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Boat owner, front seat and friend snatched this girl on a weightless trickworm in Rodman Res Fl. yesterday in the cold and wind. While I caught two squeelers all day.

I think it needs to repeated, this site has such great people and leadership! I had made a post about a product being sold out. Northern Basser read my post and offered to send me one of those exact items. He then proceeded to send me some pics to choose the one I liked and actually sent me TWO of them. Now I feel extremely guilty about this act, but it is here at Bass Resource that these types of things happen. As I have read about this many times before and now having it happen to me, it really restores faith that there are still great people in the world. Bass Resource seems to have plenty. This is a great place to find great people and leadership that keep this site so clean, positive, and friendly. So, thank you Northern Basser and Bass Resource community!!

The day finally arrived! After saving and lusting after bass boats for a few years, I bought a 2002 Bass Tracker 165 with a 50hp Merc 2-stroke. The seller completely redid the interior (full strip, new floatation, carpet and seats) and did a great job, so the interior is brand new. The hull looks great too and he said no damage or leaks at all. The seller was very nice and very honest, telling us the complete history of the boat and rebuild. I believe we got a very fair price on a great starter bass boat. My son and I are very excited about the opportunities this opens up for us - it’s much roomier and faster than our canoe. 😎

68 years ago today, I was adopted! My folks told me as soon as I was old enough to understand, and we celebrated my adoption every year , on this day. For anyone who has adopted children, thank you. If you are thinking about it, please do. My life has been amazing because my parents chose me , and I have been grateful, every single day. Jim

Heading to Bass Pro in the morning and ordering a new Bass Boat. The good - the wife said go for it. I was planning on getting a boat when I retired in 2020 but my long time fishing partner beat me to it. Now that the wife has started showing interest in fishing, seems like a good time to get one. I'll be sure to post pics.

I figured that a personal best probably justified its own thread. I got a 17", 2.8 pound Black crappie this afternoon. d**n fine fish. I've caught a reasonable number of "good ones" of multiple species over the years, but I'm pretty jazzed about this fish.

MegaStrike Crawfish is what the fat girls like.

First fish of the year!

Sorry about the image quality but I had to get it to where it would post! Pre spawn 6 lber on the Siebert Outdoors Brush jig 1/2 oz in Sunfish with a Blue Shad Zoom big salty chunk on the back. Caught her at 6 am in 1 FOW. Hit it on the fall. Happy pre spawn from NC!

Couldn’t pass on the opportunity to fish in sunshine and 44 deg air temps. Walked to a pond, only to find it about 70% ice covered. Almost turned around, but one corner was open, so I started there and slowly expanded on the area as the sun and a whole bunch of geese helped to slowly break things up. Headed home after 2+ hours, leaving the pond still 30% ice covered. Managed 10 bass while I was there though. Always fun throwing to ice sheets, pulling your bait off them and having a bass grab it - then trying to stop him from running under the ice and possibly cutting you off.

Got out briefly today. Other matters (wife got rear ended by a hit and run Wed. eve.) have consumed most of my time. Did manage a decent one in spite of low 30's and wind. Yesterday probably would have been great with 50's before a vigorous cold front.

Had a little warm spell and some of our lakes thawed (barely), so I opted for a cold water lake instead of the power plant that has been kicking my butt. It wasn't fast, but we did get some fish, and a couple pretty good ones. Blade bait caught both the bigger fish, Ned, jerkbait, and a squarebill also caught fish. Had to break ice at the ramp to launch the yaks.

First bass of 2023. Could not buy a hit on the top water popper but a Ima Flit jerk bait got bit.

Beautiful afternoon in the low 40's before the big mess tonight. Only had about an hour and a half to get out but got three halfway decent ones like the one pictured. Also got a bonus crappie, all on the Sleeper again.

