Tokyo Tony

Thanks guys Mike, we do need to get back out to Quabbin. Maybe early/mid August? I'm out of town for the next few weekends... And Hopelessly Addicted - I found these ponds on Google Earth. They are unnamed, but there are definitely some good fish in there.

Using a Steez might not catch you more fish, but I guarantee that when you do catch a fish, it will be more pleasurable than catching a fish with an Avid And that's not at all saying that Avids are not darn good rods.

Nice, I don't think I've ever been as happy as she is in that picture

Same here - I caught him (and landed him) the other day on a Spro frog, and the next day he was back in his corner, king of his domain ;D

Holy crap that thing is gigantic. Congrats!

Cute! Nice job, it looks like she had a blast

Got this one earlier today on a little Booyah spinnerbait Bottom view - she's been feasting on bluegills. That's how I caught her. I saw a huge surface splash across the way so I cast to it and she nailed it immediately ;D Got this one earlier today also on a Ragetail shad. One of the, if not the, biggest and loudest strike I've ever gotten from a bass. She didn't want my lure to get away A week ago on a 4" ***, wacky Same day as the previous pic, also on the same ***. Had to drag her through the weeds with my little spinning getup - if you look closely you can see the trail. Took me over a minute to land her. My biggest of 2008. I was throwing the Spro frog without much luck, so I gave up on the frog bite and decided to catch some dinks on a 4" ***, t-rigged. Well, this happened ;D

Congrats Sam ;D I'm a big Rush fan too

Some of you guys are saying not to set the hook with the Gammy finesse weedless hooks...I set the hook just like with a t-rigged senko and have no problems missing fish that way. I feel like I would miss fish if I didn't set the hook that way... :-?

Looks like a great bait, but I don't care how good a bait is - when it doesn't have hooks, it becomes very difficult to land fish

Jeeze at all of those prices you mentioned, I'd max out my credit cards, buy out the whole stock with the intention of selling them for a profit, and then probably end up keeping them and going into debt 8-) Crucial for 80? No question. Standard price is $140

Well I had a 30 lb leader, going for snook, and it was a very small cuda, less than a pound. I actually still have that picture

I remember the first rock bass I caught...I had never even heard of them before that day. I was fishing alone, and I caught it on a little jerkbait. I grabbed it, and was absolutely positive that I had caught some very rare, strange hybrid of a crappie and a smallmouth. I took a picture on my cell phone (after briefly considering taking it to the Fish & Game Dept for analysis), showed it to my brother, and he said, "That's a rock bass you idiot." I felt kinda stupid Seriously though, those fish are half smallmouth, half crappie. Smallie eyes and color, with crappie markings and mouth. I think they're cute :-*

If you like Dingers, you'll like *** just the same After one of LBH's posts I started wacky rigging my stick baits, and have had no problem missing bites. Set the hook normally if you're using the Gammy finesse hooks. Those hooks are tremendous. Is it possible that you're feeling panfish bites?

Big-O - that's a good point. I've never even thought of the sound braid makes while going over limbs, although I've felt it. I use a pretty long flouro leader so it's not as much of a problem in my case. But do you think that the sound repels fish or attracts them? If I didn't know that the sound a rattle trap makes worked, I would have no doubt that it would scare the crap out of the fish and repel them

I don't use lizards often, but when I do, I use Cabela's brand lizards. They move a ton of water and have a great scent to them. Fish really will not let go of them. They're cheap too As I was getting the link, I noticed that Cabela's classifies them as creature baits... http://www.cabelas.com/cabelas/en/templates/product/standard-item.jsp?_DARGS=/cabelas/en/common/catalog/item-link.jsp_A&_DAV=MainCatcat20166-cat600390&id=0054124121237a&navCount=2&podId=0054124&parentId=cat600390&masterpathid=&navAction=push&catalogCode=IJ&rid=&parentType=index&indexId=cat600390&hasJS=true

