Bass have always been suckers for topwater lures that carry propellers. And the time after the spawn can’t be beaten for this kind of action.
Curtis Laster cast a bream-colored Devil’s Horse across a bream bed and started working it across the water’s surface with a jerk-jerk-pause cadence. As he continued the rhythmic retrieve, the lure never made it past the bed.
Jerk, jerk, pause. “Ka-Whoosh!”
A ravenous bass exploded through the surface, smashed the bait and headed toward deep water like a torpedo. After a short battle, Laster landed the post-spawn bass, and his thoughts drifted back to memories of his formative years.
Laster, a bass pro from Morton, cut his fishing teeth on Ross Barnett Reservoir and Roosevelt State Park Lake, fishing with his grandfather, Ellis Laster, and an uncle, Logan Laster. Like a lot of country boys, he relished the opportunity to go fishing any time he could.
“There was a policeman and angler in Morton by the name of Freddie Warren; he saw us fishing and knew what we were catching, and he told us we were good enough to be fishing tournaments, we just needed a little bigger motor and a livewell to keep the fish alive,” Laster said. “I didn’t know I had what it took until my uncle bought an aluminum boat for my cousin and me to fish out of. We won the first tournament I entered at age 16, and we just went from there.”
Laster learned a lot of basics on Ross Barnett, a lake that gets plenty of fishing pressure, fishing there with his uncle in the 1980s.
Post-spawn bass
“I learned about fishing topwater in a unique way,” Laster said. “We were fishing with my uncle Logan and catching bream on fly rods from a bream bed … when the bass moved in and started feeding. My uncle started casting his Devil’s Horse across the beds, and we ended up catching about 15 bass in the 3- to 5-pound range, and I was hooked on bass fishing.”
While bream fishing was fun, it was nothing compared to the bone-crushing strikes from bass crunching topwater lures. Laster learned lessons about catching big bass that have served him well, with many tournament wins over a lifetime of fishing.
“These days, I’ll key on post-spawn bass and bream beds from mid-April through May,” he said. “I like to use a Devil’s Horse and a Boy Howdy. They will entice really vicious strikes around the bream beds, and it’s like clockwork every year.”
Post-spawn female bass are often lethargic from the rigors of the spawn, and they’re ready to feast and build up their energy, but they can’t usually chase fast-moving lures as well as they can later in the year, so they target easy marks: plucking fat bluegills from bream beds. That’s when the topwater propeller baits shine for Laster and many other anglers.
“When bass are feeding on bream, I’ll use the bream color and yellow perch-colored Devil’s Horse,” Laster said. “They are very effective colors, but when the shad spawn comes, I’ll switch to a chrome Boy Howdy and work that in areas where the shad are spawning.”
Find bream beds, find bass
Laster uses a Hummingbird Mega 360 unit to locate the bream beds; he can see the defined areas of the beds and the darker spots that are bass invading the beds.
“I like to start searching for beds in 3 to 5 feet of water closest to the first dropoff for post-spawners,” Laster said. “The post-spawners will suspend sometimes and wait for an easy meal to come by. I’ll also look for surface movement while scanning the 360 to determine exactly where the beds are located. If I see surface movement, it will usually be nervous bream, and that’s another sign that they’re bedding in the area.”
The bottom line is that you need to “read” the weather, the day, the time of day and the area to bring it all together. If Laster can find active beds when the time is right, he’ll have an opportunity to catch 4- to 7-pound bass in the vicinity.
Bigger may not always be better, but there are times, especially during the post spawn when bigger prop baits are like magnets to tired, hungry female bass. They just can’t resist an easy meal while they’re recuperating from the spawn. `
So many lures, so many choices. Sometimes it’s hard for some anglers to determine what to throw, when and where, but when bass are actively feeding on bream or shad, it’s an easy choice, and it should be for any angler who’ll read the conditions and give the bass what they want.
In addition to the chrome Boy Howdy, the Devil’s Horse also comes in chrome/white and is equally adept at drawing strikes from post-spawn bass under certain conditions. One of the older Devil’s Horse lures is the King Snipe, a slightly shorter, fatter, version with slightly larger propellers that make for a different sound and action. It’s pure death on lunker bass if you can find an original model.
Topwater equipment
Although many anglers use longer rods all the time, Laster likes to use a slightly smaller rod fitted to him and the bass.
“I like a 6-foot-6 to 6-foot-8, medium rod that will really load up well and doesn’t tear the hooks out,” Laster said. “I prefer the Duckett Silverado and Micro Magic rods … they fill the topwater bill for me.
“Longer, stiffer rods will often let the bass get leverage and tear the hooks from their mouths, and if that’s happening, you should consider a lighter-action rod. It might just increase your strike-to-hookup ratio.”
When it comes to topwater bass, monofilament is still the king. It is more buoyant and floats, while fluorocarbon and other lines sink. Laster wants his line to float on the surface so he can work topwater lures the way they were designed. Fish a topwater prop bait on fluorocarbon and then try it on mono. It’s like the difference between daylight and dark.
“I like the 14- to 17-pound mono because it floats, keeps my line up so it won’t sink and is tough enough to handle the violent strikes I get,” Laster said. “If you’re fishing in thick cover with lots of stumps and brush,you can use larger mono, just fit the conditions to the situation, and you’ll be okay.”
Single prop baits
While many prop baits have front and back propellers, single-prop lures with a prop on the back of the lure also work. The Tiny Torpedo and Baby Torpedo are two that come to mind for Laster.
“My grandfather used to take us kids to Roosevelt State Park Lake; he fished a Tiny Torpedo, and he really whacked them,” Laster said. “He was using a 202 Zebco and really knew how to use it, and he consistently caught bass on that outfit while casting Tiny Torpedos. You can’t catch them like that now, but back then we did, and it really helped lay the groundwork for my topwater fishing later on.”
Covering cover
Joel Ross of Brandon is a regular tournament-winning competitor who also likes to fish topwater prop baits in the post-spawn.
“Prop baits can be worked slow and methodical next to cover or along the sides of docks for great topwater strikes,” Ross said. “When you have a chop on the water surface, a ripping cadence will trigger some explosive strikes in open water. If the water is slick, use a slow twitch for a very subtle presentation. This presentation also works well around hard edges of vegetation as well as around wood.”
Ross also likes to fish around bream beds in late spring because bass will be feeding and cruising and will explode on the bait using a subtle presentation.
“In clear water, a large prop bait works well over standing timber,” Ross said. “It may surprise you how deep you can pull a fish from with a steady, fast retrieve over the timber. Make multiple casts on the same line to get the fish to come up and eat.
“I’d recommend always having a prop bait tied on for exciting topwater bites year-round as well,” Ross said.
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