A wild weather day today. First line of storms came through midday bringing wind, rain and hail, along with our warmest temps at 52 degrees. After a couple hours, the back side of that frontal line had moved through and there was a decent gap on radar before the next line hit…so I made a dash to my best numbers spot to try and hook a fish or two. Was able to stay out there for 1 hr and 45 minutes with constantly changing weather. Brief minutes of sun followed by waves of threatening clouds; temps dropped 10 degrees in that time frame. Wind variable at 29 mph gusting to 38 interspersed with brief periods of near calm. Got sprinkled on a few times, too, but nothing drastic. Despite all that, I managed 14 bass that I know of - lol. Fishing a Ned rig in those winds, I might have missed a few bites. It was a challenge, but found a good group of fish actively feeding in one small pocket/corner for the majority of the action. Here’s a few pics…

Some might remember my first double up on an A Rig where the big 5lb class fish came off at the very end a week or two ago......today the universe rewarded me with an even better opportunity, and I can now officially say I've joined the double up A Rig club. This bait is one of the most exciting baits I've ever thrown, once you get a bit of confidence with it, you feel magic is going to strike every cast. Caught around 20 I'd say, and the double up was a 5.6 and 2.7 fish. Caught another 2lb Crappie.....2lbs on the dot. Caught a 3.5-4lb class LGM, and then tons of 1-2.5lb football LGMs, and Spots. 1 fish came off a 110jr +1, close to 10 came off the A Rig, and then close to 10 came off the Flashback mini including the Slab. With Winter pool I went to the furthest most north end of the lake at times in 1ft of water, I was rewarded with dynamite Spotted Bass fishing. 65 degree rainy weather. Main lake bodies were at 54, but where I was chasing Shad up in creeks it was 56.5. Winter might be my new favorite time to fish. The girth on these fish makes you want to keep fishing harder, FOMO is real when you realize the white whales have 2-3lbs extra on them from eggs and fatting up for the spawn. These fat little Bass make me smile so much

Man, I had a good morning! Second outing of 2023 and the first time I’ve taken the boat out in probably two months or so. Forecast was a high of 75° and overcast. Got on the water about 7:30 and started with a Zara Spook. No takers. Switched to a chatterbait (which I’ve never caught a bass on) and on the second cast it got walloped. Nice bass just under 2 lbs. Tried a Zoom Trick TR with no bites and then a jerkbait. Caught a bass as big as the lure lol. Then I switched to a 5” black Senko WR. That’s when all hell broke loose. In under 2.5 hours I caught 8 bass all between 2.0-2.5 lbs. Mostly while working the bait back to the boat but one actually jumped over a sunken branch and hammered it as it dove on it. That was pretty awesome. Had a dink throw the hook and had another that I’d say was 2.5-3.0 lbs. throw the hook as well (that one hit the bait immediately and I had some slack to reel in so I’m guessing the hookset wasn’t all that great. All of those bass really fought. Hard. They must have been in real attack mode. It made for a great few hours!

When you think of a lure or technique, who does it make you think of? Hair Jig & Pork @WRB Ned Rig @Team9nine Texas Rig @Catt Jerkbait @Dwight Hottle Vibrating Jig @Bluebasser86 A-Rig @T-Billy Spinner Baits @TnRiver46 That about covers it for me. A-Jay

Friday's best of 3 LM, a crazy fineese jig eating Crappie.

Only took me 65 years, but here I am finally signing up. Howdy fellas. I live in MA on the South Shore 20 miles south of Boston. I've always been a Bass fisherman, but for many years, I chased Striped Bass off of Cape Cod. I have a really bad back but still manage to get out when I can. Freshwater is more my speed these days and I really love it. I sold off a bunch of the saltwater gear and sunk at least that much back into upgrading my LMB and SMB gear. It's a sickness. 😅 I got out of my saltwater boats and just picked up a nice little Tracker Pro Team 170, plus my son-in-law has a really nice Skeeter Bass Boat. I fish with him a lot. Anyways, it's good to be here and I look forward to sharing stuff with everyone.

Day after a big rain that had the lake up several feet and viz reduced significantly. The A-Rig is easily the most exciting bait I've fished to date, caught about 15 fish today, however I moved around so much trying to find big fish which I never could find. Everything today was in that 1-2lb range, however I still managed to squeel like a pig in mud when I managed to get a 5 fish limit on 2 casts, including my first threefer, or whatever it's called. Big Crappie as well. Fun day, but hopefully tomorrow big girls return.

