Paul Roberts

I have 'em! They're even in the box! I just seem to never get it done. Old dog thing I think. I've also spent quite a bit of time drilling and weighting other plugs. I seem to be reluctant to drill into a Rap. I seem to have some kind of reverence for them that I do not have with plastic baits. Maybe something sentimental there too it seems. Old dog stuff I guess. ;D Funny I've spent inordinate amounts of time and money trying to get just that very look, with a plastic bait -Husky's, Rogues, Daiwa's, Matzuo, Bagley's, Storm, ...and any nice looking knock off I'll put under the knife. But an Original Floating Rapala?? I..I..can't do it. What would Laurie Rapala think of me? Would he rollover in his grave, or be ashamed of me for my timidity? It's rough being an old dog.

I had called (my local BPS) about that last week. The answer was "No. Only reels".

Depth and speed are the basic controls. Build your system around those two things first. I'd start by looking at two things: -What depths you tend to fish SBs in your waters -Your current SB rig, what lure weights and lines are best for it. I start with a "standard" frame (3/8, 1/2, or 3/4) and fine-tune depth and speed with blade style. Keep in mind that the heavier the head the more stability the bait will have. But, if you are primarily fishing in water 6feet or less then a 3/4 is too much frame, requiring heavier line and bigger blades for buoyancy fine if that's what you want. Might be just the ticket in some Mexican waters! So...decide on standard frame weight by the predominant depths you fish and the SB rod you have. Here's a ballpark table to give you an idea of what I mean: 3/8 12lb 0-6ft 1/2 14lb 4-10ft 3/4 17lb 6-15ft This is a rough ballpark table. If you have a rig perfectly suited for lighter baits you CAN certainly use a 1/2 or more to get bigger blades deeper, or to fish shallow but faster. But, to get the most out of any given frame, adjust blade size and style to fine-tune depth and speed. (See the thread Spinnerbait Blades http://www.bassresource.com/bass_fishing_forums/YaBB.pl?num=1264693067 ). Depth and speed are the basic controls. Build your system around those two things first.

I agree, but IME, they work better as water gets approaches the mid 50s, or if (in cold water <55) you know there's fish within ~2 feet of the surface. If the fish are holding in 5 or more feet below the surface, and likely they are in cold water, getting a plug down 3-5 feet and then hanging (for various amounts of time) is the ticket. I like the floating Rap A LOT, when fish are a little more willing to move. It (#11) is the first topwater I start with of the year -fishing it just like a jerkbait with sufficient pauses, but it floats so it does it's pauses on top. It works best with surface temps approaching 55F. You can jerk it 2 feet down too, but only with constant forward motion. Pull it down, and then shake the rod tip and the thing will dance and flash. They look great that way and I've always wanted to weight some to get them to suspend, but just haven't gotten around to it.

Agree with the 90% energetics idea above -although I might argue, maybe hopefully, that it's more like 80/20. To put this to the ground, think about bass not being willing to move very far to make a kill. They have to know they can succeed before they commit. If you think of this as if the bass are in crevices, small areas they won't commit beyond, then you can start to understand the real need for retrieve angles on complex structure. These metaphorical "crevices" are the "strike windows" every bass carries around with it in front of it's face. Add strike zones to the picture (the physical space around a given bass) and you can see how complex it could be. Since we "see" most structure via sonar we cannot always know what angles work best at a given potential strike zone. After a while we get to know spots and can line up quicker. But it often pays to experiment with each spot and each day, even each hour, because things change -visibility, fish activity level, and fish position on structure or cover.

Awesome!! thanks for the confirmation on the algae. Knowing is half the battle and thanks for the ideas i will definitely try them on the next outing Thanks everyone for the replies i will give them all a shot until i catch the big one ;D ;D ;D I should add that a smaller lighter jerkbait, that doesn't work too deep, will be the ticket. Despite your handle this also might give you a reason to hit the tackle shop. BTW: My favorite in vegetation is the X-Rap. It is amazingly weedless due to the recessed bill and streamlined head. A sharp jerk is all that it needs to rip free -unless the weeds are heavily draped with algae of course. Try it in the 8cm size with 8# mono on a spinning rig. Keep your rod tip up and you should be able to fish it in the top 3feet of water. With FC and a low rod tip you can get it down to 5feet. And don't forget those pauses -those are what let those cold water fish know that it's worth trying to catch.

