Paul Roberts

Wow! Congratulations again, Paul. I too jumped on the X-Walk when I saw it. Topwater jumpbaits are my favorite as well. There are times when I just can't get the bass to break top, so the subsurface option holds a ton of promise. In the past I've made some subsurface jumpbaits by weighting -even tried carving one. Only one panned out really well -a very cheap knock-off plug that is simply too small for quality fish. But it really catches smaller fish. So far I've only tried my X-Walk just to see how it runs and found it's not as easy to get really good glides, as with the topwater types. But, with some more playing around I'm excited at what it might do. Thanks for the motivation!

Another point: Stick to a name brand -get a lower line Daiwa, ABU or ... I'd say $80 minimum for a decent starter reel (new price). All companies have these. Although, Daiwa has a new Procaster that just came out for $60 in the latest Bass Pro catalog. That with a Convergence would put you at $100.

There are national field guides (like you find for birds) -Peterson series has a freshwater fish one, called Freshwater Fishes. But, fish are not like birds, and are a bit more complicated to ID. I'd suggest you look for a regional guide, probably available through a university outreach (Cooperative Extension) or your state fisheries department. They will get you on the right track. Such books are less likely to be found in your local Border's, but are worth asking around in the right places for.

$100? Probably not anymore. There are a lot of good rods for little $. Shimano Convergence is a decent rod for $40. The reel is the sticking point. Do some research and then check for a used one perhaps. Others may have some particular suggestions.

I'm a long time devout spinning tackle user, but levelwinds are much better at certain things. I started using one for bulging spinnerbaits and for buzzbaits because spinning gear doesn't provide the torque (if that's what it is) to handle fast retrieves with lures that pull back at you (spinnerbaits and cranks). Bulging a big tandem bait all day, or rip-cranking vegetation will wear you and your spinning reel out quicker. Similarly, levelwinds shine for controlling of big fish. They take some practice, but with modern magnetics the learning curve is much less risky to your fishing day LOL. Dial 'em down until you get the hang of it, then start backing off. Nothing casts farther than a levelwind with a tailwind! LW's are best for heavier line and lures -1/8oz and up, and 8lb or 10lb and up. Although I'm not up to date on the latest gear, I've not seen a LW that really can cast light lures, especially with any breeze. Maybe someone will bring me up to date here and correct me. But, going back to spinning, I think spinning is more versatile, once you get the hang of them too. (There's always a learning curve to get the most out of things). I often shore fish and if I'm headed to a new pond with only one rod, I take a spinning rig. Having brush or trees behind you just isn't a problem like it can be with a LW rig. And spinning tackle skips lures much better than LW. I'd say, if you can afford it, and you fish aggressively at all with SB's and CB's (and you should ), definitely get a good LW rig.

I wouldn't recommend the SmartCast. It's a neat gadget, and useful in a very limited way -like checking depth, finding large isolated cover pieces, and spotting large fish away from cover or bottom. It has a "fish ID" feature that shows "fish" as a fish symbol, which may be effective at picking up large fish away from bottom amongst sparse vegetation, but it also marks any hard object such as rocks and wood as "fish". The problem is it doesn't have a grayline feature, which would allow for some target separation and relative hardness differences. Since you are in a boat the size of the unit is not such an issue, so any compact unit with as much pixels as you can afford would be better.

That is a rare fish. And you targeted it. Congratulations. Very well done. The eastern coastal waters (MA to NJ) seem to give up some bigger bass than more inland. Interesting.

Howdy!

Wow. Thanks for sharing that. I meet a lot of anglers who don't bother with a pfd. And we have drownings every year. I'm not going to be one of them. Glad you and your son weren't either.

It's in the subject title. Great question. Sharkbite, did you feel your questions were answered?

It applies to all baits, but probably less so to soft plastics. But, the main part, in terms of catching fish, is that all the elements of angling enter in. The problem is angling in general. You just have to fish "better" than if the pond hadn't been fished before. Meaning: #1 Be stealthy #2 Learn to present each lure very well. Learn to adjust (vary) your retrieves to trigger strikes. #3 Pay attention to what others are using and either use them better or, if it doesn't pan out, try something very different. BUT before you write off any lure (often people choose them for a good reason) know the conditions and situations where that lure shines and it'll likely still work for you (see #2). #4 Changing lures, after catching a few in a particular spot, is a good tactic.