For the most part I've been having the majority of my success this last month at the furthest north end of the lake. I started there for the third day in a row with the same results, got blanked sans an aquarium sized fish. Promised myself if that happened, I would motor to the exact opposite part of the lake a couple of miles away, the most southern portion, the dam, and lots of deep water from 28ft- 34ft. My nemesis outside of summer, and heavy cover in deeper water on key structure elements....which tends to cost more money in baits than when I can't reach the baits with the pole. My first hint that the fish might be active "offshore" was the flashback mini being trolled, I can't stress enough how much I learn from this bait, and then how many times I stop because of it, look around with sonar and start casting and bam, next thing I know I'm on a pattern. The flashback mini just opens that door so many days it seems. More of a tool than a lure at this point. I've tried to catch the fish in the deep 20ft+ water all over this lake since mid-August, and never had any success. Josh Jones is the whole reason I haven't given up, I can see the fish he can catch perfectly fine on quality downscan, but never could get them to bite anything. Obviously I'm not catching JJ fish, but I scratched the surface today, and I'm even more convinced giants are down there. All the quality fish came 100% because of downscan and strolling an A-Rig in an avg. of 30fow along a carpet of bait. I would just countdown to where I saw the Bass diving down into them, many times 15-20ft over bait in 20-34ft. I think somebody with FFS would have absolutely destroyed it today in my situation. Something that was again inspired from bits and pieces of Josh Jones's interview and what he's disclosed thus far. Two 5lb class fish, a 4lb class fish, and several other smaller quality fish including a solid Spot. These fish were absolutely fat to the max, and their colors were just something else. Every time I hooked up in that deep water, I thought it was my white whale lol. It was like I tapped into a secret source of fish on the lake. Got two double ups on the A-Rig as well and caught another nice fat fish on the 110jr +1. Total was around 15 fish in about 6 hours so it wasn't hot fishing for sure. About 10 came from the deep water, the others came in 10-15fow. A week ago I was catching them in less than 2fow, it's a defective puzzle I want my money back 😁

Couple Spots from yesterday

I caught this nice bass on a original yellow and white chatterbait back on May 31st. I had a storm at the time in the area and the winds was whitecaping the pond. I don't own a boat so I only fish from the bank. So I switched it up and threw a chatterbait and a couple of cast later I caught him. Pulled well jumped once dug down in the open water. Not sure how much he weighed but if I had to guess 3 to 4 lbs. I used a swimming fluke-style bait. Forget which one it was think it was the caffeine swimming shad. I threw it back so he still in there somewhere. Anyways that's it. Have a great night!

Went out to the pond this afternoon after spooling up some 8# Seaguar BasiX fluoro on one of my BC rigs and managed to catch 2 decent fish in the few hours I was out there. Bass were blowing up the pond in several spots chasing baitfish so I was pretty stoked with anticipation. Nice day with blue skies albeit a tad cool with the breeze but I was determined to give fluoro a try on a bait caster. Didn’t work out so well on my spinning gear. I was skunking out until my daughter came out to see how I was doing. We moved to a different spot and she sees the water exploding off to the right side of the pier. I cast out with a weighted paddle tail and snagged the first fish almost immediately. It weighed maybe a pound/pound and a half. I was so stunned at catching it that I got my hand wrapped around the line and had a time of it freeing it up. 🤨 Of course she videoed me ranting and trying to free my hand while getting my grippers on the fish. She thought it was funny. I set her up with another rig with the same paddle tail and she went at it for a while until I switched to a whopper plopper 90 to work the bank by a downed tree. Right as it passed over the tree a biggun blew up on it. To say I was startled would be an understatement as I’ve not caught anything in a while with a top water. My daughter wanted to try it next and had a blast with it. She didn’t catch anything but enjoyed working it down the bank. I may have her addicted to top water fishing now. 😎 Fish #2 weighed in at 3.10 and was a beauty! Managed to dig my scale out for it. I’m sure glad my hands are almost healed up. Not sure I could hold out much longer. 😁

For comparison who has the bigger gut?

All of mine.

