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Fall 2025
N
o matter if you are fishing a lake or a river,
or are fishing for largemouth, smallmouth,
or spotted bass, during the fall at some time there will be a good topwater bite. And yes, we all know
that a Spook catches bass in the fall, but what about other
topwater baits?
Let’s look at three key situations where other topwater baits will excel for your fall time bass fishing trips.
WHEN IT’S WINDY, MAKE SOME NOISE
Often there is a good breeze during the fall. That wind brings cooler temperatures and turns the bass. This is when the soft and subtle topwater presentations may not get the bass’ attention, both from their perspective and interest. The chop on the water caused by the wind may make it difficult to throw a popper or walk-the-dog style plug.
This is a good time to opt for a big, loud Plopper-style topwater, like the River2Sea Whopper Plopper and the Berkley Choppo. Both baits are very buoyant, so even if there is a good chop on the water, your bait will still stay on the surface and the blade at the back of the bait will call in a bass, if they are hungry.
Even though these baits make quite a noise and disturbance on top of the water, you still can control your retrieve speed, while keeping the blade on this bait moving. So, if the bass want the bait moving a little bit slower, you can do that, or if they want it burnt across the top of water,
and back to the boat, you can do that as well, all while still have the blade of the bait spinning.
There are two sizes of these baits I use, the one I’ll start out with is either the Choppo 105 (4”) or Whopper Plopper 110 (4 1/3”). As for most bodies of water they are a modest size bait and match the forage well.
If the wind is howling, or the bass are wanting a bigger meal, I’ll bump up to the Choppo 120 (4 1/3”) or Whopper Plopper 130 (5”) to get more surface disruption, and to match the forage size.
Areas I like to throw these topwater plugs include main lake flats, or rocky windblown shorelines, as the bass will move around the lake, to those sections where the bait fish are being pushed into by the wind.
Casting these baits around boat docks is a great way to get active and suspended bass to bite that are hanging under and under boat docks.
I’ll use is a Witch Doctor Tackle Kahuna 7’4” MH, as this is a combination, graphite/fiberglass rod, so it will help keep bass hooked up with this style of bait. I like to fish my topwater plugs on 40-pound Seaguar Smackdown Braid in Stealth Gray, as it allows me to make long casts, and get the bass away from any of those pesky boat dock cables and posts.
BANKS, FLATS…THE ALL-AROUND TOPWATER CHOICE…
When fishing an area on a lake or river that the vegetation is still intact or fishing a shoreline that has
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