How to Fish the Carolina Rig - Bass Fishing

going on guys this is gene Jensen and today I want to talk about one of my favorite rigs to fish in the summertime and that's the old ball-and-chain the Carolina rig [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Music] [Applause] [Music] I start with what is a Carolina rig a Carolina rig is basically I'm gonna pull this one up and I'll show it to you it's a sinker and then there's a bead and then something to prevent the sinker from sliding down the line a longer leader I like 18 to 24 inches you can go it longer than that are shorter than that but 18 is usually where I start at and then your hook with your bait so as for the the the different ways to rig other different things that I use to rig it I start off with a three it's ounce weight that'll be the lightest one I ever throw on this thing and usually it's a half ounce 3/4 even a one ounce but sinker and so I love bullet weights because they come through cover a whole lot better you can get those egg sinkers that's the that's the original sinker that they used for Carolina rigs or barrel sinker and that kind of stuff you'll see them rigged up that way all the time but I like bullet weights in fact the one that I use almost all the time hasn't been made in years and I bought a whole bunch of them when the company went out of business but it's just this way right here which is basically a long cylindrical bullet weight and if I can ever get a tungsten company to make them I will promote them till the day I die because I need them so bad I think I'm down to six now and I use my lure retriever to get them on hung I mean I protect those sinkers like crazy so other things besides the sinker is is the bead those all could please glass beads now that I'm using tungsten and stuff like that I tend to stay away from glass beads I go for metal beads like these right here and all of this stuff I'll link down in the description so you guys can go take a look at it and see it but metal beads or plastic beads are what I use use glass that tungsten will break it in a heartbeat then for what I used to stop the sinker I use you can use a swivel which is the old-school way of doing it or I use what's called Carolina keepers and they come in red and clear and I've been using these per gosh 15 years or so they've been around a long time and and they make it to where I can adjust the leader length really really easy and we'll show you that here in just a minute and then the hook there you can use just about any time type of worm hook I typically will use the offset round Bend hook with a keeper or I'll use an e WG if I'm using a really really fat worm and if I'm fishing a lot of grass I something like a straight shank hook like this or a flippin hook something that I can keep for the grass from hanging on that the offset Bend or whatever so but that's the components now let me cut this one off and I'll need to retie anyway because we just got hung again some rocks and cut this off and I'm gonna rear it everything and I'm gonna show you guys exactly how it's done alright so first thing you do get your mainline coming off of your rod is you put your sinker on then after your sinker but one or two beads output to when I need noise when I've got a little bit dirty of water maybe maybe I'm fishing at night and stuff like that I'll put two beads on just so they click together I'll put a metal one and a plastic one maybe you know just to change the sound of it a little bit then the old-school way is to take a swivel tie swivel on there then you tie a leader on to the swivel and then you tie the other end of the leader on to your hook and then you're sent with that length leader which is great 18 inches a good way to start with if that's what you got that's what you've got and I like big big swivels just because they're tough and you have a tendency to put this this rig in into areas that can really damage some equipment but for me and if I can find my pliers for me I used Carolina's keepers and they're really simple to use I have a half ounce weight on there and so when I use 1/2 ounce or heavier I use two of them because if you don't they'll slide down the leader on your cast and they've got a little slit down the center of it and I don't think you guys can see it but when you squeeze it with a pair of pliers in to end it opens up that slit and creates a hole all right and so you put the line gosh almighty hit my eyes bad and you slide it down the line put the line through the hole slide the keeper down the line okay there's no reason why I'm using a red and a white when I just have them out I don't care about the color okay and they go together just like that then I take my hook throwing hooks everywhere take my hook and I tie it on and that's it that's a Carolina rig and I'll shorten that leader up a little bit I think I can get away with probably about 16 17 inches like I said these Carolina keepers are great because then you can just grab them pinch them slide them down adjust that leader length and the shorter the leader the easier it is to cast the longer the leader the more difficult is the gas we'll get into that a little bit later but with the shorter leaders also the fish if they're really finicky