Bass Lure Fishing – A Guide’s Perspective Volumes 1 & 2

NOTE: Information pertaining to The ‘Lure of The Bass – The Revised Edition‘ can be found here.

If you’re not catching, I can completely appreciate that is very difficult to comprehend four major components – which are:

1. Am I fishing in the right place?
2. Am I fishing at the right time?
3. Am I using the right lure?
4. Am I using the lure correctly?

With the above in mind, I thought that any readers who may be new to the bass lure fishing scene (of which I know there are more and more each day) might appreciate a detailed synopsis in regard to what is encompassed within each volume of my ‘Bass Lure Fishing – A Guide’s Perspective’ series. Indeed, when people kindly email me to enquire about my books, I am often asked three questions:

• What’s the difference between the three?
• Which book should they purchase first?
• Do they need to read them in order?

I hope that the information contained within this post, and the post associated to the release of ‘The Lure of The Bass – The Revised Edition‘ will assist you to come to your own conclusions as to which to purchase.

‘Bass Lure Fishing – A Guide’s Perspective’ (Volume 1)

“A download of everything I’d learned in a short space of time…”

Released in March 2021. Quite simply, ‘Bass Lure Fishing – A Guide’s Perspective (Volume 1)’ was a book that I needed to write due to the ‘information overload’ that was occurring in my head during the lockdown! My primary objective was to write a follow up that would teach the reader how to catch bass within an all-encompassing array, and inclusive combination of situations, conditions and venues.

So, alongside the rock and reef marks where I’d ‘earned my stripes’ as it were, Volume 1 also centres around how to extract bass from the following types of venues:

• Shingle and sandy beaches.
• Headlands and promontories (areas of enhanced tidal flow)
• Estuarine environments (where I spent 40% of my time leading up to writing this book).
• Something that I have come to specialise in – catching bass on lures in the darkness.

In a nutshell, A Guide’s Perspective (Volume 1) is a collection of events that catalogue and chronicle everything that I had come to learn in relation to bass lure fishing since becoming a Professional Guide (which was four years at the time of releasing it) and that I’d successfully transferred into my guiding, by virtue of the catches my clients and I achieved.

In writing my second publication, a further aspiration of mine was that I wanted it to be easier to read, understand and digest, and as such, it is more anecdotal in nature, whilst providing the reader with a series of learning points within each account specific to the planning, strategy, methods, tactics and lure types that were utilised. Above all though, I wanted to place the reader ‘in the moment’ so to depict just what it is really like to be attached to a beautiful bass whilst being guided on this equally beautiful coastline. The ‘confessions of a bass lure guide’ is how the Bass Anglers’ Sportfishing Society commenced their very positive review here.

The ‘Consequential Catches’ that shaped many of my new found approaches, the ‘Manual and Natural Triggers’ that the angler needs to be aware of, and can administer to maximise their chances. Also featured is how I initially perceived and subsequently came to recognise what are the many ‘Patterns and Anomalies’ associated to catching bass on lures through my continued note-taking and guiding adventures, as well a chapter relating to my ‘Favourite Client Captures’. In addition to all of this information, designed and described to enhance your chances of connecting with the UK’s premier sporting sea fish, I cover the ‘Biotic and Abiotic Factors’ that influence my year-round bass lure fishing escapades, alongside my amplified appreciation pertaining to ‘Bass Movement’ – a theme that is highlighted throughout…

The Chapters

As before, photographer and fellow angling journalist Henry Gilbey very kindly wrote the foreword for me, with the subsequent 100,000 words and 304 pages broken down into the following Five Chapters – a description of which can be found below:

Chapter One – Consequential Captures

Five stories, with each one representing a massive leap in my own bass lure fishing education. These are the ‘light-bulb moments’ – the outcome of which, I feel, either alerted me to certain possibilities or that, ultimately, changed my approach entirely:

• Precision Pays – The realisation of just how precise the angler needs to be when targeting bass on rock/reef marks.
• The Game Changer – How my first ever lure-caught bass in darkness came to be.
• Winter Wonderland – How I landed what I consider to be my most significant capture – in late-February.
• Illuminatur Litore – A significant client capture, over pure sand, in 2ft of water under an exceedingly bright full-Moon…
• Old Haunts, New Tricks – My successful return to the estuarine environment – a 7lb winter bass on a surface lure.

