You may have tried different ways to catch striped bass, but have you ever tried to troll for them at night? In this article we will discuss the
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many thrills that come along with trolling for striped bass at night.
Some of you may have tried using a top water Lures before, I hope you had a good time because when the striper hits the top water Lures there is no thrill better.
I have seen times when they come completely out of the water and it shocks you so much if you’re not ready for it. I know a lot of you may have tried top water lures During the day light hours, but combine that with trolling at night and now you really have some fun ahead.
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When I first heard of this idea my first thought was, can the bass see the Lure at night? Well let me tell you, yes, they can. I have heard many other anglers talking about this and in preparation for writing this article, I searched the Internet and YouTube and watched some of the ways that other people do it.
In this article we will discuss some of those ways as well.
Imagine you are just minding your own business at night on a calm cool lake trolling around 2 to 3 mph, you have the cool night air in your face and you’re relaxing and just enjoying the peace and then Bam! Your rod bends over and you’re reel starts singing a tune. you grab your rod and tug on it with all you got. You barely have any light and this guy just interrupted your calm quiet peace, but you reel and tug and reel and tug until you start to see the outline of a great big striped bass coming toward you. She jumps and splashes a little and when you get her to the boat you need both hands to bring her in. Then, you turn on the flash of your camera and take a selfie to prove to your buddies the next day what happened, because you know they’re not going to believe you.
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She’s a monster and she’s a beauty. You gently set her back into the water and hold her by the tail as you push her forward and backward through the water and finally, she starts wagging her tail and as you release her a smile comes on your face because you know that she is carying millions of eggs and can repopulate this lake so that you can do it again sometime. This is the thrill that comes along with trolling for bass at night.
Now if that seems fun to you, I’ve got one more idea. Why donn’t you try doing all of that in a kayak. I know you can hardly stay straight up in a kayak but many of the anglers that I have seen doing it this way make it look like a lot of fun. I can’t say that I have ever fished in a kayak but when I have a large striped bass attacks your bait the funny part is that you don’t stay stationary. Instead you start going in the direction of the fish.
So if the fish is behind you, you spin around if the fish wants to go left you go left. It’s a weird feeling I can tell you because I have fished from a float tube before and wherever the fish goes you go. It’s completely different than fishing from the shore or from a large boat. It has a whole new dynamic.
One thing to keep in mind is that if you are in a kayak, you probably will not be able to troll as quickly as you normally would in the daytime unless you have an electric trolling motor so it would be wise to find a top water bait that has a lot of action at slow speed‘s.
You may be crawling at about 2 to 2 ½ or 3 mph so you need a high action topwater Lure. The AC plug fits the bill but there are probably others that will do fine as well. One of the videos I saw while I was studying this topic is a video done by FishaHolicfishing on YouTube and he has a video called monster Montag kayak for striped bass 40 pound plus striped bass -Trolling with umbrella rigs.
If you have a chance, you should really go check it out he catches a 40 pound striper bass in a kayak and even though the audio on this video is not that great the size of the fish he pulls up is just amazing.
I am kind of a big guy so I don’t think I am going to do very well in a kayak but I might like to try doing it from a pontoon. Not the large deck boats that you might be imagining but the small pontoons with one seat. I think I would like to try there in the near future.
Anyway, trolling at night can be done and it can be done very effectively. Many people like to do this while using some sort of top water bait like an AC plug or even I have seen people doing it with bunker chunks like a bunker head.
A lot of times where I am from fishing at night is about the only way to do it because it is so hot in the daytime in the summer. Going out at night when the sun is not around is just common sense and when you and the commonsense in the cooler weather on top of the water where there is no crowd and nobody on the water besides you, seems quite fun to me.
So I will be very soon taking a trip to my local lake to do some night fishing while trolling. Do you have any advice about trolling at night? I know I have left out trolling with planer boards like we see on the East Coast so if anyone has experience with that please let me know in the comments so that we can share this experience with those who have not done it this way.
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Give us a long detailed explanation so we can feel the excitement like you do.
Are there any other ways to troll at night that I have left out? It sure would be nice to hear from some of you to find out.
In summary: if you have a moment to catch large striped bass at night and you don’t want to sit on the shore, try trolling for them at night and you might even try doing it from a kayak. It looks like a blast.
