East Coast and the lack of Bass on Lures

[Mozza]

Hi Guys, just a quick Yes or No answer from you out there who Lure fish for Bass on the East Coast, how has this years numbers been for you. I along with 3 others can't believe how little we have caught this year on marks that always produce. Have any others been disappointed with how little Bass that's around or east coast or is it just us 4 having a bad year.

[JimH]

M - its possible to have a 'bad' year, thing is four of you have had a 'bad' year! Bass fishing in general appears to be in decline, there are exceptions of course, these are not reflective of the fishery mind. Could you describe your experiences more?

[Mozza]

Hi Jim, we have fished early morning, midday,evening and night time on small and big tides in windy and calm conditions, they weed has hampered us a fair bit, but there are times when the conditions seem perfect. We know the spots well enough to know at what stage of the tide to fish them at, but we have altered this by staying the full cycle of the tide to see if the Bass have changed their pattern. We have used all types of HPs (Top water, Shallow and Deep diving lures) SPs and metals, SPs are our normal go to lures, but the one thing we have noticed is the absence of Launce and we think this could be reason why the Bass aren't around in the numbers they usually are.

[Eoghan]

Actually the opposite to be honest. In the last 3 days alone my fishing buddy Steve had 3 Wednesday, 4 yesterday and 2 this morning. However I do agree with Jim that this does not reflect what I am hearing is not overall a great year. Some classic marks are producing less and smaller bass than they used to.
I have see a hell of a lot of schoolies this year which is great to see. My biggest this year is only around 6Ib but im expecting to surpass that over the next 2 months.
Steve's average on the above was approx 3-4Ib. Steve has had 1 bass over 78cm and a few more in the 70's. All on the east coast. Maybe localiased marks you are fishing have had Bass kept from them..?

[Mozza]

That's good to hear Eoghan that yourself and Steve are getting some nice Bass, very rarely see anyone other then ourselves on these marks and we are all C&R. We are getting a couple of small Bass under 2lb with the odd few over 60cm but no where near the numbers that we would normally get, considering we started catching in May and have fished 3 to 4 times a week up till last week. Let's hope September and October fish well as it's hard enough on the east coast as it is.

[JimH]

Hi M

Many thanks for your reply - its an interesting perspective considering your skills, input/effort and the fact that you haven't stayed doing the same thing over time or place.
Its reflective too of a lot of similar angling experiences on a wide range of marks.

In normal populations effort is usually returned with a high degree of success as you have experienced - but you can't catch whats not there really!

Tight lines for the autumn

[Johnboy]

Having the same issue on my east cost mark. Very few bass on lures HOWEVER the local beaches have been producing some excellent bass fishing with a lot of beach anglers saying it's an improvement on previous years... I've also seen bass at my feet exploding through balls of sprat while ignoring every lure I can cast so maybe it's a question of excess feed in the water.