Mattlures

Avid we have some Tilapia in the Salton sea and surounding canals. Small pieces of worms is our best bait. Tilapia is one of my favorite eating fish. I just wish they were closer, I would keep my freezer full

just messin with ya. It looks like an infection

hemroids

I dont think there is a single guy making a living just bass fishing. I may be wrong but I dont think there is. The fishing part is just that PART of thier job. They are all salesmen. They all do apearances and seminars and product endorsements. You dont have to be the best fisherman to make the most money. You have to be the most marketable. I bet my friend Byron Velvick makes more then most of the touring pros but he hasent been a top 10 guy. He is good and is a top 50 guy but he is more marketable. Very friendly, well spoken and good looking plus he can fish. My point is, If you become good at the marketing aspect you wont have to be in the top 10 to make a good living.

Hey dont feel bad. The guys in Texas think that bluegill are perch. and even more people call bluegill bream or brim when if fact the fish is a bluegill or some other closely related sunfish. However if sombody is calling your bass a carp they are wrong

the fish died from being gill hooked and bleed. it was a bad feeling. I havent accidentaly killed a big one since then. If i kill a small one (still very rare) then I dont feel bad. I just eat it. They are good

If you catch enough fish you will kill one once in a while. It sucks but it does happen. I still have a 12.5 in my freeezer from 5 years ago that i need to make a mold of.

I am sure this has already been posted but in honor of mrlitetackle's post of his buddy getting stuck I figured it would be a good idea to post this(even if it is a repost)

Here is my biggest fish. estimated 140lb batray

mrlitetackle lol I wouldnt be upset if you disagreed with me haha. I get in a lot of debates and unless its a personal attack It doesnt bother me at all. Besides just because I think I am right doesnt mean I am actualy right. My point is, it is verry rare that an angler is truley matching the forage or even coming reasonably close. What I am saying is that if you give a bass what it is feeding on, when its feeding on them you can have epic rsults. This is the basis of my argument. Now I am actualy not disagreeing with you at all. Of course a chartruse buzzbait will work and at times they work realy well. All of the various types of lures work and work extremly well at times. It does bother me when I hear guys say that matching the hatch is not important because they caught a bass on some X lure. this realy says nothing about matching the hatch all it says is that X lure worked. That surely doesnt meant that a different lure wouldnt have also worked or worked better. Ahh Mottfia you are absolutley correct sir. There are many lures that can create the illusion of realism. The worse the visability the easier this is. in most cases it requires a fast presentation. A fluke is a good example. You get bass busting on shad and if you work the lure properly you as an angler can create the illusion of a real shad. There are plenty of baits out there that can accomplish this when the angler does most of the work. I have watched lures underwater and the angler is the key. For instance throw a jig out and work it slow. Crawl it, hop it, but work it slow. If you watch it underwater with good visability you would never be tricked into thinking it was a real crawfish. Now speed it up and give it some iratic jerks and it looks like a fleeing dad. It would most likely fool you. Now bass eat jigs and we as humans do not know if they think they are eating a crafish or if it just looks like food of some sort. I do know from playing with pet bass in an aquarium that they can tell the difference in a jig and a dad. So I guess I was wrong in my original post. See I can admit it. while I still do belive that REAL swimbaits and live bait are the best at matching the forage you can certainly match the forage with other baits that dont look like the real thing. This requires more skill and is easir to do in low visability situations and while moving the baits faster. basicaly what I am saying is a 2in crankbait with a bluegill(or any other species) pattern painted on it doesnt match the 4in gills that the bass are eating that day. It doesnt swim like real gills and its overall shap doesnt match , heck it doesnt even have fins. Will it get bit in that situation? it very well could. I am not arguing that. My argument is that in most cases the angler is eith not matching the prey at all or only to a small degree.

my thought are this. 95% of the time when an angler thinks he is matching the forage hi is not. A bluegill colored spinnerbait looks nothing like a real bluegill. A babay bass colored crankbait looks nothing like a baby bass. A spinnerbait IS NOT a shad and doesnt look like them. and the biggest one. A jig is a jig, IT IS NOT A CRAWFISH. You see anglers think they are matching a baitfish because its a similar color. or a similar shape or a similar size etc but rarley does their offering match size,shape,color, and action. If it does all of them then you are "matching the hatch" or matching the prey. The only baits that realy do this are REAL westcoast swimbaits or live bait. If your forming you opinions based on a shad colored spinnerbait then you dont know if its important to match the hatch or not. If you realy are matching the hatch you will get better results then any other technique. If bass in FL are feeding on big shinners and you throw a big shinner for bait you will get bit. If there eating baby crawfish and you drag a Huddlebug buy them you should get bit etc. My point is very few guys do match the hatch but they think its not that important because they caught a fish on a chartruse buzzbait. They will never know what its like.

Actualy Lucky craft swimbaits are some of the worst swimbaits out there. Do a little reserarch and read their reveiws. I am not even saying to consider my opinion. Just read up on them and you will see that the LC swimbaits have all been flops. I belive the california supreme by LC got the worst review I have ever seen on tackle tour.

Way back when, I used to buy differnt lures just to see how they swam and to lear their dynamics. I bought the hydro lures on ebay probably 8-10years ago. When I got them I pool tested them and I thought there were bad. I even fished them a little and then I thought they were worse. Todays paddletails like the original basstrix are Sooooo much better. More realistic, better action, better finishes, and better design. plus you only have to buy 1 pack to try them out instead of the whole system.

If I have an epic day or catch a monster I say "yeah I caught a couple trout" or bluegill or little cats Or I say "Nope couldnt get any" If I do realy good I say "caught a couple" If I did ok I say "caught a couple little ones" If I did poor I say "It was real tough" Now when I talk to a friend who bailed out or couldnt go I actualy tell them what I caught and rub it in hard. Unless of course it sucked and then I dont call them to report. Ha ha Actualy I find myself using the Caught a couple little ones for most inquiries

Thats a good looking bait

I do not realy like the way the minnows swim on the swimbait hooks with the cork screw. I recomend a 4/0 1/4oz falcon style hook for best results

Hey Muddy I didnt know you were a former pool hustler

Plastisol settles and also seperates. You need to mix your liquid plastic better. Put something in the container to scrape the bottom. Once you get it thouroghly mixed it should be much better

In Europe Carp fishing is HUGE. its similar to our bass fishing. Carp are extremly werry fish. They spook easy and fight like heck. They will pull you through cover if they can and they get huge. Carp are cool. In most cases theycause no problems and dont hurt other populations. Its the shallow muddier lakes that they can have a negative effect. I highly recomend going after carp. I use a small trebble on 6lb light spinning outfit. I use a soft bread ball(to hard and you wont hook them) and no weight. catching a 10-20lb carp on ultalight gear will teach you how to play out a fish. I have always heard they taiste bad but I am going to try one soon.

Pitchinkid that is a very nice replica. Who did the work and how much if ya dont mind me asking

Well not exactly smarter but harder to catch. http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2009-04/uoia-lbv041409.php

I will say this, I think those Castaic rock hard shad look realy good. and I have played with them at Icast. I think they will beat all the little hard shad baits.

thats what I thought Chris. Hammer I am responding

Thanks for the kind words fellas. Any time I choose a color for using a swimbait I try to think about where I will be fishing it the most and which forage species is the most common or which ones the bass feed on more. Choosing betwwen sunfish species where both are present can make it a tough choice. Fishdontlikeme can you post a picture of this bait ?

Cabelas used to make them. I think they were called livin eye minnow or swimbait