if they feel that way they're liable to drop the drop the bait and you get hung up just a little bit more with a shorter leader but it's one of those things where I almost always fish at 18 inches 12 to 18 inches just because I want to be able to cover a lot of water with that all right so let's talk about the equipment all right so first thing is the rod seven foot four to seven foot six maybe even set if you can find a medium heavy rod that's a longer than seven foot six go with that the longer the rod the better a lot of it has to do with the cast it's just easier to cast a Carolina rig the longer rod even a seven-foot rod it gets to be a little bit more difficult but this is just what I found this is really really simple - a lot easier to cast it with a longer rod also it's it's better with a hook set we'll talk about that when we get up and show you guys how to fish it I like a high-speed reel just so I can get the get it into me and make another cast maybe I make a bad cast I've got to reel it in real fast I really there's no advantage to having a slower reel so the higher speed real the better the the line I like 20 pound test line now in my old video I talked about how you it's nice you know it's good to have floating line or something like that that's a bunch of crap now to me right now I just I'm at that point where I don't care what line I have I've used fluorocarbon for years and never had an issue catching fish yeah it doesn't float the bait up or doesn't do all this other crap but I catch a ton of fish using fluorocarbon line and fluorocarbon leader or whatever so don't worry about the type of line monofilament has a ton of stretch so if you catch up if you hook a fish or fish by it's way way out on the end of a cast it's a lot harder to get a hook set in so my suggestion would be use fluorocarbon line if you're going to use the Carolina keepers and if you're going to use the swivels use a braided main line and a fluorocarbon leader just so that you don't really get a good look at your line a lot of times so anyway that's the equipment it's really that simple medium heavy seven foot four to seven foot six long rod high speed real good line and a good hook definitely a good hook all right so let's talk about the different baits that I throw on a Carolina rig specifically in the summertime mainly straight tail ones trick worms and try to pull some out trick your typical herbs are usually my go-to unless I'm using less I'm I'm fishing for bigger fish and I'll go with a heavier wire it looks like these mustache right here pretty heavy wire a a trick room really doesn't work really good with those heavy wire usually when I'm using a trick worm I'm throwing something a little bit lighter wire like this guy magatsu ewg just because it doesn't tear the worm up that much so my trick once the egg trick alarms like what I've got tied on right here is a magnum trick worm but mainly just straight tail worms zoom me dig through my box this is a new one from 13 fishing as a pet it's a a ribbon tail or a sickle tail worm called the big squirm I've been tearing them up on that one lately we just announced all those that I cast like I said all this stuff's gonna be down in the description so you don't have to go looking it up while you're watching the video the one that I first gained confidence in with a Carolina rig is the ultra vibe speed roll or a speed one and basically it's got a little swim and tail on the back end of it I like the big beefier on body worms oh and the spring time and I know we're talking about summer but in the springtime don't hesitate to throw a lizard on a Carolina rig around spawning flats and things like that you'll catch the snot out fish to this I know I've got a good buddy of mine that's all he throws in the springtime and here's our lucky wins tournaments all kinds of stuff what other stuff do I have in here for a Carolina rig the young mighty worm which is a ten and a half inch trick worm monster monster worms but mainly just straight tails you know and then ribbon tables are are another thing that I'll throw in there like the the mag too from zum-zum makes a smaller ribbon tail worm I don't ever throw that one anymore I used to throw it all the time but now that they make the mag - and the whole monster those are my go-to worms for Texas rig and for a Carolina rig but that's it I keep your pretty simple straight tail lizard in the springtime ribbon tail and the speed worm a lot of people who heard me say I throw a sinkhole on there and that's one of the only ways I fish the stinko is on the Carolina rig but I found that it's better just to throw these type of worms so anyway let's keep rolling hi so when do I throw a Carolina rig basically post-spawn through fall okay when the fish pull out they're pulling out on the outside structure like points and and ledges drops and rock piles and things like that when they pull out when the water temperature gets about 70 degrees it starts to climb until it falls back down on the fall two to seven degrees degrees that's when I'm dragging a Carolina rig I will have one on my boat all the time but that outside cover and outside structure you know long points with rock on it hard points you know anything that's holding