Flat Sided Crankbait Fishing in Cold Water

Crankbaits are category of lure that catch bass all year round and in every body of water in the nation.

When fishing cold water, the flat sided crankbait will produce more bites than any other style of crankbait.

Flat sided crankbaits have been fine tuned and design to catch cold water bass, so let’s discuss how exactly they do that and how you can take advantage of them.

Why Flat Sided Crankbaits Shine in Cold Water

From the late fall to early spring months, the water temperatures get very cold. This causes all of the bass as well as the baitfish to slow way down.

They move less, move slower, and move tighter as they swim along. Fish are cold blooded, so moving around a bunch doesn’t help them keep warm in the winter.

They are much better off staying more still and keeping their swimming motion tighter and more rigid.

The key to flat sided crankbaits is their action. They have a very tight and subtle wobble compared to round body crankbaits.

This is much more natural and better at mimicking those cold water baitfish. Bass are on the hunt for slow, week, cold baitfish during the winter because they are much easier meals.

If you use a crankbait with a super wide and aggressive action, bass are more likely to pass it up because either it is unnatural or just seems like too much effort for them to chase after.

Additionally, most flat sided crankbaits are silent. This further helps get more bites from less active, cold water bass that are turned off by the loud and obnoxious rattles of other crankbait styles.

What Water Temperatures?

Once the water temps dip below 55 degrees, I start mixing flat sided crankbaits into my fishing.

And until the water gets below 45 degrees, I will still throw some squarebill and wide body cranks depending on the situation.

But once the water temp goes below 45 degrees, I completely switch to the flat sided crankbaits until the water warms back up over 50 degrees in the spring.

How to Fish a Flat Side

For the most part, you’re going to fish a flat side crankbait the same as you would any other crankbait.

Choose a flat side crankbait that dives to the depth that you are fishing in and simply reel it in.

As with other crankbaits, it’s going to work best if you can bounce it off of rocks, wood, gravel, or other hard structure to give the crankbait some erratic movements.

But if you don’t have a soft bottom situation and can’t bounce it off of things, just use a slightly shallower diving flat side so that you don’t get it covered in mud, leaves, or debris.

A slow and steady retrieve is the most popular technique. Just cover as much water as you can with it and let the tight vibration trigger bites.

Another technique that I learned from Edwin Evers is much like a Carolina rig or a football jig.

You start by reeling the crankbait down to it’s max divining depth, and then you retrieve it with wide sweeps of you rot to the side.

Than let the crankbait sit whil you reel up the slack and give another sweep of your rod.

I have found that this retrieve technique works especially well in ponds or shallow areas in the lake where the water is quite shallow and bass are maybe even less active that the deeper water bass.

Test out both of these retrieves and see which one gets you more bites.

Best Colors for Flat Sided Crankbaits

I always keep my color selection very simple. I pretty much only use three colors.

If the water is clear, I use a shad colored flat side. If the water is muddy, I use a red colored flat side.

And if I am fishing a clear water lake or pond that doesn’t have shad in it, I use a bluegill colored flat side (up North you could use perch colors, but I live down South so I don’t use those).

Once you have tons of confidence and experience with flat sided crankbaits, there’s no problem with branching out and testing any color you want.

But those three colors are pretty much always going to be the best and I haven’t found a need to go beyond those at all.

Also Read: The 5 Best Shallow Diving Crankbaits

Reeling this In

Crankbaits are certainly one of the most fun lures to catch bass on. You can cover tons of water and the bass absolutely crush them.

So when the water temperatures get real low in the the winter, switch to a flat sided crankbait to keep the cranking bite going all year.