Tokyo Tony

and if you add another 't' and an 'a' and jumble it a bit, you come up with "tattoo" This is getting more interesting by the minute...

If you're lucky enough to be able to launch, and also have a lake that has open water over areas that hold winter bass, you can't go wrong with a jig. But your best bet is to wait until spring and in the meantime, fish streams for trout. The trout are biting hard, and it's a good way to get your fix until ice-out. There's plenty of good trout fishing in CT

It's a stream. Why no t-rig? You think it would twist? And since it's a stream, I won't let the fish mess with the bait for too long. It'll be an immediate hookset so they don't feel the weight of the line.

Yeah but it's impossible to get one unless you have a lot of legit experience in the field. I think it would be considered product development?

If you're looking for a good buy in the $40 range, get a Shimano Convergence. The cork won't break, and the rod is very durable for the money. I've had one for a couple years that got a lot of abuse, and it is still intact.

No sah, that's a negative IMO.

Now I like that idea a lot - using split shots and a hook with the minnow instead of a jighead. Maybe that will help, especially because I can use really small baits with that rig. Do you think I should T-rig the minnow on a mini worm hook, or just use a straight shank hook and rig it like a jighead? Can't wait to try that out

50 other anglers with no strikes??? That sounds like a lousy 2 hours. Hope you guys had some whiskey. I sometimes put MegaStrike on hardbaits if I'm having a tough day, but not usually. Not sure if it makes a difference, but the MegaStrike definitely stays on the bait for a while.

I agree - it's the one I use for my base of operation, although I rarely take the whole thing with me. I usually take a few boxes out and toss them in a backpack along with leader, pliers, gripper/scale, scents, plastics, etc.

Yeah with treble lures it's not a problem, even with smaller lures. My main problem is that I have to use "big" lures to be able to reach the fishy areas. Also, treble hooks are not allowed in the area I fish - just single hook lures with no barb. Before I knew that I had some decent luck on little LC Pointer 65's, and the fish wouldn't come unbottoned...it's just with those 3" Power Minnows. I've had 25 fish days there, but with 100% landing percentage, it would have been a 50 fish day :-/

There's another one - New Orleans My uncle lives there and calls it "New Allins"

Another lure you can try is a 2" or 3" Berkley Power Minnow, silver/white sides and black/navy back is the most productive color for me. Cast it out, and just reel it or twitch it slowly near the bottom, bumping the rocks.

Wow, beautiful fish there, and chunky too ;D The ones I'm catching are stockies, rainbows and browns from just under a pound to 3 pounds (my PB last weekend - brownie), but I know that there are fish in the 5 lb range in the area I fish. Thanks for the tips guys. The baits I use are probably a little too big for the fish I'm targeting, but IMO it's worth it for a couple reasons. 1. I am not a huge fan of getting in the water this time of year, so I need to make long casts that are impossible with smaller baits. 2. I think a bigger minnow bait seems more appetizing to the bigger trout. 3. The bigger minnow bait is more visible than the smaller one. I went out yesterday and tried the hard hookset option, and I didn't notice a difference. Still the same percentage landed per strike, but the difference was that I didn't have as many fish on the line that got off halfway through the fight. I guess my best bet would be to suck it up, throw the waders on, and use a smaller bait, but for now, if I'm fishing from shore, I just have to put up with the low landing percentage. Thanks for the replies gents

I have breathable waders, and I fold them. Once they're totally dry, I don't think it will make a difference. Of course, if you fold them when they're damp, that will damage them, so make sure they're bone-dry first.

Muddy - read those reviews. I know I will not be getting that model after reading the reviews. They say the frame is weak, three of the reviews said the frame snapped at the weld, and another said it came with faulty air valve/seam. Unless you have evidence that the bait monkey wrote those reviews himself to get you to buy a more expensive one, I'd stay away from that model.

I'd advise against neoprene waders if you're gonna be fishing when it's hot out - I see you're from CA, so I recommend that you to get breathable waders. I have breathable waders, and when it's early or late in the year, I just wear fleece pants underneath, and sometimes long johns underneath that. They're a real godsend in the summer when you just wear shorts or boxers underneath the waders and it's nice and cool.

