I seem to have this problem every winter at times and I am perplexed ? In winter I keep experiencing this situation when I find massive schools of shad that have gone deep 25-40 feet + and I can see the bass amongst the cloud of bait but no matter what I try cant get them to bite . If I find sparse bait and small groups of bass with them I can get them to bite pretty easy.
Around the first week of November when the water was still in the 60's I found a similar situation with a big school of bait with bass among them and I did catch multiple fish by leaving a dropshot 4" worm on a 10" leader on 6# line sitting in place on the bottom at 25' and eventually a fish would eat it after a long delay .
I have tried vertically spooning , dragging football jigs , Carolina rig , shaking a texas rig worm with glass bead , nose hooked drop shot . Sometimes I can feel a fish pecking at my lure but they are just not eating it .
Seems to happen more on Spotted bass lakes and I am wondering if there is just so much food around and they are stuffed if this is why they are being so selective ?
Anyone else ever experience this ?