fish cut tight to the bottom it really shines in grass not like the real thick grass but you got scattered grass on a flat you want to fish a Carolina rig and just make your leader about you know 18 to 20 maybe 25 inches a little bit longer than what you what you normally would and it'll come through grass and I'll show you how to fish grass here in just a second what other kind of stuff sea grass rocks around stumps now it tends to get hung in wood and in stumps a whole lot easier and so I try to if I'm gonna throw this to stumps or to brush piles and things like that i'ma grab a Texas rig and throw Texas rig in there but a Carolina rig is is an amazing I mean it's one of those things where you hate to admit that you fish it but when you fish it you catch the crap out of them so all right let's jump up and show you guys how to fish this sucker all right so let's talk about the cast [Applause] [Music] sometimes it can be difficult it's just it's a it's a slightly different cast on a baitcaster you got to allow the rod to load up a little bit and the leader to get to get straight and like I said the shorter the leader the easier it is to cast I'd start off with a short leader and if for some crazy reason you ever want to fish a longer leader which there are some chance sometimes you that you find that you'll catch more fish I'll show you the alternative way to cast it but here's the first one it's like a lob it's not a whipping cast like you see a lot of things a lot of people do it's a lob you let it load up in the back and then you throw it over top of your head so let it sink to the bottom and drag it back in now as for the retrieves so there's two different types of retrieves that I use when I want to keep the bait on or they sinker on the bottom I don't want to deliver bait you know lift the bait up off the bottom or anything else I'm gonna drag low basically what I'm gonna do is I'm just gonna take it and I'm gonna keep the rod tip low and I'm just gonna drag it very very slowly on the bottom all right now if I'm fishing grass I I lift and drop it what I'm doing is I'm pulling the sinker out of the grass and letting it fall back in a little closer to me and a little closer to me I'm hopping that sinker out of the grass and what happens is that sinker punches down through the grass and that bait just kind of floats down on top and that's what the bass are sitting above the grass they're gonna reach down and they're gonna grab hold of that that bait so I'm just gonna lift and drop and it's just like this boom now if you feel yourself pulling up to something you can't get unhung just like this you feel yourself pulling up to a rock and the sinker hits the rock I shake it a little bit and I there's been times where man that's what triggered the bike for some reason it sent a little vibration through the bait or through the line and caused the bait to move a little bit and get bit but uh fees stuff getting getting hung on a rock pop it a couple of times first before you try to break it free and before you think you're completely hung but right now I'm dragging it through a shell bed which is one of those things and I like to keep it making noise I want that sinker to make noise and the fish come up and investigate and then see the worm moving behind the sinker and bite that's basically the two retrieves and that's why I do it don't want to sneak it just keep it keep it on the bottom or if I'm having trouble keeping it on the bottom I'm going to drag low I'm trying to get it through through cover or through grass I'm gonna hop it up over top of the you know over top of the grass so alright so because the the sinker is not close to the bait because that line slides freely through the sinker sometimes it's difficult to feel the bite and what I typically do well and because you can't feel the bite you'll find a lot of times especially when you're just starting out you're gonna gut hook a fish and so I will try to find a video where I've talked about how to get fitted get a fish on unhooked or a gut hook fish unhook and I'll link it up here if I can find it but it's hard to feel the bite a lot of times so you'll find that I'll fish it fairly fast especially the summer time you can get away with fishing it really fast and I'll fish it fast and I just kind of try to keep the line as light as tight as I can you know get hung on something I want to try to at least keep somewhat of a bow in the line and not lay slack line down on the water I want to be able to feel any time the fish thumps it ok and so when they thump it all I do is I hold it still for just a second just to see if they're pulling it a little bit and then I'll reel down and the hook set is critical if you set the hook over your head you're probably going to jerk the hook out of the fish's mouth okay and that's because that sinker is so far in front of that hook it causes that the line literally to slide out of the fish's mouth a lot of times yes you'll get the hook set sometimes but if you want to get this hook set in the fish every time you've got to side sweep set if you got a sweep set it so well hey there's a bass right there oh so when you do feel a bite reel down to them and sweeps it off to the side a nice big long sweep