Color Considerations -- Darker color baits create more contrast against the night sky and are easier for upward-looking bass to spot. Blue is the last color to disappear as light fades with twilight or depth. For that reason, if you want to add color to black baits for night fishing, make it blue. When fishing around lights (or under a bright full moon), there may be enough light for other colors to be visible to fish. On clear impoundments like Center Hill and Dale Hollow, especially around dock lights and under a full moon, white and pink spinnerbaits are favorite colors at night. When there is some light penetrating to the bottom, some anglers tie on white jigs or worms. Against the dark rocks or mud, white baits create more contrast and may be easier to spot.

Handy storage -- Use plastic snuff cans as pocket-size tackle boxes, too. In one, store a few worm rattles, glass beads, hooks, and a couple of toothpicks for pegging sinkers. Keep an assortment of sinkers in another.

Lamp-lit Water -- Don't pass up lamp-lit areas around docks, parking lots, parks, etc. at night, because the entire food chain migrates to those areas. As with low-angle sunlight conditions, position your boat to cast toward the light. Bass are looking toward the light and can (possibly) more clearly discern approaching prey silhouetted against it.

Big Freakin' Black Jitterbug. Bubble it steady for a bit, pause for a second, bubble some more. If you can get a hold of one of the Musky/XL Jitterbugs, that's the best.

Sound -- Insert rattles in soft plastics. If your jigs and spinnerbaits don't already have them, buy some clip-on or glue-on rattles and apply them. (I've heard Doug Hannon say they don't really add much sound to spinnerbaits, but I can't see how they could hurt, as long as they are positioned on the hook shank where they won't interfere with hook-ups. Thread a glass bead between your bullet weight and hook. If you use a hook where you can leave the eye exposed, the weight, bead, and metal eye will add a click every time you pick up or twitch the bait. Nighttime is a good time to use brass 'n' glass if you're Carolina rigging, too. Fish sense the presence of nearby prey by vibration and sound. Use of rattles or other sound-emitters will help bass locate your bait. Bass swim toward the source, guided by the sensations they detect with their lateral lines and ears. When they get close enough to spot a moving shape in the water, then they attack in visual mode.

Fishing Glue -- Use a drop of cyanoacrylate (e.g., Superglue) on the eye of your hook before sliding the head of soft plastic baits up to keep them in place. It's easy to overlook a twisted or slipped lure in the dark. Hold your Texas-rigged worm up against the lighter sky between casts to verify that it is still hanging straight.

Avoid insect repellents if possible. But if the mosquitoes are about to drive you off the lake and you decide to spray yourself down, be sure not to transfer DEET to your lures [and don't spray it upwind of your GPS or sonar, as some of them have ingredients in the formulation that will melt the screen]. It is a proven fish repellent, too. Don't rub your hands on your neck and then handle plastic baits, for example, if you sprayed yourself down a few hours earlier. Instead, try smoking a cigar to deter the flying pests. In Tennessee, bugs usually swarm for an hour or so after sunset and again before dawn. In the middle of the night, they're not bad at all.

I would use a worm and sinker or maybe a red fury meps should get the job done, at least works well here in NY.

Nightcrawlers on bobbers. And why did one person post 11 times on this one post? Isn't that a little much?

Dark colors are best as the other have said. It depends on the pond conditions. Nightcrawlers are best for live bait. But what lure depends on the vegetation. If the water is mostly clean, I love darker patterned Bill Lewis Rat-L-Traps. If it weedy you won't be able to pull those trebles more than a foot without getting caught up. If that is the case, go with a top water. I love fishing frogs, especially around this time of year. Slow, steady retrieve then let it sink in the holes where the bass might be.