Luke Clausen’s Tips for Fishing Grass

There are lots of types of grass and it grows both to the surface of water, on the surface, and sub-surface. During the hot summer months, late May through September, grass is a great place to find and catch a good bag of bass.

For bass in surface grass, there are two ways to catch them: punching and top water. Of course, whichever lure you choose it’ll need to be weedless. For punching I use a large weight, from 3/4- to 1-1/2-ounce rigged with a heavy gauge hook and a Z-Man Fishing Punch CrawZ, Palmetto BugZ, or CreatureZ bait. I’ll use a strong rod that has a little bit of a tip on it like the Megabass Orochi F8-79XX and Tuf-Line XP braided line in 30- to 65-pound-test, depending on the thickness of the grass.

When fishing the punch rig, the trick is to stay very vertical. Making longer pitches puts your line at an angle that makes landing fish much harder. Another benefit of the shorter flips is you’ll get more flips. It’s a game of numbers, more flips will mean more bass in the long run.

For top water action I will use a Z-Man Fishing Hard Leg FrogZ soft plastic frog bait. This bait is very weedless. Early morning and early evening action on the Hard Leg FrogZ can be fantastic.

When fishing sub-surface grass, I will throw the same punch setup as I throw for the surface grass. In fact, I fish it almost identically to the way I fish surface grass. The only difference is you won’t be able to see every place you flip the bait. Follow the shore contour and use your electronics to follow the outside edge of the weed line for best results. Keep in mind, you aren’t imitating a crawdad, you are imitating a fleeing brim or other baitfish.

For surface baits over sub-surface grass I will use a Megabass DogX or PopX lure. I’ll use the DogX when the fish are active and moving, and I’ll opt for the PopX when fish aren’t chasing the bait as much. For these baits I will use a lighter rod, but it still needs to have some backbone. The rod I choose is the Orochi XX F4-68XXG Fast Moving Special rod. I’ll pair that up with either 30-pound Tuf-Line or 20-pound Gamma Copolymer line. Target the grass outside of the shoreline points, or adjacent to deep drop offs for best results.

Luke Clausen

Hometown Spokane, Washington

Birthdate 08/03/1978

Career Earnings Over $1 Million

Favorite Lake Clear Lake (CA) - "Big fish, and they're easy to catch. It's always fit my style and I've always done well there."

Least Favorite Lake Lake Mead (NV) - "There's about three bass in there."

Favorite Technique Sight-fishing

Primary Fishing Strength Clear-water natural lakes

Secondary Fishing Strength Finesse-fishing

Biggest Weakness Fishing offshore in off-colored water

Boat Ranger

Motor Yamaha

Fishing Team Chevy

Favorite Food Sushi or Mexican

Favorite Music "Alternative, but I listen to a little bit of everything."

Non-Angling Hero Father - "I have a lot of respect for him. He makes intelligent decisions."

When Not Fishing "I like to hunt everything -- bow-hunt, bird-hunt, a little bit of everything."

Why He Fishes "I fish to make a living, and I love to fish. I love the challenge each day. Every place we go to is different."