THE PROS' TACTICS TO TAKING FLOOD WATER BASS
More Bill Dance on Flood-Water Bass
 EDITOR'S
NOTE: Editor’s Note: Some people think that the
only time to have a good day of bass fishing is when
the lake is down and clear. Well, this is just not true
for the bass fishing pros with whom I’ve talked.
This week they’ll tell us why they love to fish
in flood waters from Florida all the way to Texas. Here
are some new tricks to find the big bass.
If you choose not to fly the lake in an airplane, then
your next option is to ride the water. Before you begin
to fish, spend time on the lake learning how the rising
water has changed the lake, what areas are clearing
and which sections of the lake have the warmest water.
A surface temperature gauge can be a critical tool for
bass fishing success under flood water conditions. Once
you find the warmer water the bass are searching for,
Dance believes you should give the  bass
more than one chance to take your lure. "Bass trail
or track their baits when they can't see them,"
Dance emphasizes. "They are predators that often
stalk before they attack. In muddy water, you need to
slow down the retrieve of your spinner baits or crankbaits.
Often a bass will come to a spot because it hears, smells
or feels the bait. But then when the fish arrives at
its ambush point the bait already is gone. "If
I'm casting to a stump with a spinner bait when the
water is muddy, I cast to the stumps bring the spinner
bait by the stump and continue my retrieve. If I don't
get a bite, I cast right back to the same spot and make
an identical retrieve by that same stump. I want my
spinner bait to follow the same tracks I’ve made
on my first cast. I have learned that many times when
you duplicate the same cast three or four times in the
same area, you will get a strike on that fifth or sixth
retrieve and catch the bass you won't have caught if
you’ve only made one cast to that area."
 When
the rivers and lakes flood, Dance becomes a trash fisherman.
High water brings sticks, logs and debris into a lake
or river. The debris usually moves in the current and
hangs up in pockets and coves off the current, often
leaving piles of logs, limbs and stumps just off the
current. To fish this debris, Dance first will cast
a shallow-running crankbait parallel to the debris.
Next, he will throw a spinner bait parallel to the debris
to try and catch the bass holding on the outer edge
of the cover. However, before he leaves the area, he
will flip a pig and jig into the thickest part of the
stumps and logs to try and catch the bass holding back
under the cover. "Several basic keys will aid your
success when fishing flood water," Dance explains.
"If you understand what bass generally do under
rising water conditions, you will know where to find
them and how to fish for them. When you are fishing
flood waters remember that bass:
 *
"swim to the most-shallow water,
* "move closer to objects like bushes and stumps,
* "move away from current and
* "rely on their abilities to feel the vibrations
of the bait moving through the water and to smell a
bait rather than see a bait."
Flood waters frighten many anglers off lakes. But the
men who know what happens to a lake when it floods and
how to find and catch the bass under these conditions
often take the most and the biggest bass of the season.
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