Chapter Two – Triggers and Indicators

In this chapter I introduce the concept of Natural and Manual Trigger Points – the naturally occurring environmental phenomena and how to identify and capitalise on them, in addition to how angler can manually create their own potentially ‘session changing’ moments:

• Moonshine Monster – A client’s 70cm bass that appeared at the same time as the Moon.
• An Old Friend – A 68cm client capture (his first on a lure) on a ‘recovered’ needlefish lure.
• Early Morning Snax – Another client ’70’, landed within a critical window of opportunity…
• Go With The Flow – The back-eddying affect, and the depiction of the joint-largest bass a client has caught with me at 73cm.
• Late Leviathan – Daytime, an estuary, bright sunshine, a white lure and 18″ of water = a 72cm beast!

Chapter Three – Patterns and Anomalies

Enigmatic doesn’t come close to describing this forever-mercurial species! But there are most definitely patterns of behaviour that the bass lure angler can use to their advantage. Alongside the anecdotes, this chapter takes on more of a scientific and conjectural perspective based on my personal experiences:

• Territorial Or Transitory – How to identify and target either resident bass or those passing through.
• Do They Remember? – As ridiculous as this sounds, a number of incidents have really got me thinking…
• A Year In The Life – How Biotic (living) and Abiotic (environmental) factors affect our spiky friend.

Chapter Four – A to B Bass

In conjunction with understanding more and more about lure fishing for bass at night, within estuaries, and from those steep shingle or sandy surf beaches, is the realisation of just how far I’ve come in regards to ‘working out’ how they traverse both the intertidal and the inner shoreline… A combination of real-life events and theoretical assumptions are included herein:

• In Their Shoes – What makes a bass (and a bass angler) target an invisible, underwater, estuarine passageway…
• Point To Point – Even without any noticeable subaquatic features, there are still definitely open coast pathways.
• Creepy Creeks – Brackish, almost freshwater environments, plus ‘where and how’ to lure fish within them.
• The Motorway – Estuary mouths are stunning places to fish – in more ways than one!
• Peripheral Positioning – Deeper water estuaries and those channels – this is how I approach them.
• The Day vs Night Phenomenon – Are bass more active at night? This section answers a lot of my own questions!

Chapter Five – Moments: To Treasure and Forget…

Since becoming a professional bass lure fishing guide I have met some amazing people, many of which I now consider friends. Therefore, this chapter is reserved for my ‘favourite’ fish-catching moments together with the clients who achieved them. Plus, there’s always room for the stories about the dreaded ‘ones that got away…’:

• Blinded By Bass – The ‘classic fish that got away’ – noteworthy also by virtue of the wonderful surroundings.
• Playing The Odds – How to take someone out of their comfort zone and onto a brute of a bass!
• The Silver Bullet – A Three Day Package, three brilliant clients, a 70cm bass and an inadvertently ‘magic’ lure…
• The First Of Many – Memorable sessions and fantastic bass – moments that helped me to decide on taking the plunge!
• Two In A Million – The sixth 70cm+ bass depiction, and a very special gentleman’s journey.
• Was She The One… – You guessed it – the story of how I lost what I think was potentially my first ‘double’.

Bass Lure Fishing – A Guide’s Perspective

(Volume 2)

“Blending the analytical and the credible, with the incredible…”

In addition to adding some context, and more especially to highlight just how much I continue to learn in relation to these awe-inspiring, and exceptionally unique fish, the reason I have elaborated on the contents of my previous releases is because it was my aspiration and ambition, that in writing ‘Bass Lure Fishing – A Guide’s Perspective (Volume 2)‘, I could present a piece of work to you that is a combination of them both.

