It will help you learn, and learning is part of Fishing Smarter!
I don't keep fish as much as I used to. Instead, I prefer to tag them to contribute to scientific research. You can learn more about this in How to Tag Fish.
But, when I do clean fish I make a point of seeing what it is they are eating. I do this by cutting their stomachs open and inspecting their contents.
Sometimes it's a little eye opening to see what they have in there.
That's what happened to inshore angler Brett M. He caught a marsh bass with a big ol' potbelly of bait-sized blue crabs.
Just check out the video below.
Now, I am willing to bet a bass eating that much would hit any lure thrown at it, but consider these blue crabs were probably hiding in aquatic grass that same bass lived in.
So what would be good lures to target these fish?
I'd be willing to try any crab imitation lure like a Savage 3D Crab or Berkley Gulp Crab and then fish it along edges of grass mats or between interspersed aquatic grass. Just look at the action in this video!
If the grass were really thick, I used a craw imitation on a weedless swim hook or Texas rigged.
So be to always do this one thing when cleaning fish: inspecting their stomach contents! This can give you an edge and help you successfully "match the hatch".
