How to fish with lots of submerged trees

We got to a place where the fish finder find so many fishes under/around an area with many sub-merged trees. And we saw 2 big basses jumped out of the water. But everytime we tried, we always ended hook the trees. And the boat kept moving by the water current and I need to power the trolling motor to slowing move back.

I'd appreciate any help or pointers.

Eric.

As to what to throw. I bounce crank baits, off of submerged trees all the time. Sometimes I will hang up on one, but I have only lost one this year that I couldn't get out. Some of the guys prefer to run a spinnerbait thorugh the trees and bump them over branches. I have had some luck doing this. With crank baits and spinner baits both I have had a number of bites just after I come over a branch.

Both baits work fairly well in submerged grass as well with a spinner bait being a little easier to tear through the grass. Personally I can adjust the depth of a crank bait by as much as a couple feet by how fast I retireve it and the attitude of the rod when I am cranking it in.

Another bait that is good in grass, but not usualy used in trees is a rattle trap. It tends to hang up a lot more than lipped crank bait, but there are a couple of rattle trap type baits that have a small lip or ridge on either side of the head. Don't recall which ones as I don't tend to use a lipless crank bait in trees myself. I do like them for grass.

Another couple of baits that can produce fish in trees are light weighted ( I like 1/16 oz) texas rigged worms cast out and dropped down through the branches. I like a thinner worm matched to the water color for this slow presentation. With translucent colors selected over solid colors in clear or stained water. A wacky senko works for this as well, but I defiitely use a weedless rigged hook for it. I hate the wire weedguard hooks. Warren turned me onto the w.w.hook by reaction innovations for wacky rigging. I like a Tru-Turn style hook by Daiichi for the t-rigged worm. When dropping it through those branches I like the point burried deep in the worm to reduce snags. The cam action of that hook helps me get a few more hook sets.

I will post how they work as soon as I get a chance to try them.

Heavy

My favorite baits for working treetops, brushpiles and laydowns is the soft plastic jerkbaits like Zoom Flukes and FinS minnows and Senkos.

They're dynamite under boat docks too!

RichZ© www.richz.com/fishing

I guess if the shad rap bite is strong in the spring, I get into crank mode. This year, I don't recall catching a fish on a shad rap. It's been all jerkbaits for me as far as hard baits are concerned. If I fish the Hudson and/or Lillinonah a lot in the summer, I use cranks a lot there. But I'm not fishing tourneys any more, and I don't go over to the Hudson much with the little boat until the fall, when I can stay in the creeks. Not sure why I haven't been to Lilli yet this year. Oh yeah... Champlain. That's why.

RichZ© www.richz.com/fishing

Eric how do you like the Smartcast?

The MCSport store near me has them on sale for $99 I was thinking about giving it a try.

Eric.