sucking down south.

I have seen it where it feels slacked off in some areas for 30-40 minutes and I have seen it where it just flipped from one direction to the other.... I am not sure if there is a simple answer to this question.


PS I have had two DD fish come that both were PB's on the dead slack tide....so why run?

One of the biggest factors is the amount of tidal swing... if it is only a 1.5' difference between low and high, then the shift will be subtle and water movement will be minimal. If on the other hand there is a 4' difference going from a high tide to a minus tide, the shift and water movement will be significant.

Today, for instance, I see a 3.3' difference between the high tide (3.2') and a minor minus tide (-0.1), which is a pretty good-sized swing. On Sunday for the Pro-teen, there's only a 1.9' swing high to low (2.5 - 0.6).

There is a period of slack tide usually (always?), but some of the more extreme tides it is hardly discernable.

Roger

I'm no expert, thats for sure, but like you, I wanted to learn how to pattern tidal bass. What I have learned after concentrating on the delta for the last five years or so is to focus more on how the fish in a particular area relate to the water movement.

As the tide covers or exposes the weeds/rocks/habitat of the prey, they must move to stay protected. Bass will feed when the prey are moving(exposed).It may be eaiser to catch bass during the change because the prey are out and moving to new hidey holes, and the bass know this.

Having said that, the best advice over the years for me was to follow the fish, not the tide. Like Cooch will tell you, a bass is a bass. When I started to be able to catch inactive fish at low tide/poor water movement I felt like I was starting to understand this place.

Key on a small area that you have caught fish when active, and try to think where the fish hunker down when not active. Your long term success will improve if you fish through the tide instead of chasing it. It would seem to make more sense to run around fishing for active fish during the transition, but unless you live on this water, that approach seldom relates into a productive day. BTW, my personal best delta fish came about 11/2 hr before low tide.

+1 riplip n ash