 Put
a bunch of Bassfisherman together and you are likely to
hear about good day’s bad days, what is the hot
bait, rod, reel, line or favorite way to fish but you
will never hear about the way they run their boat. Boat
positioning falls into the often completely missed category
or is taken for granted until a very windy day. The only
press boat positioning gets is whether or not a guy was
front seating or a guy was backseating all day long. Yes
it is possible to backseat, this is when your partner
is constantly casting way ahead of the boat and most times
over your shoulder, most of the time this earns the guy
in the back seat a new partner after one tournament. When
it comes to frontseating or pardon the expression “ass
viewing” this occurs in two ways, when a boat owner
constantly casts to the back of the boat to get in that
last good spot or putting the boat in a position that
allows only the person in the front an opportunity of
fishing in water 50’ or less. Both behaviors are
intolerable and have ruined many a day on the water, but
both are overstated. I have never ever heard anyone complain
of either behaviors after doing well on the water only
after a miserable day have I heard any complaints, interesting
observation when if ever have you heard someone complain
about a partner after a good day? The shame is these behaviors
can be managed fairly if the boat owner fishes from his
shoulders forward and to the sides if he were to extend
his arms out perpendicular to his body while facing forward.
The “backseater” must also realize that he
must never throw ahead of the spot where the boat owner’s
shoulders are, this eliminates day long conflict and helps
eliminate distractions. Backseaters should always be watching
for the boatowner’s rod and lure on his back cast
this is his responsibility, how many times have you ruined
a reel for the day because you crossed swords? Nonboaters
should always clean up their garbage, trust me keeping
a boat ready to fish is a lot of work and no one needs
to find candy wrappers, empty soda cans, or melted plastics
on their floor.
Enough with the etiquette on to the meat and potatoes,
how one approaches fishing is how most fisherman use their
boat, you can fish rapid and random or slow and efficient.
Most bassfisherman are right handed and therefore like
to fish Clockwise, that means they will always start down
a bank throwing with their strong hand and using an eastbound
run on north banks and a westbound run on south banks,
this will always be most bassfishermans first choice.
Unless the bassfisherman is a great under handed pitcher
or is lefthanded he will stick to this pattern regardless
of the position of the sun, wind or current (use this
to your advantage look at spots that people miss because
they can’t make the presentation based on their
boats position). I have always fished this way, always
fishing banks clockwise it is easiest because I am most
comfortable fishing that way, my trolling motor is set
up a certain way and that is the way I fish. I should
and have been trying to improve my ability with my off-hand
so I will not be limiting myself. My approach is simple
always fish into current or wind drive the boat straight
into the current or wind and always approach fish in shallow
water going into the sun. Bass are used to from an early
stage that lots of things from above like to dine on them,
cast a shadow on one and see how they react most times
they spook and during the spring always. I always try
to keep the motor on one constant speed and try to not
let off the motor, this serves two purposes.
The first is that it lets the backseater get into your
rhythm and adjust his fishing style and the other is because
trolling motors are noisy they whir and hum and make all
kinds of noise under water, a constant hum is better than
a blast of noise and then silence.
When I am fishing weedlines I try to keep the boat shallow
and throw deep. In the text books they tell you to throw
until you have patterned a certain depth and than move
to that depth and throw parallel, well good luck that
is an ideal situation and I have never had the time to
refine a pattern down to that one depth. Besides unless
you have a very large casting deck you will be frontending
your partner all day. When bassfisherman talk about boat
positioning they are mainly concerned with moving with
a trolling motor and casting ahead of the boat. No fisherman
is complete without learning how to anchor, drift, or
troll, yes another taboo subject among the elitist. All
three methods should be mastered for instance two years
ago Joe Moldashel and I were fishing a deep rock shoal
on the St. Lawrence river the current was like outgoing
tide on the Hudson and the only way to fish these spots
was to run upcurrent of the spot and drift across it dragging
a grub the trouble was my 76 pound thrust motor was only
enough to slow me down and not enough to let us work slow
enough, the answer was a sea anchor or driftsock. These
devices are like brakes and they will allow you to be
far more effective than we were that day going past the
area at 60 miles per hour. Your prefishing a large lake
with limited time or the fish are scattered, the answer
is trolling, you can learn an awful lot by trolling crankbaits
around a lake, it is almost as good as wading. You learn
about bottom composition weeds and hard structure that
few people will ever find. Remember the father of modern
structure fishing Buck Perry trolled for most of his fish.
The last method is anchoring, how many Bassfisherman have
a real anchor and real way of anchoring using the right
amount of line. Most bassfisherman have toy anchors and
20’ of rope, get a good anchor and a rope at least
three times the length of the deepest water you fish in.
When you are working a spot with a plastic worm in 20’
to 30’ of water and the spot is a 5’ by 5’
brushpile the last thing you need is to start drifting
all around. Smart bassfisherman mark their anchor point
by triangulating with fixed shoreline objects and casting
in a direction to the object with the boat almost stationary
you can make a good presentation with the worm and let
it fall all the way to the bottom. In closing the message
here is pay attention to detail and do not think that
the only way to be effective is to do what every one else
does.
See you on the water thank God spring is here Dan McGarry
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