Aquatic Grassbeds

Aquatic grassbeds are some of my most dependable areas for catching large smallmouth bass. For example when I was writing the book Virginia Blue Ribbon Streams my son Jeff and I fished the best smallmouth bass rivers and trout streams in Virginia in order to come up with dependable information on these streams. Every smallmouth river gave us our best fishing along the aquatic grassbeds.
Some aquatic grassbeds form along the sides of the rivers while others encircle the limestone ledges in the middle of the river. I use the same tactics to fish all of these. That is, if the water immediately adjacent to these grassbeds is less than three feet deep I cast a Shenandoah Damsel Popper 6 right against the grass and fish it out 10 feet with a six inch stripping action every 10 seconds. I place each successive cast five feet further along the grassbed until I cover all of it. If the water next to the grassbed is more than three feet deep I use the Murray’s Magnum Bluegill with the same tactic. Grassbeds are too valuable to pass up.