Indeed, as the blurb pronounces in the images below: “Volume 2 is a coalescence of detailed instructional information relating to the major advancements and progression I’ve made as a professional guide, in addition to the confirmed hypotheses, real-life events, and bass captures we’ve achieved to ‘blend the analytical and the credible, with the incredible”.

And this is where I need to acknowledge my exceedingly determined clients. Because it is their effort, tenacity, and receptiveness that has earnestly assisted me to accumulate and then contemplate our findings – to the extent that it has expedited my understanding of numerous techniques, methods, approaches, lure types and types of venues way beyond my imagination in many respects. What’s more, it is this personal progression, all of which is delineated and exhibited within this, my third book, that I was extremely excited to reveal – with the watchword “don’t just think like a fish, think like a bass” never far from my thoughts…

Of huge significance I feel, has been the capacity and capability to guide two or three anglers on the same venue(s) and within the same session on a consistent basis. It is their skillset and assimilation, that I take great pleasure in facilitating and intently enhancing, that enabled me to directly compare, evaluate, and then quantify my findings and theories via not only my achievements with a rod, reel and lure, but also through the many splendid catches achieved by these anglers and very nice people too I have to say.

Yes, I am teaching and guiding them, but at the end of the day, they are ones holding the rod and casting and retrieving the lures… The ultimate level of credibility, and outright affirmation that ‘certain stuff works’ in essence, as everything I learn, is transferred into my guiding operation.

Released in April 2023, contained within the 306 Pages of ‘Volume 2’ are the detailed accounts and intricate technicalities behind, among many other significant captures, the ten separate 70cm+ bass (“a fish of a lifetime Marc” my happy client tell me which is lovely) that my clients and I landed over the two seasons since the release of Volume 1.

Foreword and Preface

‘Volume 2’ opens with a foreword very kindly written by esteemed angler, journalist, and BASS Chairman Steve Pitts (thank you Steve!) followed by a preface in which I depict the monumental capture of my first double figure bass of 83cm and 12lb 2oz that I landed and released back in November 2021. This initial segment of the book is symbolic, not only because I tell the complete story of my personal best for the first time, but also because it acts as a precursor to what is contained within each of the further representations of the many ‘crocodiles’ that my clients and I have landed.

Corresponding with the educational premise of both ‘The Lure of The Bass’ and ‘A Guide’s Perspective (Volume 1)’, these accounts are consolidating by the instructional information that is sandwiched between what I am sure you will find are enlightening and exhilarating depictions of some truly marvellous moments. And in case you’re wondering, I thoroughly enjoyed writing this one of the winter of 2022/23!

The Chapters

Dialling down and delving even deeper into the intricacies of what it takes to consistently catch a bass on a lure, if ‘Volume 1’ was effectively moulded around my improved understanding of ‘bass movement’ and their localised migration, then the overriding theme within ‘Volume 2’ pertains to garnering ‘a reaction’ out of these extraordinary fish, via fact-based analysis, real-time events, and a selection of personal and client-based stories that bring a smile to my face, and that I cannot help but reminisce over time and again. Of note, and that I hope is helpful, is that I have presented the order of the chapters in such as way that they build upon each other. So on to what is contained within the four, rather extensive, chapters then…

Chapter One – ‘Overcoming Adversity’

Chapter One – Overcoming Adversity contains 121 pages of how I have encountered and ultimately learnt to prevail (not only myself, but with my clients also) having consistently circumnavigated and overcome what were (and in many respects are still considered to be) sea, weather and tidal conditions far from ideal in which to target bass on a lure – to the extent that in many of the naturally occurring scenarios covered below, I have also learnt to embrace and harness their affects. Occurrences such as:

• Bright, sunny overhead conditions
• Water that is highly transparent (in daylight).
• Water that is exceptionally murky (in daylight and darkness).
• Atypical wind directions and strengths.
• Bright/High and/or Full-Moon.
• Cold weather conditions (in winter).
• The Small Neap Tide mindset.
• Floating and suspending weed.

