Short Strikes and Small Fish - Dropshot Technique

I've been fishing a dropshot these days and man is it a productive rig. I would say I'm getting bit around 30% of all casts. Braid to flouro on a spinning combo, 6'8" St. Croix Mojo Bass medium extra fast action. Rigged both nose hooked and weedless. Using Roboworms in various colors.

The problem I'm having is hookup ratio. I'm not sure if its because these fish are small and are just getting the tail or what. I've tried giving them slack and letting them take it for a while. I've tried taking up the slack and reeling into them as soon as I get a bit. But I still only hook into a small percentage of bites that I'm getting.

Any suggestions?

How do you tie the hook on and how large are your baits?
Tying the hook so it sticks out 90 degrees from the line is key and having a thin small bait helps too, especially with small fish.

Palomar knot, putting the tag end back through from the front. Starting out with a 4.5 inch Roboworm. As the nose of it wears out I pinch off a bit so they end up being 3.75 inches or so after some use.

I'm not a dropshot expert but I would say 99% chance it is small bass or bluegill

This is probably the case...one way to test this is to downsize to a smaller swimbait style drop shot plastic or 2" worm. You'll find out really quick what is biting.

Another good thing to use for drop shot is the Roboworm rebarb hooks. They are straight shank and provide for an instant hookup when the fish has inhaled the bait.

I use size 1 or 2 for smaller baits and 1/0 - 3/0 for larger baits.

when you get the bite and set the hook on a miss are there any teeth marks on the bait? You may be feeling fish investigating the weight. However, it is likely bluegill or other panfish. What does the bite 'feel' like?

Bluegill will do that on a dropshot for sure, that machine gunbite.

If you keep getting bit on the DS rig with no hookups try this. Drop a 1/8 oz crappie jig down to see what it is.

Roboworm has their own hooks eh. I'll take a look. I'm fairly impressed with their plastics. I avoided them for a long time thinking they would be fragile like Yamamoto plastic. I was pleasantly surprised when I finally got a pack.




Yeah I'm seeing the teeth marks. No doubt these are small bass. In my regular lake it's 99 out 100 fish that are less than a pound. In shallow water I've seen them swim up and inhale just the tail. I should have been more clear in my post. I was looking more for tips on catching these smaller fish. Looks like smaller bait is going to be the answer.

I fish very successfully with a drop shot using a 3 MM swimbait. Have caught up to 7.14. But using a 6" finesse worm caught a 9.20 and have hooked bigger but lost them in the standing timber mostly due to the light line. I always Texas rig the baits using either a # 1 or a 1/0. The hook always end up the the top of their mouth big or small.

I set the hook as soon as I feel a bite. Little bass or perch. Set the hook.

Throw it into the shoreline vegetation.

99 out of 100 fish you catch are under a pound and you ask why your hookup ratio is low??

Again I shoulda been more specific. Looking to increase the ratio given the dinkfest in this water. I'm honestly surprised nobody answered my post like "fish in a place with bigger fish."

Fish in a place with bigger fish!

I catch a lot of good fish on the Roboworm Aaron's magic. I have had a lot come unbuttoned. I think the Gamakatsu dropshot hook, which I have been using, has too small of a throat. Putting them in a garage sale! Expanding my horizons with more different hooks with a more open throat.

This is the Gammy hook modded by Roboworm especially for drop shotting

https://www.tacklewarehouse.com/Roboworm_Rebarb_Hooks/descpage-RWRBH.html

Yeah bass pro didn't have those ones but they had some VMC brand "neko" hooks that are the same minus the keeper. I used a bobber stop which worked very well. The straight shank hooks work better. At the end of the day going with a much smaller bait got me up to about 85%. Thanks for all the suggestions.

I would guess it was bream or very small bass because I use a 1/0 Owner rigging hook with a finesse worm and have no problem missing bites, unless it is bream hammering it.