paul.

for some reason, people are reluctant to throw moving baits in cold water. real cool that you figured out that's what they wanted. good thinking.

this is seriously one of the coolest posts i have seen on here. magazine quality stuff right there. thanks Paul. great catches too.

excellent. nothing like sticking those first few fish of the year. gotta love those traps. many a skunk busted by that bait.

i love mine. my only gripe, and it's a small one, is i wish the handles were a little longer. but that's just a personal preference. i am nuts over everything else about the rod - especially the handle/trigger design. Not sure how it would compare to the phenix. i have heard those are some very sweet sticks too. a little sarcasm there. trust me, i am very happy. big bass or small, i just enjoy having the opportunity to be out there. thanks for the nice words guys.

some of the coolest things in life: marriage, kids, new pb's. congrats man that is AWESOME. very thick, healthy looking fish.

heckuva bass!! very chunky. congrats big time.

these greedy fish never cease to amaze me. cool catch. btw, what's your take on the bull shad? i've thought about biting on one.

last week. 9lbs. 13oz. date: 3/8/13 time: 2:25p.m. depth: 6-7 f.o.w water temp: mid 40's clarity: clear w/ 2ft. visibility structure/cover: submerged fencerow, wood & grass presentation: slow fall, tight to cover lure: bps creature bait, tx rigged, watermelon red terminal tackle: pegged 1/8 oz. tungsten weight, 4/0 gamakatsu ewg superline hook line: powerpro braid, 50 lb. test rod: *** *** black, 6'7" mh reel: pinnacle deadbolt

big bite baits yo mamma. will catch fish anytime anywhere. i don't think they make a bad color either. when you are tired of catching fish rigging the bait, use 'em for jig trailers. wish i'd started using this bait years ago. another bait that will absolutely kill this time of year is a tube weighted as lightly as you can get away with. all time favorite tube color is roadkill/chartreuse.

agree. i caught deadbolt reels on sale at dicks several months ago and got 4 of 'em at about 17 bucks apiece. i thought they would make decent backups in a pinch for my "good" reels. long story short, i now use the pinnacles and the "good" reels are the backups. i've paid 5 times as much for reels that i haven't been half as satisfied with.

5-6 rods in the jonboat usually, but somehow it's usually the jig rod that ends up in my hands.

killing 'em with yo mammas (big bite baits) and beav'r claws (grande bass) here lately. also like trigger x craws and creatures (when on sale). also like a devil's spear (berkley) for a unique presentation that bass haven't seen before. but i have found that the chunk of plastic or pork you put on a jig seems to matter a lot more to us than it does to the fish. find something that you are happy with, have confidence in, and can afford and you'll be just fine.

agreed west tn fishing is on fire right now. great catch and good luck.

never too cold until the lake is frozen solid. i prefer winter fishing over summer fishing any day of the week.

buy any of the owner hook heads from Siebert outdoors. that's about 1.75 each i think. then buy the skirt material you like and collars from any number of places. then scrounge up an old ink pen and paper clip to make your own skirts for about .70 each. then, in about one minute, you have a $2.45 jig that will smoke ANY $4 plus jig out there. good luck.

if you've never tried Mike's stuff, you really need to give this a shot. chances are any of Mike's owner hook jigs or heads are a substantial upgrade over anything else you've ever used.

big fan of the luck-e-strike baby huey. great worm. it's versatile (segmented so you can break off sections as needed). it don't cost a fortune and has worked better for me than some worms that do.

i have 2 jigs that i really like. the siebert outdoors big o brush jig and the boss tackle gk heavy cover jig. both of these absolutely excel at what they were designed for (braid, bigger fish, and super heavy cover situations) and they suffice at everything else. pressed to choose, i'd go with the big o (superior heavy wire 3x cutting point hook that sets like light wire). as far as colors go, missouri craw (black, pumpkin, and chartreuse) is the only one i've really ever needed. day in and day out, it's been head and shoulders over everything else for me. natural colored trailer for clear water and black for dirty water.

alters the fall rate, creates the illusion of addtional size, adds additional movement, usually adds additional color or flash, changes the water displacement "signature" of the bait

big bite baits yomamma and grandebass beav'r claws. both reasonably priced and both double as excellent jig trailers which gives you even more bang for the buck imo.

