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Jar of minnows


Eric

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Very fascinating. It reminds me of a time I was fishing  a clear deep pool in a creek I occasionally fish. I dropped a fly along a tangle of branches and a big largemouth popped out of the tangle to grab the fly, but before he could suck it in a slightly smaller small mouth bass darted up from below and struck the largemouth. After a short battle the largemouth backed off to its laire and then the smallie retreated, leaving my fly alone. This played out a number of times until the largemouth finally was able to grab the fly. I returned the bass to the creek and it swam to its home. I tossed the same fly and a couple others in hoping to attract the smallie, but it didn’t show itself. I tried again about 30 minutes later with no luck. It was almost as if the smallmouth didn’t want the fly , but it didn’t want the largemouth to have it either. 

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  • 2 weeks later...

After watching this several times, I become more convinced on the theory that "panic bait gets eaten more often than injured bait."

The shiners in the jar were panic and trying to get away, that's why the bass attacked them. Once they settled down in the jar and not moving as much at the end of the video that's when the bass ignored them. At first, the bass ignored the injured shiner (the one on the hook) and only attacked it when the hooked shiner panic and tried to flee. 

This tells me that if I want to catch more bass, I have to present my fly or lure to act more like a panic/fleeing bait than an injured bait. I am sure at time the bass would eat injured bait when they are hungry, but if they are not in that mood, I still can trick them into eating with a fleeing fly or lure.

A fly on the SWING acts more like a panic/fleeing bait than an injured bait. Just a thought..........

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6 hours ago, Tom L said:

After watching this several times, I become more convinced on the theory that "panic bait gets eaten more often than injured bait."

The shiners in the jar were panic and trying to get away, that's why the bass attacked them. Once they settled down in the jar and not moving as much at the end of the video that's when the bass ignored them. At first, the bass ignored the injured shiner (the one on the hook) and only attacked it when the hooked shiner panic and tried to flee. 

This tells me that if I want to catch more bass, I have to present my fly or lure to act more like a panic/fleeing bait than an injured bait. I am sure at time the bass would eat injured bait when they are hungry, but if they are not in that mood, I still can trick them into eating with a fleeing fly or lure.

A fly on the SWING acts more like a panic/fleeing bait than an injured bait. Just a thought..........

I think you are right on target with the panicking minnow thing. I had a large fish tank at work for many years. There could be a handful of minnows in the tank with a game fish or two just swimming around when the bass were not hungry. If I added new Minnows to the tank and they initially darted around in a state of panic the bass would go into a feeding frenzy. Any injured or dazed minnows would eventually become a meal for s bass or crayfish, but those actively trying to get away seemed to be the targeted ones in the moment.

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What's fascinating to me is that using live goldfish as bait is illegal in more states than it's legal. LOL 

You know, introducing "invasive species" and all that! You can't even take a crawdad from one body of water to another one across the street without someone preaching about "rusty crayfish" amd this guys dropping goldfish? 

The bait isn't the ones who should be "panicking," it's the guy in the boat who should be looking over his shoulder wondering if the DNR in the state he resides in is about to come around and write him a big ticket! Humor

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On 1/30/2023 at 8:19 AM, Philf said:

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Now, this is very interesting. I wonder, how many minnows would it hold? Being made of glass, it probably breaks easily. 

As for the bass toying with the goldfish (nipping at the tail), those were short strikes that we experienced quite often. The bass were still catchable, but you have to show them something different to look at by changing to a different kind of fly or even the same fly but in a different color, as I had often mentioned in my fishing reports, 

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  • 3 weeks later...
On 1/27/2023 at 11:17 AM, Tom L said:

After watching this several times, I become more convinced on the theory that "panic bait gets eaten more often than injured bait."

The shiners in the jar were panic and trying to get away, that's why the bass attacked them. Once they settled down in the jar and not moving as much at the end of the video that's when the bass ignored them. At first, the bass ignored the injured shiner (the one on the hook) and only attacked it when the hooked shiner panic and tried to flee. 

This tells me that if I want to catch more bass, I have to present my fly or lure to act more like a panic/fleeing bait than an injured bait. I am sure at time the bass would eat injured bait when they are hungry, but if they are not in that mood, I still can trick them into eating with a fleeing fly or lure.

A fly on the SWING acts more like a panic/fleeing bait than an injured bait. Just a thought..........

 

Tom, just a note that all your "swing" fly fishing technique articles over the years have helped me improve my river jerkbait fishing game immensely! Thank you!

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Eric, for what it's worth, I had learned quite a lot from you too, particularly your swimbait fishing technique and success. It had prompted me to design a fly to match the swimbait and it had improved smallie game immensely also.  Thank you.

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