Got several in one of my work route ponds on the watermelon red super fluke. It was 84 here today. Definitely will have some bedding fish if it holds up for the full moon next week…😉

I feel for everyone with hard water. Been 6 weeks since we were last able to get out and I was going through withdrawals. 😆 Water temps 49-52*. Lake has come up 58 ft since our last trip... just another 150 ft and it'll be full pool! Any fish in January is a good fish. A little better one... And better... Not a big one by any means but it sure was great catching some decent fish. Pops getting in on the action.

Got out for a couple hours yesterday morning and a couple more hours this afternoon. Caught 4 each session. Nothing huge just some nice chunks. 1st 2 pics from yest. 2nd 2 pics from today

Hottest day I've ever had on the water in terms of Bass aggression. I'm going to try and make a video just showing the indescribable Bass and Shad activity on this same 2acres of water at the mouth of the northern most creek as the last few days. I've never seen so many Bass of all sizes feeding for hours on end like this. One Bass will erupt, and then 20sq feet will erupt nano seconds later with sometimes a dozen fish clearing the air. This scene repeats itself every minute for every hour I'm out there in every part of about 2acres of water, there is no end to the feeding window......that I can't stress enough. 50+ fish caught today(most fish I've caught fishing this lake my entire life), maybe 5-10 were less than a pound. Big fish was a 7.1lb old girl taken on the Picasso finesse bait ball A-Rig. This big girl was clearly on the downside of her life, she didn't look sick or emaciated, but her mouth and head were the size of a fish I've never seen before, bigger than my PB. Hoping she's just lived a nice long life. For a brief moment I thought I got my White Whale. Watched a Red Fox for a few minutes as well, very cool animal. Someone should have told me Winter fishing was like this 😁

Thanks Bob and Kyle! Well I was Catfished by the wind today lol......I literally looked at the weather report before I left at 11am said 10mph winds, by 1pm I had to hug a bank in the back of a creek for an hour before calling it with those 35mph gust headwinds back to the dock. At times my mighty 50lb motor on high was just barely getting the job done, white caps on the main body. A real Moby Dick saga, Captain Ahab was almost lost to 1.2ft seas, and 35mph gusts 🤣 Caught a nice Spot on the A-Rig, then thought I had a white whale for a second when I caught a solid sized Channel on the Flashback Mini and spinning rod. Catfish jumped right away which I never seen them do, and I thought it was a DD 😂

40 was the number today, except for my fish count - lol. We briefly hit 40 degrees for our high, and I was able to squeeze in 40 minutes of fishing before the rain moved in. Catch count was only 5 though. Several bass really washed out in color, but several displaying bright red lips. Ned did all the work today.

Lost our sunshine right as I got to the lake today. The 20 mph wind rotated to the NW as the clouds rolled in, and air temps dropped 7 degrees into the low 40s - it got cold out there quick. But, I was able to land one nice 16” fish on FnF, so I’m calling it a win. This spot was still partially frozen yesterday, so happy just to see totally open water again.

I got a couple on a Keitech today. Extra slow rolled just over the bottom. Both were very subtle bites. I also found a KVD 1.0 square bill that I lost a month ago on a lay down. I managed to snag it with my swim bait and reel it in.

Well..... I didn't get skunked. The water wasn't exactly chocolate milk, it was more like coffee with cream and a bunch of stuff floating in it. Water temp was 49. I was surprised it wasn't warmer. I managed to catch one bass. The people I talked to at the landing weren't catching many either.

