(Editor's note: The following is the latest installment in a series of fishing tips presented by The Bass University. Check back each Friday for a new tip.)
Mark Daniels Jr. has succeeded at every level of the fishing ladder, starting off by winning the 2013 TBF National Championship, then qualifying for three Forrest Wood Cups and subsequently two Bassmaster Classics. All along the way, a shallow diving crankbait has been a critical tool.
“The majority of the fish that you’re going to catch, specifically largemouths, live in zero to 10 feet of water,” the Major League Fishing competitor said. With shallow cranks, you can cover that zone quickly and efficiently. They mimic shad, bluegills and crawfish, and by choosing the right one he can bump cover at whatever depths he desires. Even when he’s beating the bank he relies heavily on his sonar and mapping to figure out where fish are feeding. “People underutilize their electronics in shallow water.”
“The important part is confidence in your equipment,” he explained. “I am a huge, huge advocate of a graphite-blended rod, a graphite composite.” It helps him to slow down his hookset, which allows fish to engulf the bait, and then provides a necessary cushion during the fight. He’ll typically pair it with a mid-range reel, something in the 6:1 range, but when water is cold he might go slower, and in the summer he’ll occasionally go up to 8:1.
Line choice is critical and he depends on Seaguar AbrazX, usually 12-pound, although he’ll drop down to 10 on occasion and go as high as 17 when he wants the crankbait to stay higher in the water column. He relies on the line’s abrasion resistance. “If you’re not in contact with something, you’re not getting bit,” he said, and the high quality fluorocarbon allows him to bring his lure over and through heavy cover without fearing that nicks in the line will cost him fish later.
He tries to keep his boat positioned so that the lure stays in the strike zone as long as possible, often paralleling the bank, and he cautioned less experienced anglers to never just cast out a lure and reel it back in. He’ll modify his retrieve until he figures out what best triggers strikes on that particular day. “You want to incorporate different things they haven’t seen,” he said. That might be an “old school” strategy like the classic stop-and-go, it might be a sweeping retrieve, or it might involve sharp upward jerks of his rod.
Once he figures out the best retrieve for a given situation, he wants to make sure that he has the best possible chance of getting the fish to the boat. That often involves changing out his crankbait’s hardware, specifically the hooks and split rings, to replacements from Owner. When fish are choking the bait, he likes an EWG-style treble, but when they’re just “slapping” it, a round-bend gets the call.
If you want to learn more about when, where and how Daniels cranks shallow, including which styles of bait he uses for specific situations, and the specific features of his signature MR6 from Bill Lewis Lures, check out his full video, available only by subscribing to The Bass University TV.
