Paul Roberts

A follow up to WRB's post about large bass domination. This is generally true. I've often said to new fishers that complain they are only catching small fish that they are most likely doing one or all of these things: fishing too fast, fishing too shallow, or fishing too far from key spots in prime habitat. For the first...ah... slow down (forward speed). For the second, either get away from the shore, or fish where you're fishing, only closer to the bottom or closer to the cover. For the third, get to know your water. Then find key feeding, resting, migrating, or spawning areas. Then figure out how and when they're making use of the area.

Advice on quality 2pc spinning rods out there? I'm aware of the St Croix's. Others?

That's a list of heavy hitters there.

Odd that this post is in the Fishing Tackle section. I've also noticed that almost all Youtube fishers present their day's fishing plan in terms of the lures they'll be trying. As if all they've ever read or watched in terms of fishing are infommercials. (Can't blame them entirely as that's what pays the bills in the fishing industry -media included). It's as if the answers are all tied to lure choice. Lure choice is one of the last and final decisions -after you've decided where and when to fish, and what the conditions and circumstances are (trends and immediate). Then we can talk about rigs, lures, and... colors. Ditto on getting some on-the-water help. In the meantime, it's time to do some reading. Good basic ones are the In-Fisherman Handbook of Strategies. All the editions are good and cheap on Amazon. The latest are the Critical Concept series, but don't overlook the earlier editions. Good place to start to ballpark bass across the seasons. Then read up on those seasons, about water bodies and how they respond to environmental conditions, and on bass behavior, which is the link between bass and their environment. There's a lot on this site in the articles library. Confidence is earned. If this fact doesn't scare you away, you are on your way to gaining it.

Looks like a Speed Trap mimic. The Speed Trap is a GREAT crankbait.

"Won't break?" Rods don't break themselves. If your rod is rated to 1/2oz you can throw something heavier, just give the rod time to react. Slow down, and don't overpower, your stroke. You should be able to feel that. Throwing lighter? Possibly, but accuracy may suffer in that the tip won't flex as much and thus be more critical in terms of how quickly it reacts. When I sold fishing tackle, I'd tell people that "you can't really play 18 holes of golf with just one club".

My gut agrees with Roger. There may have been nothing you could have done. What you probably saw was a "sampling bite": A fish that was interested but not willing to commit. Sight-fishing is rough on the ego. What could you have done? When a fish shorts on a lure, subsequent reactions are often further muted. I'd have rested him and gone back. If the fish had chased up, that's often an indication that they need speed. But, as you described it, and in that cold water, I doubt speed would've solved it. I'd down-size. Go back and try a finesse jig. Or, cut right to the chase and throw a wacky'd stickworm, or a slim worm via drop-shot.

Unopened? None. How much doesn't get the time it deserves? Too much.

Didya know Rich has gone to Green Pumpkin as his GoTo color? Or... GoEn ("Good Enough"). Probably as much bc Black Grape just isn't so widely available anymore, than bc it's that much better. John, did/do you know John Reynolds, then with Roch Bassmasters. He showed me a worm color that really worked in dark peaty water. We were flipping/pitching the edges of the ledges on a big sink-hole pond. It was a ribbon-tail worm -Gillrakers I believe- in Black Shad. The flash created by that contrasty tail triggered those bass really well in that dark peaty water. I still carry them, although almost all my waters here in CO are pretty clear pits. So I now find myself trying to hide my worms, using translucent colors.

KVD relates this story in one of his books: "During a tournament in MI a few years ago, the top four finishers were fishing the same weed flat that was about a quarter-mile in diameter. We were all pitching worms into the weeds and, as we later discovered, we were all using a different color that each of us believed was the secret to our success. I was throwing a black worm and it was the only color I could get bit on. Yet one angler caught his on Junebug, another was using Red Shad, and another was convinced that pumpkin was the hot color. Obviously, color didn't matter to the fish as much as it did to us."

Ah... back on topic. Although the similarity between astronomical events and lure color is not lost on me -both come down to belief, which for me lies somewhere between knowing and guessing. I'm wondering what "colors" were available when Homer decided on that. I now think as much in terms of opaque vs translucent, as hue. My "killer" worm when I was a kid was the Jelly Worm in black. I'd tremble when I tied one on. Still do, in fact. But then I had my black worms fail miserably under bright blue skies and clear water. I then went to grape, blue, and red, which were translucent and they worked! For a time there (when my budget was slimmer) I went with "Black Grape", an attempt at a catch-all (and not a bad one) -kinda the Green Pumpkin of it's day. All that said, I'm still a skeptic (you get that beaten into you as a scientist). I still choose the bait that "makes me tremble" -and that now varies with conditions. Under high vis conditions, I tremble most with slim straight-tail translucents. I still tend to gravitate toward purplish ones, even though bass have been shown, in both physiological and behavioral studies, to have a more difficult time discerning short wavelengths (blue on out) compared to long (red on in). Best I can "figger" at this point.

Well, my stats looked at moon phases +/- 3days full and new through the spawn period. When just looking at that spawn period (Dec-Apr), 50% of the lunar month (+/- 3d of new and full) yielded 40% of the catches. Which leaves 60% caught outside those lunar periods -the other 50% of the lunar month. The best month, for the moon theorist, was Feb when 53% of ShareLunker bass were caught during full/new, leaving 47% caught outside. Not very promising, at least for full or new, or at least counting 3days either side. Now there are other theories out there. I believe Bill Murphy liked the last quarter to full. Pete Maina's ideas considered quarters as well. I think Hannon liked full. And then there's moon up/moon down. I didn't look at those. I have not discounted moon influence on spawning. I have some interesting observations myself over the years, and some actual data taken over 3 seasons. But when you look really closely at something biological, it becomes complicated. I feel I can say this though, that local conditions are the trump card.

