By Steve Price
September 1, 2011
The assortment of lures on Randy Howell’s boat deck told the story.
Of course he had both a Yamamoto Shad Shape Worm as well as a wacky-rigged 4-inch green pumpkin Senko on drop shots, but beside them lay a deep diving crankbait, a heavy lipless crankbait, a Big Joe spoon from Lake Fork, and a 12-inch Yamamoto Curly Tail on a ½-oz. football head jig.
“When you’re trying to figure out a tough bite during the summer, you have to be versatile,” says Howell, “but just as importantly, you have to follow your instincts when something inside tells you to change lures or techniques. If that particular lure isn’t right there for you to pick up at that moment, chances are you won’t take the time to rig it and an opportunity may be lost.
“So much of the time, your instincts do pay off, too.”
That’s just part of the Bassmaster Elite pro’s summer strategy. Those different lures add variety another way, too: even when he may be catching bass on one of them, he rotates through the entire on-deck assortment. Not only does he often discover another lure that produces better results, the continuing changes help prevent bass from becoming too accustomed to the same presentation. As a result, Howell may keep a school of fish active and biting longer than normal.
“Some lures, such as the lipless crankbait, are good for locating bass, and they’re effective because they bring instinctive, reflex-type strikes,” notes Howell “I’ll fish them on braided line, letting them sink at the end of a long coast, then ripping them fast off the bottom. You simply cannot depend on reflex strikes continuing very long, however, so I think these crankbaits are more valuable in just telling you where bass are located.
“It’s important to understand when you’re catching bass pretty regularly from the same spot and then the action stops suddenly, that the school of fish is usually still in the same place. They have just become accustomed to seeing the same lure coming by them too many times. That’s why another lure that has a different action and appearance can often get those fish biting again, but you have to have that lure rigged and ready to cast, which is what I’m trying to do with all those rods on the deck.”
One of the unusual traits the Alabama-based pro has seen in recent years that also reinforces his multi-rod approach is how often summer bass are now caught fairly shallow and away from normal deeper summer cover and structure. Instead of locating on the breaks, Howell often finds schools of bass on flats that don’t have cover, structure, or even nearby deep water. It only emphasizes the need to be versatile this time of year.
“Finding bass on shallow flats doesn’t happen on every lake every day, of course,” he points out, “but I have seen this situation often enough, particularly on flats that have a hard bottom, to remind me that I need to have at least one rod rigged for it. My first choice is often a 4 or 5-inch Senko rigged on a ¼-oz. football head. I describe it as a type of power-finesse fishing, in which I try to bump the lure into rock, wood, or anything else on the bottom.
“If, for some reason, crawling and hopping the football head over the flat doesn’t produce, I may go to the drop shot with the Shad Shape Worm. In the past, I might have used a shaky head for this type of fishing, but the drop shot frequently out-produces a shaky head now. I’ll fish it with a 7-foot spinning rod and 10-pound fluorocarbon and walk it around the flat.”
Howell won’t hesitate to throw the big spoon, either, if bass on the flats won’t hit soft plastics with any regularity. Like the lipless crankbait, it’s more of a big bass reaction-strike approach, only in slightly deeper water. He makes long casts, lets the spoon sink, then rips it up hard off the bottom. He repeats this all the way back to the boat, and, like the crankbait, a strike does not necessarily tell him he’s found the special lure for the day but rather, just that he has found bass on that flat.
Summer bass are also notorious for gathering on channel breaks, a situation Howell has seen occur frequently on the Tennessee River impoundments where he competes regularly. This is when the deep diving crankbait usually earns its position on his boat deck, but all too often it’s a short-lived bite. Speeding up the retrieve, changing angles, and grinding the lure along the bottom doesn’t always re-fire the school, either.
“When this happens to me, and it has many times, I’ll change to the drop shot or maybe the football head,” says Howell. “This gives the bass a completely new lure to look at. Because I know the fish can stop biting at any given moment, I start rotating through my entire on-deck selection before it happens.
“Even if I don’t catch a fish on the other lures, at least I have given the bass something new to look at and perhaps caused them to forget about the crankbait for awhile. I don’t have a particular sequence of how I rotate through my different lures but I do make enough casts with each one to make sure the fish see it.”
Howell doesn’t do a lot of summer night fishing anymore, but he has certainly done his share over the years, and even today when he does go out after dark he keeps a
fully-rigged arsenal ready to use. Generally, it’s the same selection he would be using during the day, and overall, his approach doesn’t differ. Being versatile and having a variety of lures to offer the bass is still his preferred approach.
Howell also emphasizes the need to follow your own instincts when you’re still trying to locate summer bass and your first or second lure choices aren’t working.
“Every bass fisherman has experienced this, when you get an idea that such-and-such lure or technique just might work,” he explains. “Maybe you’ve seen it work successfully or just read about it, but the truth of the matter is, if it’s really a different presentation for the conditions, you will seldom try it if you first have to stop and rig a rod for it.
“You simply won’t take the time to do it, and it’s just as easy then to dismiss the entire idea. The thought, for instance, of trying to coax a school of bass on a ledge into biting a wacky rigged drop shot on eight-pound fluorocarbon after they just stopped hammering a fast crankbait really is pretty easy to dismiss unless you have the drop shot rigged and ready right in front of you.
“Believe me, a lot of tournament decisions are based entirely on random, instinctive thoughts, and many of them turn out to be exactly the right decisions, too. I think one of the first lessons anyone learns in bass fishing is that you have to follow your instincts, and it’s especially important now during the hot summer when bass can be difficult to locate.”
