Paul Roberts

You are good to go.

Whump! WTG, Paul.

Another long lean one. You are about to break into the DD's.

Nice ride in!

Very cool. Thanks for posting. I had a set of agate guides a buddy gave me, gosh, a long while back now. I wrapped my first rod guides with those, replacing stainless ones on a glass spinning rod. Don't remember anything about performance with them. I imagine they'd be heavy. That first one in your pics is of a mayfly -almost certainly Ephemera danica -the largest mayfly in Europe which brings the biggest trout in the streams up to dry flies. Anglers spend long winter nights tying flies -and apparently wrapping on rod guides- for that special 2-3 week event. Same here in the US, for some related mayflies.

Yeah, they look great. But, I don't own any. Lunker City has some great stuff overall. Let us know.

Home free here!

Sorry bout that, ww2farmer. Mixed you up with Speedbead for a moment there. You changed your avatar on me.

Yeeeha!!!

Wayne, how many rods do you have?? Now if you were using an old cane pole your great grandpa handed down -with a repaired tip- I'd be more impressed.

Knowledge is worthless without tools? Guilty as charged! We live in a (rapidly urbanizing) consumer culture. The models offered up in the media-driven bass fishing culture mirror urban culture -selling the latest promise of success, satisfaction, and happiness. Precisely the things one cannot buy. This isn't just in fishing. This is what we are now -no one is immune- bc it has become the fabric of our culture.

1/4oz Cordell Gay Blade -a blade bait. Casts a mile, sinks fast and vibrates nicely yo-yoing.

My M spinning Ardito arrived today. It is indeed a powerful “M” -a “MH” by many manufacturer’s standards. A common rating for M spinning is 6-12lb lines; the M Ardito is rated 6-15lb, and I would more comfortably call it 8-15lb. I think you’d have to really baby a 6lb line on this rod. In general, both the “M” and “MH” Ardito spinning rods I handled have powerful butts and mid-sections, likely to protect the ferrules for such an apparently thin-walled high modulus blank. The "flexible ferrules" advertised may flex some under heavy strain, but bending the blank by hand on either side of the ferrules does reveal "flat spots" in the blank’s curve. This appears to add power over the blank, and leaving the vast majority of the flex to the tip section. Possibly guide distribution relieves these flat spots some? I didn’t look at that. My “M” Ardito weighs 4.8oz's -a bit heavy for a high performance rod- and this will likely affect sensitivity to some degree. However the upper 2 sections -the fishing end- weigh less than 1.5oz's. The handle section is where all the mass is, weighing in at 3.3oz's. I have two one-piece spinning rods that are comparable: A Kistler LTA 7ft M 8-15lb (I could see 6-15lb) weighs 3.8oz. This rod has a less powerful tip than the “M” Ardito and serves as my soft plastics/tube/drop-shot rod. A 1pc Fenwick Techna AV 6’6” “MH”, 6-14lb (I’d go 8-15lb) is a powerful crisp-tipped rod that weighs 4.3oz and serves as my casting-jig rod. Again, the flex in the Ardito is out there in the tip, and the tip is much stronger, more rigid, than the LTA and comparable to my Techna AV. There appears to be enough tip power there to make a good casting-jig rod, so I won’t be needing the MH spinning I was originally considering. I went ahead and ordered the Ardito MH casting rod to round out my break-down pond-hopping rods. Will be curious how the extra mass pans out in terms of sensitivity.

That much vegetation in the upper is not surprising, given that the surrounding land is mostly agricultural and runoff likely adds a lot of nutrients. So... it's likely mostly an outer weedline lake. And weeds will factor in to winter habitat too in places. Both bluegills and perch will live out there. Then there is the lower end, with depth, perch and walleyes, (and if clarity holds) indicating possibly a deeper (mesotrophic) coolwater fishery too. However, if agricultural runoff is substantial, there is most likely an oxygen deficit below the thermocline -probably so. Twenty-five feet may be "the bottom" for much of the year. That will change with turnover and wintering fish could potentially go deeper. The upper lake probably winters bass too. They would be weed oriented -nice to throw some rock or wood in if available. Let us know what you discover.

Water clarity (long term) can clue you in to how deep bass will live. Low clarity can keep fish in the top 10 or 15 fow, allowing you to exclude a bunch of water. Sounds like your fish are free to spend time deeper -depending of course on thermoclines, prey types, cover availability, and whether or not there is a strong population of larger predators or competitors out there. In general, think deep and steep for winter habitat, and shallow and flat (and protected) for spawning habitat. Find areas where the two are nearby and you are making a good bet. Lastly, substrate type is key for spawning areas -hard bottoms like cobble, gravel, hard pan (sometimes beneath a shallow layer of muck they can sweep away). Bass show "site fidelity" meaning they return annually to the same areas, even the same individual beds. Areas that have the elements to produce successful year classes, get revisited and populations build. Those are the spawning areas you want to know about.

Little stickers.

It really pays to see the rods in person.

Very little stands alone. It's all very contextual. Such info as "NW corners can heat earliest" (receiving incident sun while it's still low i the sky in early spring) might be helpful, might not, depending on the layout of the lake, or the particular cove for that matter. More important to understand is that deep water (a relative thing) provides primary winter habitat and spawning habitat is primarily in shallow protected (from wind and current mostly, and temperature stable) areas. The early spring -the transition- is all about the trip between. What kind of water clarity does it tend to have? How far can you see down?

Yeah, weeds, rocks, and wood all have their challenges. And diff head types (and guard types) can help. Such as... my awesome Mango above is primarily a weed jig. And it's awfully good around wood -even the thinner branches that can catch hook eyes and hooks. However that cone head may wedge in rock a bit easier than some wider heads -although there's a crevice for every head size. As others have said, being deft with your retrieves and 'finessing' when in potential trouble will get your through a lot of stuff. Apply only enough pressure to keep your snag-guard doing it's job. Also, rod angle can help (when lures close enough), and buoyancy of rig (line, jig, trailer) can help you slip over and through stuff without 'adhering'.

Will do. I just got the boys off their laptops so I guess I ought to do the same. G-night.

LOL! I've been trying to post a pic of THE most snagless jig there is! But I was having an... episode. Pic wouldn't show, then I got called away. Then my computer crashed. In the meantime I was playin' around with you. Then my wife called -she's had a bad day. So... without further ado... THE most snag free jig there is (your punch rig doesn't count -it's not a jig. )

I've collected a number of diff files, used for diff size hooks. Really any fine file will work. For large hooks, the best I've found is the Luhr-Jensen Hook File. For medium hooks I'm still using a couple Chinese files I picked up somewhere cheap. They still do the trick. For small hooks -trout flies- I use a diamond hook sharpening file. It has a groove down it that helps keep a small hook in place. I keep them hung from a lanyard, vest, or backpack and handy at all times, and I test my hooks on a thumbnail every now nd then. Hook sharpness really matters. The going method is to hone three sides. In the past, doing that with saltwater flies, I've eventually honed the points down to nubs. But, I've found that three sides isn't necessary. I can get a nail biting point by swiping one side (of the three). Next time I swipe the second side. If I still have the hook, or fly, I then swipe the third.

No worries. However, I didn't take any offense to the different number. I didn't develop the formula, and most probably won't. I don't know how accurate they are. But you're right, they are pretty much a ballpark estimate. A 2lb difference margin for error would certainly make one or both formulas pretty much useless.