In your experience, when you catch a female off a bed, and she is released within a short
distance from the bed, how often does she go back and how long until you can catch her
again? ( I know this answer varies, but on "average"?)

In a catch, weigh, release tournament, if you catch a 10 lber off a bed does it make sense
to sit on the bed and wait to catch the same fish again?

I have caught the same female off of a bed twice in one day before

No amount of tournament money or ribbons could tempt me to do that.

+1

I fish a couple of local ponds and I have seen the same fish caught multiple times in an hour and by different people. Sometimes when they are 'on' they are ON! It can't be healthy for the fish but it the nature of the environment.

It depends on the amount of money to me. I’d rape the beds for the right price.
A club tourney or something like that? I’d try catching pre/post first.

Depending on how locked in she is, I have seem the same female caught on back to back flips in the bed. CWR/CMR tournaments sometimes have rules about visually catching the same fish off a bed.

A couple of years back I found a 10lber on a bed in the Lake Fork Marina cove. Got her to hit a swimbait I threw on the bed. She came off right at the boat. She ran to a stump a couple of feet by the bed. I threw out past her and swam the bait by the stump just to see what would happen. She pounced on that swimbait with a vengeance I landed her, got a weight and a quick picture and turned her loose before anyone noticed where she was. She stayed on or near that bed for 2 more days. I would stop and watch her for a second on my way out each day.

^^^^^^^

Another reason right there why I want to fish with Mark Perry....things just happen in his boat

Over the years, I have caught the same female twice off of the same bed....neither was very big, a 3.5 and a 4.75.....I would guess that it is not the norm, and like those above, I wouldn't do so unless the rules allowed with money involved 🤔

Most catch and weigh tournaments rules is that you can’t catch a bed fish twice in the same day.

Thank you, my thoughts exactly ! I used to be the worlds worst about pestering bed fish, they have a hard enough time as it is without me adding to the stress. I just don't do it anymore.

Not that hard once she calms down, you will see her back on a bed or somewhere near. Most all fish on the bed are catchable, if you make them mad enough. But I have had my heart broken many times because I couldn't see them anymore. Really wild fish will be gone for a while, some will stay close. If I can get my bait to rub her side a few times, she will get pretty mad. They will pick up the bait, and before they can throw it out off the bed its time to cross their eyes. On a good bed fishing day my boat will have 30 to 40 different types of worms down in the bucket. It's the only time I pull out cotton candy, but it works.. Seen fish bed in 8 ft of water before in clear water.

otter be a seaon on it like northern states do on some fishes , 2 months no bass fishn during major spawn period for certain lakes , think about it

I fished an ABA tournament last year on Palestine as an amateur very late during the spawn last year and we were sight fishing, catching bedded fish. My pro placed very high in the money, and I came in 13th. My pro fished tournaments on this lake regularly and something he showed me about the fish we were catching is that almost every one of them had cull tag holes in their upper or lower lip. It appeared that most everything we were catching had probably been caught and released and more than likely weighed in. If they were released by a release boat, they still made it back to a bedding area. It may not have been the bed they were caught off of, but they went back to one.

Most tourneys take the fish from you after weigh in. It is typically released either at the weigh in site or taken out into the middle of the lake in a live release boat and dumped. I would bet most 10 pounders will not go back to the same bed if you caught her a few miles away within the timeframe of the tourney.