That should tell you a lot right there. Lures don't catch fish by themselves. It's what you do with them that catches fish. that might just be the take-home message for this whole thread. I'd do some reading on presentation -there's lots here in the articles section. Learn how to fish just a few lures well -your choice, but I'd suggest: a plastic worm, a jig, a spinnerbait, and a topwater.

Not odd at all. This was likely an aggressive fish (a "retard" in natural selection terms if there are many anglers about) or one with a penchant for crankbaits. This is not that uncommon. I knew a good sized pike that lived in a quarry I fished a number of years back. It loved small crankbaits. I rose the fish many times on various larger "pike lures" (spinners, spoons, plugs) but only eliciting follows. But I caught her four times in three years (her growing from 28 to 30 inches in that time) twice on a small 2" Big-O in crawfish, once on a Shad-Rap, and again on a larger 2-1/2" Big-O in a dark bluegill finish. That same quarry had a big largemouth (21-1/2") that would hit big crankbaits. I caught her twice on a Swim-Whizz and a friend took her the following year (now 22") on a 3+" Big-O. We never caught her on anything else. I now have a big female I raise or catch every now and then at the same location in a pond I fish often. She is always vulnerable to a Mepps #3. It seems she just has to come take a swipe at that lure! Sometimes she engulfs it, other times she strikes short. I caught her on back to back evenings once -the second night I got her to chase and then to commit by zig-zagging the spinner in front of her -she couldn't stand that. Interestingly, a nasty slippery swimming jig (killer) she doesn't seem to care to chase. I did catch her on one once by dead-sticking it on one of the rare opportunities I got to sight fish to her. And I could probably get her to take a dead jig at other times, but the Mepps she's willing to chase, so I'll play that card as long as she's game.

senile, very lucid thinking. 8-) Maybe they'll let you out of the memory ward yet! ;D

WRB brings up a related point: That selective pressures (angling) can remove aggressive fish from populations. This is most intense when it's catch and kill fishing. C&R still has an impact, by aggressive individuals eventually being killed or damaged in repeated capture. There's a good study on this highlighted on a great site run by Brian Waldman: http://www.bigindianabass.com/big_indiana_bass/research/index.html Scroll down to: Pressure and Bass Aggressiveness But, although related in that it explains degraded fishing success over time, it's not the whole story, nor the question at hand: Whether bass can learn to avoid lures. They can. There are numerous examples but I'll offer this one: Keith Jones, Director of fish research at Berkley says that, in his tank experiments with lures on bass, he has to use a new group of bass for each test, because they learn so fast and stop biting. The question is; What is it they are reacting to? What part did they learn to avoid? Which brings up RogerWaters neat question: My thoughts, not research backed, is two-fold: That no bass will have enough bad experiences with crayfish to stop eating them altogether after being caught on them; They'll likely eat 100 or more successfully for every 1 they get caught by. But beyond that, and what both gobig and WRB brought up, is that you can't separate the lure from the presentation complete: The One of the best examples of this I've seen was a time I fished live nymphs on 2lb line to stream brookies on a public fishing stream. Now, I've been a dedicated, scholarly trout fly-fisher for years. I know my bugs and am a meticulous fly designer. It's amazing what people can come up with in terms of ultra-realistic flies. What I had driven home forcefully by those little brookies was that the fly, no matter how accurate an imitation, cannot be separated from the rest of the presentation. What trout expect is for live insects to drift downstream with the current. The resulting image is FOOD. The response is, GULP! When I fished a live stonefly nymph down to those trout, the legs kicked, the body wriggled, the pale belly flashed; I couldn't have tied a better fly. But, if I didn't present correctly, if an errant current caught hold the line causing the slightest drag, the trout would reject the nymph. And interestingly, it wasn't that they spooked, they simply let it pass, like any piece of non-food like a pine needle, grass blade, or leaf bit. But, get it right and they eat the nymph, or a reasonable synthetic facsimile. The point is: The lure cannot be separated form the rest of the presentation elements, unless you are able to make it so. Interestingly, if you ***** one of those trout with a hook, they'll sulk for a while, and can be more difficult to dupe afterwards. Contrast this with trout that have never seen an angler (high mountain streams here in Colorado) where I can be somewhat sloppier in my line control, and can literally ***** a trout 3 or 4 times before it's put off to a good presentation. Now head to a heavily fished C&R tailwater fishery and holy moly those are difficult fish to fool. The take-home message is, the lure, no matter how accurate an imitation, cannot be separated from the rest of the presentation. And that individual fish do learn. The saving grace is that conditions for bass vision are not always perfect and that aggressively feeding bass (especially in competition) are more willing to believe, for lack of better. But after being caught a number of times (or even once, according to some studies), bass become more circumspect. So...How long can bass remember? In one nifty study a group of bass were introduced to a Rapala minnow plug. They struck it readily for several minutes, then strikes fell off. The bass were divided into groups and tested after different time intervals, and the bass showed that they remembered something negative about the lure (indicated by greatly diminished hits) for as long as the study went for 3 months! But, in our fishing, we have a certain amount of latitude in control in our presentations (within, of course, the considerable confines of having the lure attached to a d**n cord!). This is what presentation really is; It's attraction, then triggering. If you know how to control and adjust these, you may be able to continue to dupe fish on a given old lure. Presentation, all aspects of it, is in large part what separates the really good angler's from the average ones. From my trout fly-fishing experiences, I'll offer an adjustment to the old adage, Presentation is 90% of catching, to this: After you've got presentation down, lures that fit the expectations of the fish, the one's that say FOOD! the best at that moment, will turn the most heads. From my bass fishing experiences, where food imitation is more difficult (because of the combination of still-water and the size of prey and lures), that triggering (how you manipulate any given lure) is critical to the amount of success you receive with any lure. And this factor increases in importance enormously as bass become educated.

