Paul Roberts

All of them! There are crayfish developed for just about anywhere there is a wet spot: They live in lakes, rivers, streams, swamps, ditches, and soggy fields hiding in vegetation, under rocks and wood, and burrow into mud. One way to find crays is to explore the shallows at night with a flashlight. The sheer numbers of active craws can be astounding.

Hope you're OK with me jumping off from your post. Not at all wanting to disparage anyone's excitement over a new lure -esp mid-winter! But... the accompanying infomercial vid I watched about this lure was memorable in its... ridiculousness. I'm responding more from the hyped up nature of the vid as any one here. -Most bluegill I've seen injured and dying slowly at the surface did so bc they swallowed a worm on a hook. They aren't littered around out there for bass to pick off. And there are MUCH better ways to mimic -even suggest- a weakened or dying sunfish (to bass). -Bluegills flipping up onto mats and pads (as they show in the video) is darn rare IME; not something either bass or angler could count on. I highly doubt the designers of this lure actually saw this frequently enough to imitate it. Instead, they simply made an eye-candy sunfish and put a double hook in it. Of course it lays flat and has virtually no action -esp something Spook-like. Now that would be getting somewhere. -If it's no different than a Spook, this sunfish bait should catch just as well as a Spook in open water. And it won't. Probably the most effective trigger of a well-designed Spook-type bait is the direction change followed by the length of the glide. The problem with designing a slop bait is the sheer density of veges. Not much you can do with a solid mat but make some disturbance (or punch through) and in the case of a topwater, almost anything can cause a blow-up. Now... break that mat of veges up some and triggering opportunities begin to happen. And a rotating pancake would not be my choice. I strongly suspect that this lure is destined for the dark corners of tackle boxes everywhere. Or... maybe framed on a wall? But it would be a human wall, not a bass's. Apologies to all possibly offended. Cabin fever is setting in.

Matt, apologies up front -I haven't fished it (and almost certainly won't). I see it as a pricey gimmick. Bass will eat almost anything pulled on/through dense veges. It's not "frogs" they're after most of the time either. A bluegill bait is closer to the truth much of the time but one lying on it's side (bc that's the easy way to make it) isn't it either. The vids of it were far from impressive (esp if you shut off the music and hype talk); It moved the way one would expect a center-weighted pancake to move -rotating back and forth around the weight. Yeah, it'll catch some bass -heck it moves some water up there. But if it manages to outperform other hollow-body topwaters it's in spite of the fact it looks like a bluegill to the human eye rather than bc of it.

My Skyline rods are still just as they were -one I bought in 1981. Ditto a Shakespeare boron, Fenwicks, and some others. Never heard of a rod breaking down like that. At least I haven't seen it.

Hey, is the new Fuego casting reel the same animal as the older red one?

I've posted a bunch over the years on back-reeling, as explanation, then almost always in defense. I've never opened a back-reeling thread. Drag may be simpler -maybe. Bottom line I guess is that I just don't want to turn control of my fish over to a mindless stack of washers. Here's another (I must have missed):

Ach, apologies... SP is "soft plastics". Edited my post.

Love it.

I have an older LTA, 7ft M F. It's an excellent soft plastics rod in that it has lots of backbone but a softer tip which is helpful in "weighing" the line to feel for life. I don't like this for jigs bc bass spit them too fast, but for soft plastics a softer tip (not a wimpy tip!) is a plus.

BCing: just shy of the weakest link. Spinning: Lock it down and back-reel.