Lol, I bet she loves that

Well you'll notice a big difference going from 6'6" to 7' in casting ability - you'll be able to cast farther more easily with the longer rod, and you'll be able to set the hook better when your bait's way out there. M to MH, others can answer better, but the stronger rod has more power. You'll be able to horse a bass out of the cover and not feel like the rod's gonna snap, and you can use heavier line.

Yes, perhaps it's retardation. The only reason I can think of as to why the "Missurruh" may have started is that "Missouri" sounds kinda like "misery", and maybe some folks didn't like that... It always cracks me up when someone says "I'm from Misserruh!"

I always thought the swim senko looked stupid, but after reading that page I guess I should buy some. They look pretty money.

Well I was born in Tokyo, Japan, where I lived until I was 4 yrs old, then the family moved to Miami, FL for various reasons. When my American mother married a Japanese man, my grandfather (her father) wasn't too happy about it because he was kind of old school and always imagined her marrying another white person. After he met my brother and me, and really fell in love with us, he decided it was ok that my mom married a Japanese man (this sounds bad, but you had to have known him to understand - and he fought in WWII so he had a natural bias against Japanese). Anyway, when he met us he nicknamed me Tokyo Tony and my brother Nagasaki Ned just for fun (our names are not Tony and Ned), and my brother and I still occasionally use those names for various things in his memory.

If you've noticed a lot of my posts lately, you know that I've been doing a lot of trout fishing to get my fix since the rivers are not frozen. I've been using almost 100% 3 inch Berkley Power minnows with an 1/8 oz jighead, and I've been catching a bunch. The problem is, I only land about 50% of the fish I have on. I'm not talking about strikes, I'm talking about having the fish on for a couple of seconds before he gets off the line. Some of this is due to the fact that in the areas I fish, you have to crimp the barb down, but the main problem runs deeper than that, I think. Do you guys have any ideas on how to increase my landing percentage? I don't set the hook with trout like I do with bass, I just raise the rod to put pressure on to drive the hook home, like a fly fisherman would set the hook. Is that the best way? I think the main problem is that the bait is just a little too big for the fish, and that the fish aren't getting the whole thing in their mouths. My hooks are razor sharp, so that's not the problem, and I'm keeping tension on the line 100% of the time, so that's not the problem either. I can't really use smaller baits because I won't be able to cast them far enough... Any other ideas??? Thanks.

I guess for now I'll hold off on tournaments then - it does seem like it detracts from your recreational fishing, if "recreational" fishing is even possible at that point. HOWEVER, in the overall scheme of things, I'm sure tournament fishing may enhance the whole fishing experience for a lot of people: competition, enjoyment, etc, but I'm talking specifically about the impact tournament fishing has on the days when you're not fishing or prefishing a tournament, but just out to fish. I know myself pretty well, and I really believe that the whole nature of fishing would change for me if I started doing tournaments, which is why I'm hesitant. I still really really really enjoy competition when I'm fishing, whether it's against my brother, myself, or those little green scoundrels, and I can be pretty intense on the water (especially when competing with my brother), but that's kind of a friendly competition that doesn't mean all that much. If I'm looking for serious competition, I can always head to the golf course or the poker tables. At this point, I can still go out and hang out at a pond or lake or river for a couple hours and lazily cast, or take a 20 minute break to eat lunch out there or have a couple brews and think nothing of it. I don't want that to change, although some day I'll probably end up fishing tournaments anyway. I'm in no rush though. So if I'm not fishing tournaments, how do I measure myself against other anglers? By height, of course ;D

1. Drink less "Mountain Dew", if that's what we're calling it nowadays 2. Catch a LMB 7.5 lbs + (difficult in CT), and a smallie 5 lbs + 3. Lose 35-40 lbs by July 1st (otherwise I lose a bet...) 4. Religiously track and record every fishing outing I go on (I totally slacked off with that this year) 5. Buy a boat. there are some others that I won't mention, but I have a lot to do in 2008

So what's the deal with you Missouri guys calling the state "Missurruh"? Any of you Missourians not pronounce it that way?