paul.

very nice bud. gotta love that fla. weather. i was wearing about 6 layers of clothes and gloves too and i still got cold today. glad to see you're gettin' out and catchin' a few. i wish they had those peacocks around here.

this is one of my favorite times of year to fish. mainly cause i have the lakes all to myself and it's prime time for my favorite bait - the jig. went after lunch and fished 'til sunset. not a great day, but not bad for 45 degree water, post-front bluebird skies, and 10-15 mph winds. caught 8 little chunkers. best 5 woulda probably gone 14 lbs. all on my new favorite jig with a rootbeer/green glitter brush hog trailer. if not for this bait, the day mighta been pretty bleak. i couldn't get 'em to hit anything else. all caught off deep wood. i got one of these jigs for about a dollar on clearance at a local tackle store. now i gotta find a way to get more (hopefully without paying full price ). the little wire trailer keeper is really great and this has got to be one of the most snagless jigs i've ever fished. hope y'all are catchin' a few too. http://www.***.com/descpageTERMJIG-TPTSJ.html#

i have always thought kistler rods are some of the sweetest sticks i've ever picked up, but the price has been prohibitive to say the least. but i just couldn't hold out any longer once they went on sale at our local gander mtn. store. as impressed as i am with the rod, i was even more impressed once i read trey kistler's personal statement on the attached warranty card. in our politically correct world, i'm sure he realizes that his statement of faith could actually hurt sales. but obviously his convictions are so strong that this matters not. it's obvious this man has priorities higher than selling rods. my hat is off to mr. kistler. seems like a good guy and he definitely makes a good rod.

agree totally. not wal-mart's fault. i guarantee ya that anyone who would gripe at wal-mart for stuff like this would gripe twice as loud and long if they raised their prices to pay for extra security measures.

other than remembering it was in january, i'm not exactly sure about the date paul. i don't really keep detailed records. too much work. ;D forage was probably a mix of shad/shiner minnows/bluegill.

move to tennessee. ;D

i have caught plenty of bass in 35 degree water. jigs, tubes, small plastics (zoom ultra vibe speed craw is a killer), suspending baits. live baits work well too if you can find them this time of the year. the trick seems to be finding the windows where the bass are active/feeding. these are few and far between when the water is frigid cold. but if you can time it right it can be really great. you will be fishing for bass that might not have seen a lure in 3 months. i remember a couple of years ago i found a hot bite in 35 degree water. i was catching 'em left and right in 3-4 ft. of water with a suspending bait. good ones too. i got 2 over 7 in that trip. i haven't experienced anything like that since then, but i do have fairly consistent results when i go in the winter using the above mentioned baits.

beached the boat to take the pix on land so we wouldn't have to worry about wave action affecting the shots. both pix taken with a $4 disposable camera which was all i kept with me at the time. nowadays i have a digital with me, but the disposable is still always there as a back up. both fish were released quickly after posing.

cool topic. here's one of my best fishin' memories. even now, sometimes it amazes me what went down that fateful day. after all, the odds against it are overwhelming - especially here in tennessee. without the pictures, i'm not sure if i'd believe it myself even though it still seems just like yesterday. it was a day that was both real and surreal at the same time, a day i hope to never forget. it was feb. of 2006. looking at the conditions the night before had me so excited that i had trouble sleeping. talking over strategy with my buddy wayne, we both realized the potential for an epic day. it seemed that all the bassin' planets had aligned in our favor. the moon was right. the weather was right. the sky was right. the water temps were right. the wind was right. in all my years of fishing, this is still the only day i remember where it all just seemed to come together perfectly. we arrived at the lake about 10 o'clock or so. we were throwing jigs and it didn't take long for the bass to tell us we had made a good choice. a couple of dinkers right off the bat as we fished along one of my favorite drops. then, fishing a big sunken treetop on the drop, i got the bite i was looking for. it was the classic "mush bite" on a jig where it just feels funny all of a sudden, heavier than usual. i drove home the steel and i felt her weight instantly. i knew this was not your average bass. of course in the cold water, her fight was limited. just a couple of powerhouse runs and a couple of massive head shakes. "get the net!" couldn't come out of my mouth fast enough when i got my first look at her. wayne did a perfect job of it too, scooping her skillfully. i remember him saying "this is the biggest bass i've ever seen!" as we got the camera out. a couple of pix and a ride on the digital scale and she was back in the water quickly swimming back home. 13-8!!! the second biggest bass i have ever caught. and the icing on the cake was that a good friend was there to share it with me. i remember shaking so badly after releasing her, i couldn't fish for a while. so i just manned the trolling motor while wayne continued to sling the jig. and why fish anyway? there was no way the day could get any better. or could it? finally, i got my composure back. we continued to hit some key spots but our success was marginal at best with only a few dinks to show for our efforts. i remember we were kinda disappointed as we entered the home stretch of the trip. it seemed almost greedy to want more after my monster early on. but we did. i had saved one of my favorite spots for last. a place where a deep ditch runs into a big brushpile. the bite had picked up a little as we got into the afternoon. i remember us commenting about how the fish seemed to be turning on again. i also remember telling wayne we were about to hit a spot where there might be a monster. we hadn't been on the spot a minute when i saw wayne set the hook. there was almost panic in his voice as he told me he had a big fish - a REAL big fish. i cranked my jig in as quickly as i could and grabbed the net. i remember his praying aloud for the line to hold and his urgent pleas to land this fish as he withstood her powerful surges. i was ready with the net when she came up. i remember silently hoping i could do as good of a job netting his fish as he did with mine. the very minute i scooped her we both hollered at the top of or lungs. it was the biggest fish my friend had ever caught. we repeated the weight and pic process with wayne and his giant fish and then watched her swim away too. 13-2!!! i was so happy for my buddy. he had caught his "fish of a lifetime." we tried to fish after that but honestly we were both worthless. there was only a little daylight left anyway. so we loaded up the gear and headed to wal-mart to get the pix developed. 2 teeners in one day. how incredible! in a state where the record is only 14-8, we had both missed it by only a pound and change. wayne and i still talk about that trip almost every time we speak. it was an amazing moment we will both always treasure and one that brought us closer together as friends for sure. that day taught me several valuable lessons. (1) take advantage of optimum conditions if at all possible. it is not every day that conditions come together almost perfectly. (2) never call "good" or even "great" good enough. keep slinging that bait. you never know what might happen to put the icing on the cake. (3) great fishing moments are even greater when shared with family or friends. you can see the picture of my fish from that fateful day in my avatar. here's waynes. looking forward to more stories y'all.

