Maximize Florida's Early Spawn

By David A. Brown

It’s like Black Friday without the absurdity. Arriving earlier than the rest of the nation, Florida’s spawning season offers a warm-up look at the seasonal opportunity spike in largemouth bass accessibility. Based in Gainesville, Fla., Bassmaster Elite pro Bernie Schultz says his home state’s geography plays by its own rules.

“We’re in a unique place, in that the state has two different climates,” Schultz said. “Florida is the most southerly state in the eastern part of the country and it stretches north-to-south hundreds of miles. So, we’re subject to have tropical to subtropical to typical continental U.S. climate.

“South Florida is almost tropical and because of that, those fish can spawn in late fall, like November, while in the northern part of the state, it’s more early spring. Weather is critical, but if we have a warm winter, they’re going off in January. So, the usual range (for the Florida spawn), I’d say, is from November through late April.”

Pretty cool to have first crack at the giants, but the Florida spawn is no cake walk. When these green goblins are on their game, there’s nothing like them; however, Florida bass have a Achilles Heel. Read on.

RULES OF THE ROAD

Balancing the awesome with a dose of reality, Schultz points to the Florida-strain largemouth’s notoriously delicate nature — something that often comes into play when the fish set up to spawn during the fall-winter months. Suffice it to say that “Floridas” don’t handle change well and, while that can be frustrating, there are legitimate reasons for why that is.

“Most Florida-strain bass don’t have creek channels and deep places to retreat to or migrate through,” Schultz said. “Most of them live in dish pan shapeed lakes that are, on average, 7-8 feet deep, so they can’t run away from a cold front too well. They’re subjected to whatever hits them. (The only exception would be bass in spring-fed water bodies and tidal rivers.

“Once they move shallow, a cold front can shut down the spawn. The fish may move to the deepest edge of the spawning area, but they’re not going to swim all the way back into a river channel or a deep structural feature like northern-strain bass do on reservoirs.”

As Schultz explains, the more cold-sensitive Florida-strain largemouth also react differently to the photo period, while northern-strain largemouth are more predictable. Northerns, he said, will spawn when the photo period is right and it isn’t always a temperature-driven thing. Compare that to a Florida bass and you might have the sun and moon in just the right positions, but if that water temperature doesn’t meet the expectation, these sissies would rather bury into vegetation and wait for the right scenario.

As Schultz points out, one way to minimize the cold front influence is to mind your location on a Florida lake. Following what he calls “The Northwest Factor,” will help you maximize your time, by eliminating lots of nonproductive water.

“You go to the northwest part of a lake or a feature within a lake with a northwest orientation, so it’s protected from the cold north wind,” Schultz said. “The northwest part of the lake is going to be the first part of the lake the fish will seek for spawning, because these areas get the longest exposure. Where the sun strikes any body of water in the state is more from a southerly angle, so it bakes that northern shore longer.”

TAKE IT TO ‘EM

Since prespawn staging is a whole different deal, we’ll focus on the actual bedding zone. Here, Schultz employs a handful of tactics, depending on the location and mood in which he finds the fish.

Texas Rig: Schultz favors a 4- or 5-inch bait, but a beefy 6-inch Senko’s not out of the question.

“If conditions are favorable, I’ll use the 5-inch, or if I’m on big fish, I might go to the 6-inch,” he said. “If conditions are unstable, I’ll go down to a 4-inch. Less is best during a cold front, or in heavy fishing pressure.”

Schultz rigs 6-inch Senkos on a 5/0 wide gap hook and drops to a 4/0 for the 5-incher or a 2/0 for the 4. His first preference is an unweighted rig, but he may fish his Texas-rigged Senko with a 1/32- to 1/2-ounce bullet weight.

“It just depends on where I’m trying to put the bait,” Schultz said. “You’re not always sight fishing in the spawn; you’re often flipping maiden cane or pad stems — bass love to spawn there. I’ll use the least amount of weight as possible; just enough to penetrate the cover.”

For sight fishing or open-water casting, Schultz fishes his Senkos on 10-pound Suffix braid with a 10- to 12-pound fluorocarbon leader. If he’s pitching/flipping, he bumps up to 30-pound braid and 17- to 20-pound fluorocarbon.

Wacky Rig: When the fish snub the Texas rig, Schultz switches to a wacky-rigged Senko with a VMC Octopus hook set beneath an O-ring. This simple, enticing rig works great for shallow, open water, but if he needs to be more precise with his casts, or get his bait down quicker, Schultz will add a nail weight and fish his bait Neko style.

Ned Rig: Preferring the slimmer profiles of a 3- or 4-inch Senko to the wider body of a cut-down 5-incher, Schultz rigs his bait on a VMC Finesse Half Moon Ned Jig and targets areas of cleaner, featureless bottom. His preference is the open style jig, but since he typically casts past the bed and works the bait into the danger zone, he keeps the weedless version handy in case peripheral bottom moss impedes his presentation.

For all of these baits, Schultz keeps it simple with his colors by relying on Junebug, green pumpkin watermelon laminate, or water melon red glitter. Regardless of bait choice, he believes an angler’s most helpful asset is distance.

“The biggest mistake I see people make is they get too close to the fish,” he said. “You want to leave some distance and cast from as far away as you can and still reach the fish.

“Also, slower is better during the spawn. Dead sticking originated in Florida, and for good reason. That’s why the Senko is so deadly; I can’t think of a better bait for bait for fishing at a glacial pace. Patience is key.”