328 
FOREST AND STREAM 
July, 1919 
eccentric old lad will sometimes be found 
outside the customary places. The most 
general idea is that bass are essentially 
lovers of the shadows and deep cool 
waters. This is all true enough but does 
not prevent the wise fisherman from 
dropping a lure in the wide, bright ones ; 
there is where the chances are mighty 
good for raising good big mouth. 
The big mouth bass will be found in 
more open pools where there are sand 
bottoms or even mud bottoms, not neces- 
sarily requiring any cover and disregard- 
ing currents also. Sluggish, warm pools 
will appeal to him. In this characteristic 
he differs widely from the small mouth 
bass. The small mouth is rarely ever 
found where the stream does not boast 
of a gravelly or boulderry bottom with a 
plentitude of shade and cover. 
Sunken log drifts, submerged boulder 
piles, drifted brush and tree tops are 
more to his liking ; under the lee of grassy 
banks, undercuts among tree roots, in 
the shelter of weed and brush coves and 
among lily pad aprons, all places of the 
kind must be viewed with expectancy by 
one who is after the small mouth. Some 
of these places that have been mentioned 
are profitably worked only at special 
periods of the day, because of the fact 
that they are favored by the bass either 
as feed grounds or as a place of shel- 
ter and rest. 
The weedy coves where there is a good 
depth of water, the sunken rock piles 
and beneath the log drifts are the places 
of idleness and lookout. In the heat of 
the day those places should receive the 
fisherman’s attention, leaving the shallow 
water along the lily pads and on the 
sand and gravel points to the morning 
and evening hours. 
I notice there seems to be a prevalent 
attitude among those who express them- 
selves as authorities on matters of ang- 
ling, to discourage activity on the part 
of the angler at those periods of the day 
occurring between the early morning and 
evening hours. The bulk of the writers 
and experts talk this sort of thing, which 
I must say is in strict opposition to my 
own personal ideas of the bass fishing 
game; and why? Because of the con- 
vincing fact that actual experience along 
many a stream of the past has taught 
me to look upon all such balderash as 
eminating either from some “take it 
easy” sportsman or from one who fishes 
possibly a week out of the entire season 
and then goes home under the hallucina- 
tion that he knows all there is to be 
learned of the bass fishing game. 
He rummages through the public 
library for reference books, remembers a 
few things his guide might have dropped 
broadcast as exercise for his entertaining 
abilities, and writes a couple of dozen 
fair sized books upon how and what to 
do. If its bass you are going after then 
take a tip from one who realizes that 
what he does not know about this eccen- 
tric gentleman, black bass, would make 
much better reading than what little he 
does know, and keep after them. 
It would be a good plan for the man 
fishing for bass to fasten into his hat 
band the simple recipe that will unques- 
tionably catch the fish. Work for them, 
and work for them from sunup to sun- 
down; that is the thing to bring about a 
full string of the game rascals. And 
therefore do I say: Consider not the 
morning and the evening hours as the 
- 1 
only ones when bass can be taken, but 
rather study where and when they are 
most likely to be, at the different periods 
of the day. 
Some of the best bass of my experi- 
ences have been taken out in the hottest 
part of the day; in fact, personally, the 
noon hours and early afternoon, if any- 
thing, are more favored by my efforts 
than any other time. The feeding 
grounds, it must be understood though, 
are as a rule deserted at this time and 
those places where the water is deep, 
under the logs, at the edge of the weedy 
coves and over the underwater rock 
drifts are the places to confine your 
efforts. 
Make your casts as near where you 
figure them to be resting from the heat 
as possible and very carefully manoeuver 
your bait, if it should be a natural one, 
about in the vicinity. If it should happen 
to be an artificial offering place it be- 
yond where the fish is expected to rest 
and try to manoeuver it as near him as 
the place will allow. 
This is one of the surest ways of at- 
tracting the attention of this wiley chap. 
A S to fish taking food only at set 
hours of the day, I do not see any- 
thing to it except as a theory. 
Practical results destroy any such teach- 
ings as unwort’ny of consideration. Of 
course it must not be concluded that I 
mean it to be understood that the morn- 
ing and evening hours are less profitable 
than the middle ones, or for that matter 
as apt to yield the same quantity of fish 
in a corresponding area of water. They 
will not, generally speaking, because 
of the fact that at the regular feeding 
hours the fish are in the habit of con- 
gesting at those places where their 
natural food exists. The thing I at- 
tempt to point out is the fact that those 
hours, supposed to be lost, might be well 
improved by the conscientious and vigor- 
ous angler and turned into profit, win- 
ning bass to be proud of. 
It means work and plenty of it to 
whip a stream during the heat of the 
day, and as a rule no great quantity of 
fish will be taken out at any one place, 
as happens during the feeding hours, 
but what are creeled will most generally 
be ones that, considering pounds and 
inches, which means a worthy opponent 
to test your skill, are the best that the 
stream affords; the big ones seem to be 
the more active in the heat of the day. 
Then as another very vital considera- 
tion in the summarization of bass haunts, 
there occurs the presence of weather con- 
ditions. Weather has as much to do 
with the yield of a stream in filling the 
creel as any one of the other conditions 
which have been dwelt upon. There 
again appears a wide variance of opin- 
ions, all of which are more or less well 
founded. 
Personally I lean toward a calm 
stream for my best fishing. This will 
be looked upon with disfavor among a 
great many of the brotherhood but past 
results have forced me to give a calm 
surface the preference. A slight breeze 
ruffling the water, though, is not at all ob- 
jectionable and in some cases helps mat- 
ters along, but I do not favor a strong 
run of rough water unless it should be 
for trolling with a deep working artifi- 
cial lure, or still fishing in very deep 
water. In that case the depth of the bait 
will place it past any disturbance of the 
more agitated surface. All in all, though, 
I favor the calm days or the evenings 
with their delicate ripples. Cloudy, cool 
days are oppressive to the fisherman and 
do not stand high as a successful time 
for bass fishing. 
Just previous to a heavy thunder 
storm or shower of rain, the bass assume 
an active state and without question it 
is a good time to have a lure out; then 
the fish seem to sense an influx of their 
natural food. I have oftentimes thought, 
or it might be that for some unexplain- 
able reason the unnatural restlessness of 
the atmosphere, that one notices previous 
to a storm, might affect the fish and 
drive them forth from their hiding places 
in the same manner as one will notice 
children and geese racing about wdth 
an abnormal hysteria. It is possible that 
the fish are affected in the same way and 
grab at anything which might come be- 
fore them no matter what shape it pre- 
sents or how strangely it seems to act. 