Here are some basics: Basic controls are depth and speed. You control them by jig weight, line diameter, and trailer bulk/buoyancy. Start with proper line diam for the given situation (depth, clarity, and cover, mostly). Choose a head style for the cover you are fishing: Cone-shape for weeds, bulbous (Arky) for wood, football for rock. Choose a hook matched to your line strength. Don't go Flippin with 50# braid with a light wire hook. Don't try to stick a big bass with a heavy iron on 8# mono. Choose trailers (several sizes) plastics, pork, or none at all. Choose a color that either mimics (imitation is impossible) prey, usually fish or crayfish. Or, just choose one you LOVE and fish it with confidence. Fishing it: Decide (or divine -"let the fish tell you") how deep and how fast or slow you need the jig to run at. Knowing what various combinations of components offer takes some experimenting as there are many permutations possible. Want to slow a given combination down or speed it up? Add a bulky trailer, or trim it down, tie on a lighter or heavier jig, or increase/decrease line diameter. Pick your jigs in terms of component combinations heads, bodies, and trailers. Experiment with retrieves lures rarely fish themselves. Adjust speed to fish activity and play with triggers (the many variations on the varied retrieve theme). All makers produce good stuff. Find something that floats your boat, choose appropriate components, and fish em. The fish will teach you the most.

Several things at work here. First, bass have been shown by research that they can and do learn to avoid lures -it's called conditioning. This has been documented in lab and pond studies, and empirically by anglers all over the country that have fished virgin waters and seen the angling decline as they continue to fish it -often quite rapidly. Something I've seen many times (and a good fishing tactic, as well as a good test for seeing short term conditioning) is fishing through a good area with biting fish, catching until they stop biting, then going back through (quietly) with another lure. This often turns a few more fish. It's most obvious in a discrete area -like with smallies in a stream pool. But not all individual bass are the same -some are more aggressive, some more cautious, than others. In some studies there were individual bass that were caught repeatedly, while other individuals were quickly considered "immune to angling". There are also instances, lots of them, some mentioned above, showing individual fish being particularly susceptible to certain lures. I've seen this myself. Just what part of the presentation the bass are susceptible to is open, but some individual fish have seemed to be suckers for certain lures. There are also lures that, I believe (from experience), that fish have a more difficult time conditioning to; Your Trick Sticks (and other plastic worms) are a good example. In this situation, careful presentations with such lures will still dupe educated fish, and this is often (a piece of) the prescription offered for duping trophy bass. Educated fish are also often more susceptible to lure types new to them as well.

