Hey, Keith here.

There's something about fall that gets me every year. The air finally cools off, the leaves start coming down, and the water’s surface is active with scattering baitfish. 

The shad migration is happening right now, and it sets up one of my favorite retrieves of the entire year: a technique called the burn and kill.

My son-in-law Spencer and I put it to the test this past weekend on a set of lakes in Covington.

Today, I break down how we worked the burn and kill, why it's so deadly during the shad migration, and which baits you'll want tied on to try it yourself.

There's just something about fall, from the cooler air finally breaking the summer heat, to the leaves changing, to the baitfish that show up scattered across the surface almost everywhere you look.

This past weekend reminded me all over again why bass fishing this time of year sits at the top of my list.

I fished a set of lakes in Covington with my son-in-law, Spencer, and we leaned on a retrieve I was taught about two decades ago, one that's still just as deadly today as it was back then.

It's called the burn and kill.

We got started early, right as the sun was coming up. I threw a Berkley Doom Stroller lipless crankbait and Spencer worked a SlapGill, a topwater bait built to look like a bluegill that walks across the surface the same way a spook does.

We headed straight for a choke point that connects two large lakes, a stretch of water about 50 feet wide where a good bit of current was moving through.

Normally when I fish that particular spot, I'll cast to the middle and let the bait sink before I ever start my retrieve, but this trip called for something different.

Baitfish were scattered across the surface in several spots, so instead of our usual approach, Spencer and I started fan casting and working our lures fast, right up on top, where the shad were showing themselves.

It didn't take long for that to pay off.

My first bass came on a stretch of retrieve I call a burn, where I reel fast for about three seconds before easing up, and that first fish blew up on the Doom Stroller only to miss it completely.

I stopped reeling the instant it struck, let the bait fall on a slack line, and the same bass came right back and crushed it on the drop.

That one bite is really the whole technique in a nutshell: Burn the bait hard, kill the retrieve, and let it fall like something wounded.

We spent the rest of the morning doing exactly that, burning our lures across the surface and then killing the retrieve so the bait could sink for about five seconds before we started the next burn.

By noon, we'd put 14 bass on the bank, the biggest weighing in at two and a half pounds.

The reason this retrieve produces so well in the fall comes down to how closely it mirrors what the baitfish are actually doing.

Shad aren't holding still during the migration; they're scattering, darting, and getting run down by feeding bass.

The kill is what seals the deal. When a lure suddenly stops then falls, it looks exactly like a shad that's just been stunned or wounded, and that's an easy meal most bass won't pass up.

Most of our strikes this weekend actually came on the fall rather than the burn itself.

This retrieve also lets you cover water quickly and locate active fish without wasting time. 

Because you're moving the bait fast, you can fan cast a choke point, a flat, or a creek mouth and figure out where the school is holding in just a handful of casts.

It works especially well anywhere there's current, since moving water sweeps a falling bait naturally during the kill, making that pause look even more like an injured baitfish drifting along instead of a lure just sitting still.

Whatever you tie on, try to match its size to whatever shad you're actually seeing on the surface. That one adjustment matters more than which brand ends up on the end of your line.