set until you feel a soft feel that fish solid and then if I time and get him into the boat I thought that was the fish but a critical critical to have a sweep set so let's get to catch something like I might have something right up against this Bank I so if you want to fish with a long leader this is what's really nice about a the keepers you want to fish with a long leader even as long as your rod I think the longest whenever were fished with it was eight feet long it ain't the same cast it's it's a different cast and I'm going to thank Pete glue sick I was at Bass University last year a couple of years ago I came around when it was but we were he was talking about fishing at Carolina rig at Bass University and he talked about the lasso cast you know how you throw a lasso around your head and throw it same thing with this one you have got to get this rod loaded up and it is so difficult to do it when you cast it normal so what he did and I suck at this cast by the way but just want to show you guys is you basically around your head feel bad for the guy in the back of the boat cuz you're gonna hit him in the head but that's your cast and with those long 8 9 10 foot leaders that some people fish that's what you got to do you know and it's pretty crazy you start here and it's and you won't get a backlash if you try to do it the traditional way what happens is your weight gets away from your your swivel or your Carolina keepers and halfway through the cache your weight slings forward and hits that swivel or your keepers and it causes your lung your rear realtor to basically backlash to push ahead and you get an overrun and it will do that every single time matter of fact I will show you what happens my sinker is way over here and 15 feet to the right then backlash but 15 feet to the right was my my carolina keeper and my my hook and I didn't get nearly the length of cast but I didn't have my thumb on there it probably would have backlashed so the lasso cast there's one you probably never heard of like so why I pick a Carolina rig over a Texas rig now a Texas rig is really good for exact locations I'm fishing a rock pile a brush pile or I'm fishing you know a line of rocks or exact locations a Texas rig you can just pitch right in pull it back out pitch it in pull it out pitch it and work it around but a Carolina rig really shines when you've got to cover a vast spot you know an area that's just like a giant flat that's rocks or it's hard bottom or it's a shell bed or or even coming off of a Ledge you drag it that sinker comes down and that and that that worm is just floating down behind that sinker that's when it really really shines and so basically you know right now I've got this huge shell bed I got I keep seeing baitfish ticking so I've got baitfish working and their way across the shell-bed the bass are moving in I've got a ditch that comes in from deep water and that and what happens is these the bass will push these baitfish up in this ditch and then run them up on the bank and up into the shallow areas and so they're not sitting on one specific place and so I'm pairing the bank along this ditch and I'm just dragging and I'm feeling for rock and I'm feeling for that hard bottom and I'm feeling for a bike you know when I fan cast and I work this this area really really good just it covers big spots better than a Texas rig and that's the best I can explain it another one of my retreat retrieves is just this right here I'm dragging it down us down about a 40 yeah but kind of a slight drop but it's got a hard bottom and I typically just fish it straight up just like this but you see how slow I'm dragging it that sinker is not coming off up off the bottom like I said if I'm having a hard time feeling the bottom or I feel like my sinkers not staying on the bottom I'm gonna drag really really low I'm okay with you know with this if I'm if I'm feeling that sinker the whole time I'm just gonna really slow and you move the bait with your rod you don't move it with your reel and the reason is is you typically will not feel that you'll lose a lot of sense sensitivity you won't feel the bite quite as easily if you're trying to move the bait with your reel there's like let him take it my first dish for the day who brought him in green you know you want to open his mouth look at that the ball and chain to the Carolina Reed was a big ol worm for that little bitty fish to hit but uh that's the nuts and bolts of fish in a Carolina rig well like I say be sure to introduce somebody to fishing introduce them to my channel let me help you teach them how to fish more importantly get out of the water guy catch some fish and have a great day we'll see you

Channel: Flukemaster

Views: 515,038

Keywords: how to fish, carolina rig, bass fishing, fishing, how to catch bass, how to fish the carolina rig, how to, bass, fishing tips, tutorial, Flukemaster, Summer fishing, fish, fishing video, largemouth, summer, largemouth bass, bass fishing tips, how to rig a carolina rig, how to fish for bass, carolina rigging, fishing tricks, fishing tip, fishing knots, fishing in the dark, bass fishing videos, summer fishing, summer bass fishing

Id: ZWU0TSyu-UI

Length: 23min 10sec (1390 seconds)

Published: Wed Jul 24 2019