Fall Topwater Bass Fishing!

I have to say, I’m a sucker for a good day of topwater fishing. To me theres nothing better then waking up in the morning and seeing winds at 5 km per hour and knowing the lake or river is going to be glass.

I may even be a topwater fanatic to a fault, always looking for that next big strike, fiending for it, not wanting to give up or change tactics until I get my fix. I can spend 6 hours casting the same bait in the same lake without a hit and still be hopeful because I know sooner or later I’m going to see a splash, feel a strike and see that beautiful fish break the surface and dance across the water like gravity was non existent.

But what makes topwater fishing effective? What can we do to ensure more hits and more landed fish? Here is what I’ve noticed in my recent experiences. Natural colors, enough said, nothing beats them. When I pick up a lure like a scumfrog, hula popper, jitter bug or chug bug I always make sure to get the darker more realistic colors. I have about 10 hula poppers ranging from light green to white and red, using them all equally I’ve noticed I’ve never caught anything on one that wasnt “natural”.

When I hit the lake or the river and I have my scumfrog, jitter bug and hoola popper I know its going to be a good day. For example I was fishing muskrat river a few days ago tossing everything in my box just to see what would stir up a strike, after getting nothing for about an hour I decided to talk to a local fishing the other banks, he said “Topwater hasn’t been working all year!”, but me being as stubborn as everyone knows I can be I started tossing that scumfrog right to the edge of the cover, within a few casts, FISH ON!

Now that may not always be the case and I do vouch for natural colors but every decent fisherman knows to coordinate your bait with the conditions. Clear water or natural cover I’ll always toss greens, browns or sometimes even blacks. Darker water or over cast days I’ll experiment with my whites, yellows and reds.

Just be aware of the conditions and you cant go wrong, even if you dont land a lunker nothing beats a good day on the water.

Dylan Kingsberry is an avid fisherman and the head writer at http://www.w3fishingreport.com. In his downtime he enjoys travelling his home province of Ontario searching for the record bass, pike and walleye.