I just hit his one a couple days ago. I'll paste it below...the lowdown on "clarity" vs "visibility". If you take the time to read it through I think it will help. As to lure "color", the way I see it, it's a balance across the range of lure visibility vs obscurity. The mood, spookiness, of the fish as well as immediate sky and water conditions will dictate. But only the fish can really tell you in any given place and time. First... Visibility and clarity are separate things. Clarity pertains to the purity of water. Visibility pertains to the distance light can travel in water. Clarity affects visibility. Clarity: I do not use simply clear, stained, muddy bc they don't say enough. Clarity is how much light can penetrate water before being absorbed. Pure water (nothing dissolved or suspended) allows light to penetrate, suffice it to say, very deep. But no water is pure. It has: -Suspended materials, usually algae (usually green), or soil (usually tan-brown often like coffee with cream in it). -Dissolved materials: Usually tannins and others substances dissolved from plant and soils from the surrounding land. These, esp tannins, tend to be a reddish brown. These can be a consistent water color or they can be transient, due to events. In my very clear ponds phytoplankton (algae) blooms following sunny periods turn the water green'. When we have lots of rain, and water levels flood shoreline plant-life, the water becomes stained due to the dissolved organics. Heavy rain may wash in both suspended and dissolved soil of course -mud. All these things reduce visibility. Visibility: Visibility is related to clarity in that it's how far light can penetrate in inches or feet. The standard way of measuring visibility is to take a white lure and lower it down until it disappears and measure. Then bring it back up until it reappears and measure. Average the two. But this only tells you how far YOU can see down! To get an equal amount of light to reach a fish's eye, who's already down in the water, you then DOUBLE that number. The reason you double it is bc for you to see an object from the surface, the light has to penetrate to the object, then reflect back up to your eye; doubling the distance the light has to travel for you to see that reflection back up at the surface. Sothe amount of light needed to illuminate the white jig you lowered down is actually double the distance. You got a surface visibility of 10ft, but that same amount of light can actually penetrate ~20ft. If you were a diver, you'd see that white jig just as well at ~20feet (in front of your nose of course). Sohow does this work underwater for fish? Think how far light has to travel to an object of interest, and reflect over to a fish. How far away is the object from the surface and how far away from the object is the fish? Add it up. That's how light works in clear water. Now add dissolved, or worse, suspended material and light gets absorbed, reducing visibility (distance). But light is absorbed differentially by foreign material, that is, different colors are absorbed or reflected. Algae blooms reflect green and absorb reds and blues (bc chlorophyll in these tiny plants use red and blue light, but not green). Tannins stain water a reddish brown bc they absorb greens and reflect reds and some blues. But these colors are only seen near the surface as light is quickly attenuated in affected waters. So, for the upshot, I categorize my waters by visibility in feet or inches. I do not lower a white lure, but just how far I can see bottom, or weed tops. Then I make note of either suspended or dissolved materials and it's color'. In my neck of the woods that tends to be green from blooms, occasionally reddish from dissolved material, or rarely, muddy brown from washed in mud. I record: clarity in feet (never inches here where I fish), water color and why (dissolved, suspended, blooms, erosion, etc..). I choose tackle according to this and the rest of the visibility factors (see Roger's table below). As to lure "color", that's a MUCH more complicated subject, in my book, and I'm not yet learned enough to tackle it to my satisfaction, but I'm workin' on it.

Best jig trailer in my book. But it's an old book. Will be trying SuperPork this year to compare with UJ. I have to pre-soften the UJ, and it's a bit labor intensive. Lately I've also been using the Rage chunk some too. When I first started using skirted jigs I used no trailer at all, and they caught bass that way too.

Tom's DS suggestion is a good one too.

Looks like home to me. That grass is filamentous algae. It is tough to keep a clean lure. Some areas will probably have more than others. Just get used to fishing around and JUST above it. The main issue I see at this time is water temp, so you'll have to keep the forward speed on your retrieves in check. Bass won't likely chase far -think a foot or two. So keep forward speed slow, with pauses so they can catch up. Suspending jerks, CO-bladed single blade SBs, Chatterbaits, jigs, or T-rigged creatures, are all good bets. Also, a wacky-rigged stickworm suspended under a float is a good option. Because of the algae you'll want a grass jig with a cone shaped head. I like the Nichol's Mango. Dead-sticking after a pop and fall can be deadly, but the amount of algae will affect this. Don't worry about a little bit of it on your jig, and when you pop the jig up off bottom do it crisply and much of the gunk should snap off. Then dead stick it again. Too much gunk? Swim the jig, but do it slowly. Try the Nichol's Mango in 1/8oz. Same with SBs: I'd use lighter SBs (1/4 or 3/8) and either slow-roll or Yo-Yo (rise and fall with dead time). These are less 'gunk-free' than a good grass jig though. Sloan Aggravator is a really good one. Chatters (1/4oz) slow-roll well too, and coldwater bass like them. Smaller suspended jerks can probably be fished over the top of the gunk too. Use a buoyant line and hold the rod tip up in front of you as you work it. This'll keep it working higher in the water column. Do not use fluorocarbon line as it sinks; use mono or braid -these float. It's small water it looks like, and they really could be anywhere. Most certainly though, the big females will be clustered together somewhere. Find 'em. Enjoy your search.