In addition to the numerous ‘get arounds’ associated to the items above, as I intimated earlier in the post, within each chapter you will discover real-life stories that connect and reaffirm many or all of the principles I cover, whilst also confirming many of the hypotheses I propose. The six indelible events depicted alongside the multitude of instructional information in the ‘Overcoming Adversity’ chapter are:

• ‘The Water and The Lure’ reveals the thought processes and the methods utilised that enabled a 72cm/9lb client capture in extremely shallow water that I knew would become murky as the depth decreased towards low water – something I/we used to our advantage via utilising a white paddle tail lure under a bright sunny sky. There’s a few comical moments in this one!

• ‘Meant To Be’ is my account of a beautiful 6lb+ client bass landed in exceptionally clear water this time, via the crafty use of a natural-coloured soft plastic lure retrieved to make brief contact with the seabed so to create a ‘smokescreen’ that only a bass would know how to take full advantage of!

• ‘The Window of Opportunity’ recites the events of what were, by far, the worst weather conditions in which I have guided anyone. Yet through the hard-won knowledge of a particular venue, and matching the tactics and lure type to the overall environment, my clients prevailed in water clarity that was bordering on ‘hot chocolate’ – oh, and it was in complete darkness too!

• ‘The Hunter’s Moon’ summarises two significant client PBs for the same angler, on the same mark, on the same series of tides yet a year apart, the second of which (at 6lb+) was successfully accomplished thanks to a ‘ploy’ I administered to vanquish the effects of one the largest and brightest Moons in the Lunar calendar.

• ‘Pity Taken’ takes in an exceptionally frosty December night, when my clients not only had to overcome the cold, but also over the ‘floodlight in the sky’ via the use of what could be classified as an atypically-coloured lure for night time… Black.

• ‘U571’ is an account of the largest bass that I personally landed and released (at 8lb) during the 2022 season, following the planning, exploration, and experimentation within what is historically perceived to be a ‘difficult’ period in which to catch most sea fish – the very smallest neap tides…

Chapter Two – ‘Templates For Success’

The inspiration for this chapter was the hour-long presentation that I formulated and presented for the 2022 BASS AGM titled ‘Finding The Features’ that you can watch here. Expanding and elaborating on this, through the use of photographs, images, diagrams, illustrations, and comprehensive descriptions, the next 71 pages that form Chapter Two – Templates For Success’ describe the extremely specific topographical and intertidal features that I look for in the seabed, and how the current interacts with them, divided into nine Inner Estuarine and seven Open Coastal settings. These ‘templates’ comprise a varied selection of what I have used, and that I continue to rely on in my continual quest to increase my portfolio of the 200+ proven bass marks I currently have at my disposal.

Again, blended into the narrative are two enduring accounts that encapsulate and summarise the components relative to the corresponding environments above. These client captures are:

• ‘Coalescence in Colour’ conjoins the majority of the very specific features that I look for in an inner-estuarine mark, as well as overcoming the issue of ‘dirty’ water. Here, I recount the moments leading up to and following handing my client a very bright lure, whereby he extracted a stunning 6lb bass – I’ll never forget his face!

• ‘Zero to Hero’ describes a collection of sessions in which, again, the problem of murky water and bright sunshine was bypassed, before the main event transpired – a whopping 70cm bass being the cherry on top of a day that commenced with a talented young angler never having previously caught a bass on a lure. What a fish!

Chapter Three – ‘Marginal Gains’

The third chapter in my most recent release is titled: ‘Marginal Gains’. Building upon and linking into the information contained within the first two chapters, within the next 69 pages I divulge the advantages associated to all lure types by means of eight differing retrieve styles. Further, this is all in conjunction with the natural occurrences around us, and that can be achieved by applying innovative and considered ‘judgements and adjustments’ to our ‘mindsets and skillsets’.