Here's what I had: I lumped full and new bc there was no significant diff between the two. Here’s the breakdown by month showing % caught +/-3d of full and new moons: Oct 50% (6) Nov 38% (8) Dec 41% (17) Jan 31% (45) Feb 53% (104) Mar 50% (199) Apr 25% (72)

It's always nice to make it simple. But, hungry bass don't always bite what we're offering. Match the hatch is a tall order IME. I have quite a bit of experience here as a a long-time trout FFer too. It ain't what we're all thinking a lot of the time. Keeps the lure, and fly-tying, industry crankin' though. Glad, cuz I like collecting cool stuff. Reminds me of all the moon theories out there. What's telling is the variety of moon theories presented by... really top-notch long-time experienced anglers and guides (Doug Hannon, Bill Murphy, Pete Maina, JA Knight, IF staff,...). If you consider them all, every facet of the lunar month is covered. They can't all be right. I especially liked T9's assessment of the Texas ShareLunker data. I ran stats on it and found that 50% of those big bass were caught on 50% of touted key periods in the lunar month (full and new). T9 ran those numbers another way, and found that the largest percentage of big bass catches occurred... on weekends. Do I remember that right Brian? Angling is one lousy sampling method as far as ascertaining those why's. But, luckily we also have observations from many fields and a lot of technology that can shed considerable light (keeping on topic ) on probable why's. In the natural sciences there are probability distributions around everything, and what they measure is the diversity inherent in living beings and systems.

LOL, I'm with you there. My brother used to say, "Never follow Paul in the woods. You'll come home all scratched up at days end and have no idea why." Might seem like a direct contradiction here. But it's not. It says a lot about another strength -the ability to read water and dissect a spot. A lot of anglers run and gun right past a lot of biters. Doesn't mean you have to sit and soak, instead it means you have to know what you're looking at. I think that's been touted as one of KVD's strengths (Zona I think talked about this) -his ability to dissect a spot and be on "biters". Add versatility and you've got... KVD. I too have a slow boat, a very slow boat -a float tube. So I better know where I'm at and how to make best use of it, or I'm in for a "slow" day in another way. For me, it's about understanding conditions & circumstances, what they mean to the fish, being versatile, and packing smart.

A lot! I go through the 5 stages of dying everytime I fail to eat.

Here's an interesting story. I came into a feeding frenzy of big channel cats on wind-blown banks. They were crushing the chartreuse-pearl colored crank I was throwing. After catching several and puzzling about it, I decided to keep one for dinner. Upon inspection, that cats belly was packed with Russian Olive fruits. Piles of them were blown in concentration on wind-blown shores and the cats were stuffing themselves. My crank looked and acted nothing like them but, apparently, it was close enough. Now, cats aren't as visually oriented as bass are, but it shows what motivation can mean. I've come to the idea that (educated) bass are darn difficult to fool with artificial lures. Match-the-hatch is a tall order in my experience. Lures just don't look or act like prey, except in (mostly) fleeting instances. Those instances are what we should target. To that end, conditions that mask the fake-ness of lures weigh in heavy. My main "color" plan is to either make them visible or obscure them, when I think it matters. One of the early empirically derived decisions I made early on was that translucent worms outproduced opaques in high visibility conditions. Is this a solid "rule"? No, there are too many potential variables, not the least of which are angling related and tell us little about what fish are seeing and thinking about lure color.

Yes, holy cow. I was gonna duck this entirely. But, there is some relatively new stuff on UV vision in rainbow trout adults that had gone undetected by previous investigations. I got into that discussion on a trout site. Of course the guy bringing it forward appeared to have some investment in the idea so he ran a bit far with his conclusions. Then there was some very old work done on yellow perch (1980's) -which originally were known to use UV only when very young- that found UV sensitivity in adults. Use? Unknown, but social reasons were suggested (something I suspect for both rainbow trout and possibly bass). As to lure color, I pretty much go with Hackney's take, for lots of reasons I've shared here over the years. But, I will also... never say never.

Most millipedes have chemical defenses, exuding irritants that would likely make them poor critters to mimic.

Carp are great fun, anyway you catch them.

They are ready to go aren't they. Problem is, the ON button just doesn't get pushed so easily.

Each state is different. Some states the landowner owns the water too. In others it's only the bottom. You'll want to know how your state laws are set up, then get the actual property boundaries and see if they jive with what the landowner is claiming. Good luck. I hope you still have access. The first thing I would do as ... Benevolent Czar ... is give public access to all waters, via right-of-way, all the way around. Then again, when my brother sat me down to play Sim-City years ago I just built parks everywhere. When the populace began to riot and the police complained I built a park over the station. When the hospitals became overcrowded I built a park over that too. I built parks on every acre of land, until I ran out of money on the very last square. It's probably a good thing I'm not "Benevolent Czar".

It would definitely not be as much fun. But fun is a funny thing. Those handicap access fishing docks always give me pause: Imagine if I could only fish there. ... I'd probably redefine my idea of fun.

They must be breaking the surface to take? I remember you saying that you had to slow the retrieve some, but slowing a 1minus must mean it's fished as a waker?