Excellent post. You decide what you are willing to afford. You DO gain sensitivity as you move up the price scale, to somewhere near $200.00, but it's not linear. That is, a Cumara is NOT twice the sensitivity of a Compre. And a Compre is NOT twice the sensitivity of a Clarus. The Convergence series at ~$40 bucks is a good IM6 stick, as good as we had so many years ago, and we caught a lot of bass then too. Just using Shimano's here, for comparison. There are LOTS of good rods out there. Where you start to notice a difference in performance is in longer and/or stronger blanks. Short, light power rods can get by with lesser quality materials. Longer more powerful blanks get cumbersome as more of that lesser quality material needs to be built up to get the power and rigidity needed. This is esp noticeable in fly-rods. You can get good performance in a 7ft fly rod for a pittance. But similar performance in a 9fter requires higher quality materials. This is also noticeable in spinning and casting rods too. Compare a top rod and a mid-price rod in 7ftMH up, and you start to see what I mean. Rods lower on the price scale feel cumbersome by comparison. Low end rods feel "rubbery", lacking MOE. So, a 7ftMH Convergence is going to be cumbersome and a bit rubbery in the tip, a Cumara will remain light and crisp. Best deals in the house? If money is an issue, forget brand, and styling, and look at the clearance rack of every shop you enter.

I would've been a hard sell on line visibility not mattering to the fish, once upon a time. But over the years I've come to realize that line "visibility" is way down on the list of what's important pertaining to line. With T9's and WayneP's endorsements, I'd say case is pretty close to closed -until we ALL start using it -then who knows???? Will those fish learn? OK, let's not start THAT discussion again. ;D

I can almost feel it -adjusting for the 6 or so extra pounds I've never experienced lol.

Tommy, just a couple more important questions: How many chips in the finish of that gold chromed Trap were there? What color were the pipes on the boat shed? Was the coffee still warm when you finally sat down after collecting yourself? ;D Man, after reading that, my fingers are numb, and I can almost smell that bass.

It's all about depth and speed for me. Blade size and type factor in. I have SB configurations for the range. I use willows for speed and/or depth and Colorado's to slow things down. I do use some Indiana's but really only to tame an unstable bait that can't handle the CO in the size I'd like. I use Glenn's approach (http://www.bassresource.com/bass_fishing_forums/YaBB.pl?num=1247326108) of using a standard weight (in his case 3/4, in mine 1/2, for stability), and then I adjust blades from there. I use 3/8 too for much shallower places. (I do have even smaller but they more rarely see any use anymore). I also have 3/4s for deep water, but where I mostly fish I am more apt to configure a 1/2oz with a shorter arm and single willow for summer, and a single CO for winter. For example, I just picked up some new Strike King "Burners". Looks like a great basic design: low center of gravity head to stabilize the blades at high speed. They come with extra narrow heavy willow blades, for really high speed -hence the "Burner". I plan to use some this way, subsurface with lots of rod manipulations. But I took some and switched the blades out to Colorado's for "bulging" -retrieving fast just under the surface -deadly. Colorado's make a great bulge in the surface film and depending on size of blade, will fish faster of slower. In general, the larger and wider the blade the less stability (ability to run true) and more critical tuning becomes -using a heavier weight head really helps. I also replace the terminal split ring with a tiny snap -so I can change blades on the water. In general, the higher the visibility the faster, and possibly quieter, I go. The lower the visibility, or heavier the cover, the slower and more disturbance I want. If you need the willows and you feel there's too much flash -you can pop on some vinyl tape, or use a permanent marker for a quick alteration (it rubs off). Think depth and speed first.

Ditto. I fish small ponds, and the same is true there. Two ponds, side by side, might be a week or more apart in timing. Appears to be due, mostly, to unequal heating. Change something drastically between the two, like volume, and the difference could be weeks, or more. As to the fishing, all kinds of unforeseen things can appear. Gotta be there to keep on the pulse. I'll potentially have open water in about three weeks. I start with ice-out winterkill checks, and then stay on 'em as much as I can.

Month? Time? Depth? 13-1: September, 10pm, ~6ft 4-15: February, 11am, ~30ft 5-2: November, 10am, ~1ft Sorry, one more...sky conditions? Thanks, Bill.

Howdy from roloCado!

Month? Time? Depth?

"A picture is worth a thousand words" No it isn't! Seen LOTSA pix of bass. Each has a story behind it. I'll bet those happy clients of yours have more to say! Details man, details! Or was everyone just nodding off fishing Senko's under a float. ;D

What month was it caught? Do you remember the weather? Maybe time of day?

What month was it caught? Do you remember the weather? Maybe time of day?

What month was that?

Let's definitely get the month, if not date, in there. Todd, can you edit your initial post to add month of the year?

WildBill, can you give us month of the year on those?