Inclusive of the impressive array of venue types that I fish and guide upon (beaches, rocks, reefs, creeks, lagoons, headlands) both in daylight and darkness, the emphasis is on how we, as anglers, can gain every conceivable advantage over our inherently wary quarry. All of the small things either add up, or one of them will make the difference within a session – this is my mantra, and some of my findings linked to the reactionary nature of these amazing creatures or how I’ve learnt to counter their reticence or reluctance to take a lure have served to blow my mind!

As per the previous chapters, the information contained within the third segment of the book is predominantly instructional and educational, with the two stories embedded with the text incorporated to showcase how even the infinitesimal or miniscule adjustments to the retrieve style or angle can or do make a massive difference to the catch rate:

• ‘The Boxing Day Bass’ is the first of the two factual accounts that sets the scene in relation to how a very specific action applied by the angler (me!) resulted in the capture and release of a 71cm bass that was the highlight of my Festive period I can assure you!

• ‘Talking The Stalk’ is, in essence, the second part of the ‘Zero to Hero’ recital in which another ‘client PB’ was achieved within conditions and on a venue that, even three years ago, I would never have looked at – thus demonstrating the learning that has taken place over a comparatively short period of time within my bass lure fishing erudition.

Chapter Four – ‘What The Future Holds’

None of us ever stop learning. And added to my penchant for deciphering how I can catch bass from as many differing environments as possible, whilst utilising newly learnt methods, tactics and lure types, the fourth and final chapter ‘What The Future Holds’ is reserved for how I see my bass lure fishing and professional guiding operation possibly developing over the next few seasons. Moreover, and rather excitedly too, the chapter also details the environments in which I have only recently discovered where, when and how to catch what is an ‘intelligent species’ in my opinion – the future perhaps, with possibilities that I cannot wait to explore, relish, and reveal in Volume 3 of course!

Just the one account opens the chapter here, but it is one that facilitated a number of fundamental enlightenments that, consequently and positively, have altered to my entire outlook:

• ‘You Couldn’t Write It’ portrays a quite remarkable chain of events that culminated in the capture and release of a mesmerising 74 cm lure-caught bass that I landed in late-March 2021 on the very first cast of the session. However, it is what transpired in the lead up to this event that is especially noteworthy, and almost unbelievable!

Price List and Purchasing Information

NOTE: Any books purchased between the 4th-20th August 2025 will not be posted until the 21st August as I I’ll be away on holiday.

The prices listed below include the postage and packaging to a UK Mainland/IOM/Northern Ireland/Channel Island address. If you would prefer to pay via BACS/Bank Transfer, then please complete the Contact Form at the bottom of the page and I will reply with my bank details. Alternatively, you can email me directly at: marccowlingblf@yahoo.com

*** This could be helpful! *** If you would like to purchase all three books at once, then it will be cheaper for you either pay the amount directly to my PayPal account (rather than clicking on the separate buttons below) or by attaining my account details, both of which can be achieved by completing the Contact Form at the bottom of the page, or by emailing me directly at marccowlingblf@yahoo.com whereby I will provide the relevant details.

NOTE: If you are looking to purchase from a Republic of Ireland, EU, or Worldwide address then please contact me via the Contact Form at the bottom of the page as I will only send via TRACKED POSTAGE to destinations outside of the UK. Please also note that a further £10 will be required on top of the prices quoted below to cover this (which is why you need to contact me so that you can attain my PayPal address or bank account details).

Option 1. The Lure of The Bass – The Revised Edition – £25.99 ** My Latest Book **

Option 2. Bass Lure Fishing – A Guide’s Perspective (Volume 1) – £24.99

Option 3. Bass Lure Fishing – A Guide’s Perspective (Volume 2) – £24.99  

To purchase Options 1 and 2 – £48.99

To purchase Options 1 and 3  – £48.99

To purchase Options 2 and 3 – £47.99

To purchase Options 1, 2 and 3 (all three books) – £69.99