Summer Slam – Topwater Giants

By Andrew Ragas

Topwaters and surface baits, longtime bass fishing staples at night, are popular for smallmouths. They are hard to beat when surface activity is prevalent, the lakes are heating up from the sunlight above, and insect hatches take place. When either of these conditions are in play, topwaters often get eaten quickly, and generate vicious strikes.

Summer’s swelter is notorious for delivering the most difficult fishing of the season. Bites are typically less aggressive and fish are driven deep during daytime, becoming even more difficult to locate. Dog days, hot weather, warm water temperatures, heavy pleasure boat traffic and passive bites become common excuses for a poor day of fishing. Oppositely for me, these conditions deliver the best trophy smallmouth fishing of the year.

During the dog days of summer on many north country lakes, big smallmouth bass become creatures of the night. When nighttime calls, and most anglers are asleep, the fish go nocturnal and feed.

It’s the middle of summer. The daytime surface temperatures on my favorite natural lakes and flowages is hot. Water temperature is at its seasonal peak, sometimes warmer than bath water. Due to these conditions, daytime angling for the coolwater smallmouth bass is a struggle and often a kick in the butt. When dealt with the adversity of the dog days of summer, the best strategy I’ve learned is to sleep or work all day if needed, then launch the boat late and fish later.

The dog days of summer triggers a late night feeding binge. Deep dwelling gamefish species retreat from their mid-lake open water locations and cool water sanctuaries, encroaching shoreline areas and littoral zones in search for prey. On the many natural lakes and flowages I fish, smallmouth bass undertake this short-distance movement to feast on the abundance of rusty crayfish and unsuspecting preyfish and insect hatches. During a nocturnal period when most anglers think smallmouth bass go dormant, loud surface topwaters that create noise and push lots of water score gargantuan fish that are feeding heavily to retain their weights.

Summer Slam

In most years, the Rapala X-Rap Pop is my go-to surface bait. But when it’s not producing, a large walk the dog will pique smallmouths interest.  For targeting very large bass, I like the bright colored, 4 and 5 inch sizes of the now-defunct Rapala X-Rap Walk, and the all new Rapala Skitter-V. Both have wide side-to-side action, and push lots of water.

New for 2019, the Rapala Skitter V has become one of my favorite walk the dog style surface baits. It pushes a substantial amount of water, and it’s V cut underside prevents the bait from rolling over sideways.

Long casts on 15 lb. monofilament, with powerful sweeps of the 7ft 2″ med. hvy fast action baitcasting rod to generate the optimal walk-the-dog retrieve cadence, and mix some pauses and breaks in between. Trust me, you will want the mono; it keeps baits floating, and provides necessary stretch for successful hook sets so that you won’t rip the bait out from fishes mouths. The big strikes and huge fish surface lures produce from shallow water during July and August months will make you wonder whether you’re fishing the Amazon for peacock bass rather than the northwoods for smallmouth bass.

The shallow tops of bars will now become the focal point of your topwater fishing. Rock bars, humps, and shoals are some of the best locations I’ve found for sunset and after dark fishing. The tops of them all will usually have the sexiest elements of the structure which could be the largest rock or boulders, which in turn also attract the forage species of crayfish and shallow water baitfish. Smallmouth often gravitate to them in low light to use as an ambush point. They will also hold on these locations throughout the night, using them as resting areas for the night too. Over the years, I have experienced nights where I’ve been able to pull up to 20 to 30 bass off of these small structures. When that happens, the spot is loaded with food and the fish pile in like it was spring all over again.

A topwater fished over the tops of shallow bars will catch the most fish. The sights of explosions and strikes will be something to behold.

Topwaters are my favorites for this hour. They’ll perform best on nights of high humidity and without any wind. Keep a close eye on surface activity or insect hatches, as they are hard to beat when surface activity is prevalent.

I have gotten best after-dark results with the Rapala X-Rap Pop. Fish will hear it, see it, and strike it from great distances. What separates this topwater from others is the amount of surface water it pushes, and the loud obnoxious plopping sound you can get it to produce. Every mid summer, it engages some of the largest smallmouth in the system to strike and connect. The more obnoxious and loud your pops, the more strikes it triggers.

The X-Rap Pop comes with two strong VMC trebles. In order to keep fish pinned with the most minimal of hooksets, I strongly encourage immediately swapping only the front hook in favor of a larger size Trokar Tk300 round bend treble hook. A slightly oversize hook will help you connect with more fish and reduce the number of misses from fish that failed to grab it.