Find out what the prey species are, and find them. Locations first, then choose and adapt methods to fish these.

A group of us were walleye fishing together. One guy was not catching at all. So he finally put on his favorite shad rap cast out got a strike and reeled in a very big, very dead, and very stinky walleye -hooked in the upper lip.

Smaller shallower waters will spawn first, then progressively, the deeper. The whole spawning season considering shallowest (~5foot) to deepest (~50+ft) waters will likely take two months or more start to finish. In any one water though the range will be shorter. In the smallest shallowest waters the whole egg laying period will be done in about 3 weeks, with a one week period that sees the bulk of it. In large deep waters with different groups of bass living in them, (shallow and deep), the time range might be a couple months. Males will stay to guard beds and then fry for as much as three weeks. In the ponds I observe, females stay on with a given male about 3 days. Some (maybe many) return to spawn with different males, over a two to three week period, or more. If you are interested enough you should spend some time just observing the spawn. You'll get familiar enough with it that you can tell by almost a glance where you are in the season, coupled with looking at weather trends over the previous week of your planned fishing trip. BTW: Males often abandon beds, for several reasons: They make them prematurely (no females ready yet), severe cold fronts (although after eggs have been layed I've watched a number of males sit right on through snowstorms), made beds in not quite the right location, and angler's catching and re-catching them.

Thanks, Raul and MaxDal.

Are you in a boat or on shore?

Is this lake always muddy, or is this due to a recent event?

Some good advice here on lures and confidence. As to bass location (a big part of things) I think five-bass-limit is right. Get shallow, some gravel/cobble substrate in a cove somewhere and find 'em. Then follow them back out after they finish (probably two to three weeks). Try some topwaters (if you have clouds or wind rippled surface) -a fun way to locate shallow bass. If there's cover try swimming a jig-n-trailer through those cobbled shallows, or a spinnerbait -try bulging a tandem just under the surface. Stay with it. Enjoy the reading and it'll come together more and more.

Yeah, I hear you. I too am frustrated with tackle shops nowadays. There's certainly no excuse for rudeness, and poor advice doesn't help either the business or the customer. But we're all in this together actually, the customer and the shop employees. It's the reality of retail markets today. Good tackle shops are getting rarer. Good shops run by dedicated anglers are disappearing in the wake of corporate mega-stores like Walmart, Dicks, Gander, even BPS, which isn't always peopled with the brightest bulbs. We now get our expertise from the magazines, videos, and internet. AND there are a ton of products out there to follow, which means there are a million things we can wish for, and expect, thanks to the internet. I worked in a very large tackle shop in upstate NY back in the 80's -when the internet was still in it's infancy. Back then we stocked Trilene, Stren, Sigma, Maxima, and Ande (and we were a big shop). But look now! Holy cow! The chance of having the exact line formula you read about stocked in your local Dick's is not likely. Instead, you'll find the products of the companies with the most marketing power. We were the biggest shop in the state then and had almost the volume to compete with BPS and Cabela's in some areas. But not all. People OFTEN came in with their Cabela's catalog in hand to point out lower prices, and we'd always counter that here you don't have to wait, you don't have to pay shipping, and there is a lot of local expertise here in this shop (we really did have a staff of dedicated anglers). Twenty years later the shop still exists, but is less than half the size, with a quarter the staff. I now have a BPS relatively nearby and they don't carry what's in the national catalog. As I get more knowledgeable, and particular in my tackle needs, I go to tackle shops less and less. It's frustrating to have to settle for second or third choices on my "needs". I guess it's the nature of the retail world today. The internet has changed everything, and our expectations with it. I think it's equally frustrating for the tackle shop owners and employees as it is for the customers. We all just have to realize that.