Oh yes. As kids we had a particular yard that was thick with them on rainy nights. And we got pretty good at quickly and efficiently extracting them. We also heard about using a dilute bleach solution to chase them up out of he ground during daylight. It worked, but the worms always died within a few days, so we stopped doing it. Last year I was in SE Asia and found some worm holes and castings in a small park near our urban home. I was especially hoping to find an Asian Giant Earthworm. So I took my son out after some rains looking for worms. But the pesticide applications made for very poor worming. Pesticides were understandable owing to the prvalence of Dengue and Malaria, however the urban set were afraid of any life form with more, or less, than two legs. We did capture an Asian Blind/Worm Snake that looked like a dark worm except that it was dry to the touch. Then, one afternoon, after a good tropical downpour, I found a giant earthworm sticking out from a crack in the sidewalk! It's head was a good half-inch in diameter. I grabbed it, grossing out passersby, except for the kids whose mom's shooed them away. I wrestled with it for a few long seconds before it broke! I admonished myself for rushing things, although I was rusty at the art of worm-wrangling, and it appears that that type of worm is rather soft. I never did see another. Check this out (scroll to the bottom): http://www.broadsheet.ie/tag/worm/

No worries. No stupid questions.

"Dredging" -fishing deep.

Some research has come out since these observations were made and the conclusions have been that ingestion happens in the wild but has so far been shown to be rare -not enough to warrant population wide concern. Also, most ingested SPL's are excreted. Those most apt to become impacted were SP's that swelled greatly when in the water for some time. It is suggested that anglers take care not to lose SPL's or discard them in the water. Some tournaments apparently provide bins to collect spent SPL's. Most anglers I know are pretty stingy with their lures and spend time mending them. As to toxicity, I dunno about ElaZtech. It's labeled "non-toxic" by the manufacturer mainly bc it does not contain pthalates -the chemical softener used with PVC to make SPL's. Some of these pthalates are more toxic than others but research so far is mixed about real environmental impacts. There are enough yellow flags though that I'm at least staying aware of the research and am being more careful with my use of SPL's. It's one of the reasons I'm interested in alternatives such as ElaZtech.

Ach! Bummer, although ElaZtech is so tough it's less an issue. I did however use a CA glue on EZT to change the tail angle on a swimbait (with a wimpy tail! ); not sure if it'll hold.

Can you supply pics of those weeds? Also, what's the water depth and layout where those fish are? Lastly, how's the water's visibility? How deep can you see? Very clear, clear, stained, muddy?

Wow. Congrats, you've got a rare fishery fishery there. Do you know what they are eating out there?

Long and lean?

Here's the low-down:

The Mitchell 300Pro looks and feels nice. Good reviews too.

Although I wouldn't pass up checking out some deeper dredging I'd certainly be spending more of my time in that shallower vegetation -esp if you aren't catching. Good luck with it. Let us know how you do.

No stick-worm fishes like the original Senko (except Kinami). And no worm is more expensive, or more fragile, than the original Senko. Other stick-worms I've tried do not have the wobbling action Senko's have on the fall. Senko's sink fastest and are good deeper water baits with minimal weight added. The other stick-worms out there IME vary in sink rate. I've found the Wave Tiki Stick and the BPS Stick-O to be slow fall baits that work very well for sight-fishing, or back in super-shallow flooded stuff. The ElaZtech ones will fall slowly, esp with some salt washed out of them. For deeper you can T-rig or use a wacky jig head.

You should be in prespawn. Your water temps are probably mid to upper 60's to 70. High clarity often means that fish can go deeper than in more turbid lakes. But... that doesn't mean they do -esp in in S FL where winter isn't all that challenging for the fish. Is your water a natural lake, river, pit, or a residential pond? Is there much cover -vegetation- or is it more swimming pool like?

Rolling boil. I grab four worms by the head in a pair bamboo tongs and hold the tail in for 20 seconds or so. Then lay them out on a paper towel to cool and dry. No, I don't wear a mask. There is little odor so I don't think the stuff volatilizes. But there is a gasoline like slick on the surface of the water. I use a used sauce pan picked up from Goodwill, rather than ones I'd cook meals from. I'm not so comfortable pouring the residue down the sink anymore, after learning more about pthalates. I've been looking into alternatives now for my SP's -starting to get more familiar with ElaZtech lately. They do not have a ribbon-tail worm at present though. Until then I'll fish what I have and if I need to boil more I'll take the residual water down to the toxics window at our local recycling center. I go by there every now and then anyway.

Where are you, what state? Do you know what season you're in, in terms of the fish? What's the water visibility like? Shore or boat?