good 'uns for sure. that's awesome. great job man.

hey there bb. it's not so much the "amazing paul". it's just that i'm using an amazing bait. i continue to be wowed by the capability of the mattlures hard bluegill to catch fish even in non-swimbait conditions. i said it before and i'll say it again. a good bait will catch fish when it's supposed to. a great bait will catch 'em even when it's not. to answer your question, i am using variable speeds and retrieves until i find what the fish seem to like. this bait is very versatile. so really the sky is the limit on what you can do with it. with just a small amount of practice and a little imagination, you can make this bait act so much like a real bluegill that it's kind of freaky. really has to be seen to be believed. since i screwed up and deleted the original post in a brain-dead moment when i first woke up this morning, here's the picture of one of the twin 3 pounders i caught yesterday on matt's bait in super tough conditions. it really saved the day since i didn't catch jack on anything else.

thanks. yeah, i still use the giron (although not as much since i got matt's bait).

tough break man. hope you get another crack at her (or an even better one). keep after 'em man. we can't let cali take our smallmouth record. ;D

now that's some drag pullin' action right there bud. very cool. 8-)

then why ain't ya still out there? if you were still fishing, you'd be up to at least a 15 pounder by now. ;D

very nice. way to make the most out of a tough day.

huge!!! great job man!

way to figure 'em out and salvage something.

seems like so many times fishing slow with plastics will save the day. way to go man.

not to be disrespectful, but i'm not gonna tell it, at least not right now. i might later.

very nice, especially for ul.

a couple of observations. first of all, anything that catt says about catching big bass applies, at least as far as i'm concerned. second, if you really want to catch big fish, it's smart to focus on "where" and "when" first. "what" to use is a secondary concern. but since you asked, my top 4 choices would be jigs, swimbaits, plastics and live bait. the order of preference would depend on the where and when factors.

and here's the big one of the month so far, an 8-11 caught this evening on a secret swimbait, my new second favorite lure.

i am very sorry guys that i have not been able to post on here a lot. i have some computer issues. > anyway, i've been blessed with a real good month of fishing. not many over 5 pounds, but the numbers of 2 pounders putting on the fall feedbag has been off the chain. and the action has been very consistent. most have been on jigs and swimbaits. haven't taken many pictures but here's a couple i did get. this one is a fat chunky little spot i caught out of a local river bottom area earlier this week. i try to make at least one trip a year here because i really do like fishing current. i also am nuts over spots. if they consistently grew about 3-4 pounds close to home, i'd probably give up fishing for lm. ;D

first and foremost, got to have some very fun trips with my youngest including a new pb for her which was my top priority this year. second storyline would be my introduction to swimbaits this year, learning these baits, and catching some good fish on them. other than that, i have been just happy and blessed to catch a few nice fish including a new spinning tackle pb, new topwater pb, and new live bait pb. '08's fishing ain't over yet for me though. maybe there'll be some more good stuff to come.