Bass Week: Top 5 Bass Tools

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Here are five tools that you need to have handy every time you head out to go bass fishing.

While it’s fun to research our next tackle, rod, or reel purchase—there are other needs that should probably come before filling a wall/ceiling rack and tackle compartments with more sticks and baits. Not to say there’s anything wrong with that …

But how many of us go out looking specifically for bass fishing accessories? Sure, there are impulse buys at bait shops, online, or at the recommendation of fishing buddies, but this class of fishing items often goes overlooked.

Along those lines, here are five essential fishing accessories no bass angler should be without—items that could really help you on-the-water in a pinch.

1) The Rod Glove:

We’ve been down the road of ordering unbranded rod sleeves off of Amazon and most are subpar, with the mesh fabric fraying and not a lot of elasticity to slip over the first couple guides from the reel seat on something like a dropshot spinning rod. With rod sleeves, you do get what you pay for.

The Rod Glove company offers numerous families of Rod Glove sleeves to match the sticks you’re trying to protect, from ultra-long and stout froggin’ rods to finely-crafted and expensive spinning combos you probably treat like fine China.

Our advice? Keep your rods in Rod Gloves in your boat lockers, your garage, or the back of the vehicle. They not only help keep rod blanks, guides, and tips from getting damaged, they also prevent nicks in the mainline and leader—eliminating compromise with your next big fish!

2) Braided Line Scissors

If you’re like us, you can never seem to find a braid scissors when need it—like when you need clean cuts to adjoin a new fluoro leader to mainline braid. Then it’s endless searching around the boat and a lot of wasted time.

The solution is to have several braid scissors on your boat at various locations—or, keep one on a lanyard around your neck. While there are a number of capable braid scissors out there, the FishUSA Premium Braid Scissors is a champ with a price that allows purchasing a couple without flinching. The scissors feature soft-molded grip handles help leverage the cutting of braided lines with more strength and comfort. Affix a lanyard to an end hole in the handle for safekeeping and run your belt through the sheath for immediate access to this fishing tool whenever needed. There's even a screwdriver for your convenience. The blades include notches for adjusting lure rings or bent spoon lures, holes for hook straightening and tightening knots, and other jobs on the water.

3) Digital Scale & Measuring Tape

Speaking of big fish, how many times have you been in a situation where you’ve caught a big bass but realized you don’t have a scale in the boat? Yep, we’ve done it plenty. At this price ($29.99), you can buy two—one for the back of the boat and one for the bow (or your backpack) to ensure any trophy catches are documented accurately beyond a simple cellphone pic that will have anybody asking “How big was that bass?” anyway. The Berkley Digital Fish Scale from Berkley will weigh fish up to 50 pounds; stores 10 weights in memory for tournament help; tare feature allows combining multiple fish weights; features a no-year fish clip; and includes an attached 48-inch tape measure.

4) Reliable, Rugged Rain Suit

Experience proves that the weatherman and Mother Nature are often out-of-sync with each other. And especially if you don’t follow radar closely on today’s smartphone apps, wind and rain can sneak up on you quickly. Lightning, of course, is reason to get off the water, but a lot of times some the best bites can be pre-frontal and during the wet and windy stuff. Our point? Don’t leave home fishing at any point without back-up rain gear.

For fishing on foot, we like Whitewater Fishing’s Packable Rain Jacket and and Pant, which rolls up into the included bag, compressing into a small footprint for easy backpack storage. When we’re not fishing on foot, we keep the sack in boat storage for use by fellow anglers without rain gear when it starts to get wet.

But also consider Whitewater’s Great Lakes Pro Jacket and bib, which was designed by a team of tournament walleye and bass pros to include every serious angler-friendly feature you can think of, like pockets in all the right places, and some kind of elasticity to the waterproof material that isn’t bulky and moves with your body. If you fish no matter the conditions—especially on bigger waters—this is a combo worth considering.

5) Outboard Jumper Kit

These days, everybody’s trying to wrap their heads around power—when and where to use lithium batteries for electronics and accessories, the best type of dual purpose or starting battery, the right switches, charging set-ups, etc. And things still go wrong on the water—like a dead starting battery miles down-river or lake from the launch. Sure, you can jump your main motor off other batteries, but they might not have adequate amps—or maybe you don’t have jumpers in the boat. And limping in on the trolling motor is a last resort, let alone your boat insurance policy’s on-the-water tow coverage. An easy solution is carrying a fully charged, portable jumper kit in the boat with you at all times like models from NOCO. Have a look and see what size works best for your needs. Always good insurance and serves as a portable power pack for charging other electronics, too.

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