With no speeding bass boats, I prefer to fish wide open water areas in winter even while most bass fishermen this day fished tight to the bank and were having some luck. Out in 50 - 80' of water I have no snags, weeds, or people to deal with and can easily see everything that's happening all around the boat.
I found my open water bass cruising behind big schools of shad down to 50' deep, with a few shad balls being pushed up to less than 20' deep. Dropped some of my favorites on their heads: dropshot, a small kastmaster, and a sonar minnow and found some biters. Also a lot of followers that wouldn't commit!
And also threw a 1/48th oz. clear tube jig when encountering the fish sitting motionless at less than 5' below the surface. Gliding very quietly within 35 feet of them and IF presented perfectly, they will snap at that pretty quick. Get too close and, it's weird, they almost always swim right under my kayak like 2' down, where I cannot "see" them and lose them completely. I'm now getting much quicker getting the garmin into "Pet Bass mode" looking out only 4 to 6 feet instead of 60.
First lake trip on the Hobie in 2026 and a handful of fun, full-bendo, drag screaming, around-the-kayak style battles with 2.5 pounders that usually jump a couple times, with good shots at some fat bluegill. Plenty of missed fish. Using 6lb braid to 5lb fluorocarbon. (back to the trout thing later this week)
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