big fish are rare fish. the odds are stacked against a bass ever reaching trophy proportions from the time it hatches - even more so in northern climates where growing seasons are shorter and a fish has to survive even longer to become a lunker. sounds like you had a pretty good year though.

yes, but different trailers for different situations.

this thread is very intriguing to me. any time i hear fishing guys talk about "favorite" anything, i think it's interesting. as anglers, we are prone to develop emotional attachments to anything fishing related - spots, times, equipment, and especially BAITS. these attachments can be related to any sort of positive reinforcement we receive which is directly (or even indirectly) related to the given variable. tackle companies are well aware of this angler tendency and they get fat off of it. they realize how easily swayed we anglers are and understand that we will pay a premium for products that for one reason or another have inspired that almighty confidence. in the blink of an eye, we develop a blind loyalty to a certain product - sometimes without stopping to think that our rationale could very well be based on an erroneous presumption to begin with. another interesting thing about our confidence is how easily it can be influenced. we develop a liking for or a trust in certain people who are associated with a product and forget that their goal is to make money off of us. that being the case, why would they come off as anything other than likeable or trustworthy - especially in front of potential paying customers? that would be bad for business. big time advertisers get where they are for a reason - because they're good at what they do and they excel at playing the game of creating and manipulating angler confidence. and sometimes forums and message boards are where advertisers do some of their best work. for example, take something as simple as givng a few free baits to certain key fishing forum members. with that one simple move, advertisers are able to do two things essential to product sales - maximize support and minimize resistance. members who get free products suddenly develop amnesia about what their previous "favorites" were and wholeheartedly endorse and use their new "favorites" if they happen to catch fish at all. why? because they are FREE. who cares if i could have caught 8 fish on baits i paid for if i can catch 6 on free baits? support mobilizes quickly for the advertiser and people are eager to talk about how great their product is. the guys getting the freebies rave and suggest that everyone else should go out and buy baits that they are getting for free. any resistance or negativity towards the given product is quickly dealt with and crushed out of fear that advertising dollars and free baits will dry up. in the end, all this makes little difference because we are all still going to have our favorites. that's just human nature. but make no mistake. it's not misplaced confidence, emotional attachment, or blind loyalty that puts fish in the boat on a tough day. it's an open mind and a willingness to step outside your comfort zone. at least that's my opinion.

no and yes. no, big o did not design the hook. it is an owner 3x strong cutting point hook. yes, it is a great hook.

i used to be one of the biggest ragetail guys on here but like many others have said, i found over time that the cost does not justify the results. i have had several trips within the past few years where i have had to use other brands of plastics to bail me out when ragetail wasn't getting it done. i remember one particular trip where i wasn't catching jack on ragetail worms (thumpers or anacondas) and i started using culprits and zoom mag II's. i ran through several bags of those and caught plenty of fish. that's when my eyes started to be opened. have also had several other trips when ultravibe speed craws have beat rage craws. all this promotion of ragetail as being better because they are "high action" plastics is a clever marketing gimmick in my opinion. there are times when low action or no action rules the day. anyone who has fished jigs or plastics for any length of time all will vouch for that. and it seems like i've heard it said plenty of times that one of the reasons behind the $4.99 price tag is the "special packaging" that supposedly ensures consistent action. again, more clever marketing hype in my opinion. weren't ragetail products $5.99 per pack BEFORE the clamshell packaging? what kind of profit margin is SK / ragetail shooting for here? here's another challenge. surely it shouldn't cost strike king any more to make baits than it does berkley, zoom, or others whose products seem to be at least equally good yet have substantially lower pricetags with more products in the package to boot. if it does, then SK is doing something wrong and the consumer shouldn't have to pay for their mistakes. if ragetails drop to $3.99, i'll start buying some again because they are good plastics and i have caught a bunch of fish on them. otherwise, since i don't have a money tree growing in my yard, i'll go with manufacturers who don't insist on making such a big dent in my bank account for what appears to me to be no good reason. maybe then i can afford to go fishing more instead of funding someone else's trips.