Wanted to be out early as the weatherman said possible T-storms in the afternoon, but work issues kept me busy until 11:00. I wanted to fish from the boat but with limited time I opted to fish from the bank. Since it’s close to home, I brought five rods (3 spinning, 2 baitcasting), especially as I wanted to try my Fuego after the recent clean and lube job I completed a few days ago. I started off with a spinnerbait using the Fuego. No bites but everything worked well (almost lol. The handle started to wobble later in the day. I had to tighten the nut when I got home). Next was a jerkbait, a Whopper Plopper and a squarebill (no bites except one superdink tapped the WP). Tried a weightless Senko TR followed by Mann’s Jelly Worm TR (also a Zoom Trick) and a Ned rig. Nothing at all. I cut the squarebill off the Dobyns Fury/Tatula 100H and tied on a 3/0 Gamakutsu EWG and rigged the only Daiwa Yamamoto Neko Macho I had on me. Color is General’s Melon. I fished it for several minutes and got a strike. Not big but the first bass of 2023! Not long afterwards something hit it and ran fast as soon as it hit the water, but when I set the hook it was gone. Fished it for 15-20 minutes more and was ready to pack it in when I saw a fish strike something 2”-3” off the bank in heavy weeds. I figured what the heck and casted to that spot, hoping to catch the last dink of the day. Bam! It got hit. Hard. I set the hook and the fight was on. I knew it wasn’t a giant but definitely bigger than the first one. After a nice 20-30 second battle to get it out of the weeds, I had it in hand. My scale’s batteries decided to crap out so I couldn’t weigh it, but I’m guessing it was 2.5-3.0 lbs. Hooked it good in the lip. No damage and back in the water quick. I mentioned this before, but I’ll say it again. That Dobyns Fury 705CB may not be a rod one would use for that application per the specs, but I have caught several nice bass with it rigged with those hooks and either Neko Machos or Fat IKA’s. Every bass has been hooked solid. I like that set-up a lot.

Took my papaw’s old 1957 boat out today, still floats. No trolling motor, just anchored up with the right wind and dragged a tube. Got a smallie just under 18” and a beautiful sunset , not bad for 4-6 pm. Going upstream for some big LM in standing timber tomorrow evening, that’s why I brought the stump jumper boat

The drum was a riot on 4 lb test

Got some productive time on the water this weekend. These were my two best on Sat. Caught a total of six. Sun. turned cold with frontal passage but still did pretty well. Every one was just foot long class but fifteen bites still made for a lot of fun. Dark Sleeper still doing the job. We'll probably ice up this week but spring's getting closer. I can't remember Jan. letting me get out as much as this month has.

Went out to a local lake park near me to try my new set up. Did not disappoint! Made my day Stella scream on a wacky senko🫠

I called my "guru" last night. (A kid I taught to fish 40 years ago, and put on a 8 pound smallie) He's a heckuva bass fisherman. I told him I was struggling in cold, muddy water. He asked "where are the bass in the Summer when it's muddy?" I said, "shallow, very close to cover" He asked "how do you catch them". I said "put something flashy right in front of their nose, for a reaction strike". He said "Bass don't have a thermometer." It rained buckets Thursday. The lake is really muddy again, with lots of stuff floating. I caught 7 today in 4 hours. Water temp was 49 to 51. Some were right up on rocky banks, the others were at shallow stumps. The same places I catch summer time muddy water bass. I caught 3 on a Red Eyed Shad (lipless) and 4 on a black and red spinner bait. Biggest (pictured) was a 3.21 pound 18 1/2 inch Largemouth. 4 spots and 3 largemouth. I'm pleased with my last 2 outings, but I'm still ready for warmer, clearer water. I'm going tomorrow but not sure where yet.

Not a very successful night, only a few of mix 10-13” but caught biggest one so far. Probably 16-17” and not beat my PB @2.52lb but I’ll take it all day, happier than 4lb bass I caught a few back for sure. My old PB released of course.