My two favorite soft jerkbaits are Lunker City Fin-S and YUM Houdini Shad. The Houdini shad has an amazing tail action on the fall when you don't remove the middle piece from the tail, and the Fin-S come in a great variety of sizes and colors with a tremendous injured-looking action. If I were you I wouldn't wait 30-40 seconds for the bait to sink on every cast unless the fish aren't biting it any other way. You should look into weighted wide-gap hooks. My favorite of that style are the Mustad Ultra Point because you stick the holder into the nose of the bait so you don't have to tear it to insert the hook. Try these hooks out and fish the bait the same way you would weightless. You can even adjust the weight to change the actions http://www.cabelas.com/cabelas/en/templates/pod/standard-pod-wrapped.jsp?_DARGS=/cabelas/en/common/catalog/pod-link.jsp_A&_DAV=MainCatcat20166-cat20291&rid=&indexId=cat20291&navAction=push&masterpathid=&navCount=1&parentType=index&parentId=cat20291&id=0024537

Yeah, I know - I almost didn't post, but I figure all the other Carrot posts have been so positive, might as well get a counterpoint right? : Honestly though, I stand by what I said, and again, the Carrot is a nice rod. IMO, the Crucial is nicer Skillet - you're in for a treat with the Crucial. Now I haven't tried all the $140 rods out there, but I can't imagine for the price it gets any better than a Crucial.

Hey guys, well a week and a half ago I bought a Carrot Stix as my jig rod - 7'3" MH F. At first I liked it quite a bit, but the more I used it, the more it felt lacking, especially in sensitivity and overall feel. I started to regret getting it instead of the Crucial I was comparing it with in Cabela's. Well I ended up going to Cabela's and trading the Carrot in for a Crucial 7' MH F (and some new hooks), and I have to say, I much prefer the Crucial. I might miss that orange color for a while, but I'll trade looks for more sensitivity anyday By the way, Cabela's customer service, as you all know, is top-knotch. I brought the rod in, explained that there was nothing wrong with it, but that I just didn't like it as much as I thought I would. They took it back, no problem, even though I told them I had used it for a week. The Carrot wasn't bad, I just didn't like the feel. Even though it was lightweight, and more expensive than the Crucial, it felt kind of cheap, IMO. Anyone else find that?

Micro - the durability depends a lot on the color LC you choose. Aurora black and American shad, for example, are not durable at all. The finish will chip away quickly - even though these colors continue to produce when they're all chewed and chipped up. I have a Pointer in Aurora black that is absolutely demolished, but it's still one of my go-to's. On the other hand, Ghost minnow and Chartreuse minnow, for example, are very durable colors that seem like they're actually built into the lure as opposed to coating it.

Put a little super glue around where the rubber first meets the line tie. That will absolutely solve your problem Don't mess with the hole underneath where the hooks come out.

I asked this question in another thread, but it wasn't answered: Is a Crucial generally more sensitive than a Carrot Stix? I'm beginning to regret choosing the Carrot only because it's not as sensitive as I had hoped (it's sensitive, but not really sensitive). I'm sure Cabela's would accommodate me... Anyone?

The best way to catch them is to throw something with a hook near shallow weeds

Thanks guys Got her in a couple casts. Went back to that pond a couple days later for an hour and a half without so much as a sniff :-/ That's bass fishin'.

Like it's been said, the X-Rap is generally the more erratic bait of the two. However, you can fish an X-Rap as a more finesse-type jerkbait just by using very subtle, spaced-out twitches. I do that often in the early spring on a lake that's too shallow for a Pointer. When the fish aren't aggressive, the Pointer absolutely outfishes the X-Rap. I can't remember too many times in cold water that I had fish follow a Pointer without striking it. However, I can think of many occasions in which this has happened with an X-Rap. I just think it has to do with the very realistic colors of the Pointer combined with a more realistic action. When you're fishing the bait slowly the fish is going to inspect the bait before deciding whether or not to strike. People say that the X-Rap is better for super-aggressive fish, which doesn't really make sense if you think about it. If a fish is super-aggressive, does that mean it'll attack an X-Rap but not a Pointer? I don't think so. The X-Rap may have slightly more attracting power, but if you're using an aggressive retrieve I think the difference is negligible. They're both good jerkbaits, but the edge definitely goes to the Pointer. If it isn't gonna kill you to spend $15 on a lure, it's definitely worth it. It does hurt when you lose them though. I've lost two in the past month, and each bait held a lot of sentimental value for me, not to mention the $.