Grab A Bass In The Thickest Grass

By David A. Brown
Special to BassFan

As bass move into the warm-season mode, they spend a lot of time "chilling out" in shady digs. Common favorites include docks, laydowns and bridges, but don’t overlook the dense cover of grass.

That collective term “grass,” means different things in different lakes, but the key attractions are shade, shelter and bountiful feeding opportunities for the bass. The filtering effect promotes local clarity, while the comfortable habitat appeals to the crawfish that cling to stalks and the shad that cluster in the aquatic air conditioning.

“The grass gives off oxygen, so that’s where the baitfish like to be,” said Toledo Bend guide Stephen Johnston. “It’s also a good place for the bass to guard their fry.”

“This is where all the baitfish live and that is why the fishing is so good (in areas with abundant grass). Without the grass, the bass would totally scatter. If the bait doesn’t have the grass to hide in, the fish will just suspend or roam throughout (other habitat).”

Various Varieties

Hydrilla, which grows in long, tangled masses with individual green leaves grouped around the stalks, probably gets the most attention in the grass game. Often forming dense “walls” with well-defined edges, most of the hydrilla’s mass occurs within a few feet of the surface, with broad, shady spaces below matted canopies.

Other common varieties include:

> Peppergrass – Wispy stalks with elongated green leaves that lie flat at the surface.

> Coontail – Bushy green or brownish foliage surrounding center stalks looks like a raccoon's terminus.

> Milfoil – Resembling tiny Christmas trees, milfoil stalks sprout upward-slanting branches with green leafage.

> Kissimmee grass – A thick, wispy variety native to Florida lakes, Kissimmee grass often grows in scattered clumps interspersed with lily pads.

You’ll often find peppergrass blanketing a shoreline, with its surface leaves forming a tight cover that conceals spacious areas beneath. Coontail and milfoil are offshore grasses that often intermingle. Both grow in solid clumps from bottom to surface.

Bass take whatever their lake offers, and the mixing and matting of multiple grass types increases the appeal. Add in the rafts of floating vegetation such as hyacinth, pennywort and water lettuce and the seasonal salad brings even more to the table.

Promising Signs

FLW Tour pro J.T. Kenney treats a grass line or mat just like a hard shoreline, in that he looks for the dips, turns and points where bass are most likely to stake out their ambush positions. Gaps and cut-throughs – usually carved by boat passage – also merit close inspection.

Bassmaster Elite Series pro Greg Hackney further dials in the sweet spots by looking for interior holes, which indicate some hard structure – a stump, rocks, etc. – breaking up the growth below. Consider such structure, as well as emergent wood, your fish-gathering spots.

Hackney adds this: "I always try to find the isolated patches of grass away from the long stretches of grass. Those long stretches will hold fish, but that's where everybody stops because it's easy to just fish along that edge. But those isolated patches often hold bigger fish – plus, they get less (fishing) pressure."

Windward edges, just like wind-blown banks, will often be the more active spots during light to moderate blows. When the wind’s cranking, however, fighting to stay off the grass and maintain effective presentation angles may become a losing proposition.

Rise and Fall

In tidal fisheries from the Potomac River to Louisiana’s Atchafalaya Basin and Mississippi Delta marshes, water level greatly impacts shallow grass action. In the proverbial nutshell, it's all about access – a truth lived by fish and fishermen.

Incoming water grants fish full admission to deep, interior cover, with all the benefits of shelter and feeding therein. Predictably, high water finds the fish scattered, while outgoing water draws shallow grass mats tight, condenses the inhabitable water and pushes fish to the outer edges. On lower stages, secondary grass lines and isolated points often find fish gathered and highly competitive.

Consider also that vegetation filters water, so outgoing tides see a cleaner flow exiting grass lines. This, along with the buffet of departing forage, tends to attract bass to natural drains and run-outs. Conversely, incoming tides bring cooler and more oxygenated water to shallow vegetation, so look for an uptick in bass enthusiasm here.

Tempt 'Em

Grass bass can show considerable diversity in what they bite, but meteorological conditions can impact the game. The low-light conditions of early morning and cloudy days generally find fish roaming the edges, while bright sunlight pushes them deeper into the cover.

You reaction bites often turn on when the wind blows into grass edges, but on the downside, wind-driven chop makes it harder for the fish to find the same topwater that drew strikes around the edges during yesterday’s calm. The makeup and density of a grass bed also helps determine what you can and cannot throw.

Pitching or flipping jigs or Texas-rigged worms and Beaver-style baits allows for precise presentation, so hit those gaps, points and any wood standing or lying in the grass. Here, and especially with heavily weighted punching rigs, braided line is absolutely essential for negotiating a fish out of the slop.

Other options include:

> Looking up – Topwater walkers and poppers can prove highly productive around the grass perimeter, especially just after daybreak. The weedless design of hollow-body frogs (and buzz toads rigged on wide-gap hooks) takes the surface game farther into the vegetation. Be sure to pause floating frogs over the holes, or "windows", in the grass. Twitch the bait on a slack line to keep it in the open spot and hold on tightly.

> Swim team – Rig swimming baits like the Reaction Innovations Skinny Dipper or YUM SwimN Dinger weedless on wide-gap hooks and run them across dense grass mats or through the gaps and lanes in sparse and stalky vegetation.

> Snag attack – Snagging cover is generally considered a negative, but not when you’re grass fishing. Intentionally latching a crankbait, ChatterBait or swimjig on hydrilla edges and then ripping it free simulates fleeing forage and often triggers aggressive strikes.

> Spin doctors – They resemble bait clusters, and casting spinnerbaits along grass edges is an easy sell to bass that don't want to leave their sanctuary. Silver and gold willow-leaf blades best resemble shad, but the thump of a Colorado blade can coax deeply buried bass out of cover.

Whatever your bait choice, mind your proximity and noise level. Even in dense vegetation, reckless intrusion will put the fish in a big-time pouty mood.

Consider also that the dead center is not the only place to find fish, so work outside-in rather than immediately pushing through and scattering your quarry. Also, go easy on the trolling motor to avoid blowing out a promising spot with sudden bursts of propulsion.