Took Sunday off, but was back at it yesterday. Caught 4 small Bass, but two slab Crappie. Finally got enough power to fish this big of a lake with an electric motor. Got a group of 29 battery to go with a group of 27 which will be the backup, and the group of 24 will remain the Garmin power supply. I stupidly bought the smallest battery first, but this now enables me to stay on the water all day, or all night come summer. Today was just another hard to describe day. The importance of staying with a particular bait for as long as possible until you have that breakthrough has brought me my hottest three weeks of fishing. First it was the A-Rig, even though I had caught sporadic fish on it for the previous months of throwing it. However I bought 6 high end blade baits because of TacticalBassin monkey, have thrown this since November, and caught ZERO fish. The main reason I've stuck with those two baits is because they meet two huge criteria of mine, Shad imitator, and must have a reputation for pulling big fish. Well today it produced 20+ fish ranging from 1lb-5lb+, and sadly lost a no doubt trophy caliber fish. I can only guesstimate it being 7lb+ because it looked bigger and pulled 1000% harder than the 7lb I caught a few days back. Lots of 3s, a few 4s, and one 5lb+. The fattest 3lb Spot I've ever seen came off it as well. I watched videos on how to throw it, and that technique never worked, being a big fan of the Yo Yo retrieve as a Chatterbait guy, that's when all the magic happened. A parabola retrieve trying to avoid the bottom as much as possible vs. the gentle lift your rod tip and let the bait always come back to hit bottom. I'm trying to Vomit Comit this bait if you will. Overall caught 30+ fish as I caught 2 on the A-Rig, and then at least 10 on the Flashback Mini but those were all fun sized. The duality of fishing emotions is about as extreme as it gets, on one hand, I'll never forget a day like today, on the other hand I got literally nauseous after losing that fish, and to be honest I'm still kind of torn up about it. It was really a special fish, I've never had a fish squeal my newer Zillion drags. Just sucks, but what else am I going to do but fish harder as it's the only known cure. I doubt it was a DD fish, and that's the whole goal, has been my whole life. In August I said I'm going to singularly focus on accomplishing a childhood dream, my oldest dream I can remember....a DD from the lake I spent my childhood fishing. I'll fish this lake over 300days/1200hrs per yr. until that happens. I hope to give this thread and you guys a break from being my blog spot at that time as well lol. Couple of the beautiful Spots Finally a few pics to show just how cartoonish fat 90% of them are....it makes me so happy to see it every time.

Hit the pond today for a few hours. Blue sky, temps in the upper 40s, water was mostly muddy from the recent rains but I was feeling the need to wet a line so I went for it. Wound up catching 4 LM in the 12” range on a Yo-Zuri 3DB jerkbait 110 and a 1/4oz Siebert’s Outdoors @Siebert Outdoors jig in bloody shad with a Missle Baits Shockwave Shad trailer in Pearl White. Managed to hit a sweet spot in a corner of the pond that was roughly on the eastern side with intermittent wind gusts that would blow a bomb cast way off target if I wasn’t paying attention. I need to visit Neely Henry again soon!

You guys better be nice to Katie, she'll be back to embarrassing us all in a few short months 😎 Fished in schizo weather, misting rain, sunshine at times, cloudy, weird conditions. Once that sun started peaking I out though, and after being skunked for about 1.5hrs, I headed to the north end of the lake where it's much more shallow, and an untold amount of more recently spawned Shads get herded against structure where wolf packs of Bass turn the water into a volcano. This happens quite often, and usually ends it terrific amounts of frustration. You could net the fish going crazy easier than getting them to bite a bait 90% of them time. I threw 6-7 baits at them, and then started to throw the A-Rig, and it was producing quite well. Caught 5-6 fish in about an hour, but eventually I realized the size class fish that were there weren't worth risking maiming by this very harmful A-Rig. First time I can remember driving away from dozens of fish blowing up in the background. I made the right call I think, these fish were getting SO FAT and I want big fish agressive fish next year, and the year after so it's not completely altruistic. I love the A-Rig for big fish, but these smaller fish can hook themselves with the other free hooks in some bad ways. Just didn't feel ethical to me. Caught a tank of a Spot, and these were the 1-2lb uber belly LGMs.

Any bass fishing in Indiana in January while fishing open water is always a nice bonus. A dozen today was pretty much above expectations given the recent arctic air blast that froze everything up. A couple on jerkbait, but mostly Ned doing work. Outside of several rainy days and a brief cold snap toward the weekend, the 10 day forecast isn't too bad for keeping things open and fishable. Working on getting a clothing sponsor to market a line of holey jeans for anglers I think the market is pretty much untapped at this point - lol. Here's a few...

***UPDATE*** It’s amazing how things work out. My old corporation (15 year tenure) got wind of my lay off. I was offered a very attractive six figure compensation package with annual bonus if I were to return to the organization. Not only that; higher salary than what I was making at the company I got laid off from, a line of Senior VP’s that vouched for my return, and unlimited vacation time with a hybrid work schedule. Look out bait monkey; we’re about to makeup for some lost time 😁😁😈😈 Thank you again to everyone here in the community for your support and words of encouragement! I’m back baby!!!!