J Francho

I've caught a few bass on Punkers. It's mainly a northern pike bait for me, though. In fact, they're in one of my pike bait boxes, lol.

Same thing up here. Happens in the bay by my house. Some of the dead shad are HUGE!

Big cranks, short flipping and pitching, swimbaits 1-4 oz., spinnerbaits, buzzbaits, umbrella rigs.... Basically anything where extreme speed in not necessary. I remember when 5.0:1 was "high speed." I also use mine for casting lures and float rigs for salmon and steelhead, and for big bucktails for northerns.

You can have mine when you pry it from my cold, dead hands! Mine have a sweet sexy shad custom paint job.

We have shad, just not the same species: http://www.dec.ny.gov/animals/7031.html http://www2.dnr.cornell.edu/cek7/nyfish/Clupeidae/clupeidae.html Those gizzard shad can get over a foot long. As for advice to the OP - fish slower. try a nose hooking floating fluke style bait - Z-Man makes a good one - on a senko wacky hook. Twitch it ever so slightly, and then dead stick it for several seconds. Rinse. Repeat.

Because the FishGrip is handy on it's own.

My Kistler Drop SHot Special rod broke like that, maybe around a foot from the top.

Looks like a cool way to fish. Not too far off the way I centrepin for trout, though no reel. Simple. Deadly.

That's beautiful! Congrats!

Match the bait to the hook. Caught this guy on a tiny 3" plastic bait, using a #4 hook:

Mattlures Hardgill Floater MS Mini Slammer Hudd 68 ROF 12 OG HPH Black Dog Shell Cracker G2 Mostly because they are well made, and big, but not too big.

Looking "natural" is one of many things that can trigger a strike. A fast moving bait can trigger a bite better than anything "natural," sometimes. Sometimes slower works. Sometimes purple. See what I mean? There are more bass in the weeds than there are in open water. Probably 100 times more bass in weeds. Find weeds, you'll find bass. Find weeds, and forage, and you'll find more bass. Find weeds and forage on favorable structure, and you'll find even more bass.

They are probably seconds. There's only a few places that actually make the weights.

What makes you think it's off brand? They're just cutting out the middle man, and wholesaling direct.

I don't feel there's any benefit to tungsten DS weights, but for bullet sinkers...oh yeah.

Could have been a bad pack. Can't say for sure, but I had some mosquito hooks break while salmon fishing. I didn't really put much thought into other than maybe a a bad run. Still use them, no other issues.

Looks like a great rig, provided it's mechanically sound.

Yep, and we're happy to have them!

I know I can chuck a 3/4 oz. spoon pretty far on my 9-6 spinning rod for salmon....I mean silly far!

I use regular old 12# CXX, a graphite (not a glass cranking stick!) medium fast or MH fast rod &' or longer, and a very high speed reel. The best baits are lipless. A floating, billed diver, is different, you kill the retrieve when you feel it first encounter weeds. For a lipless, as soon as you feel it encounter weeds, You snap a hookset while reeling fast. Then return the rod to your normal retrieve position. It shouldn't be pointed at the bait, but it shouldn't be perpendicular either. Just enough to get a good feel for what the bait is doing. This is why you want to use a graphite stick. There is also the "right" grass for this. It's never going to work for weeds that are at or just inches below the surface - a spinnerbait or surface/wake bait is a better tool for this. Lastly, practice! You'll get it.

Is there a question, or a topic to discuss?

This is one of the cooler aspects of the kayaking community. Reminds me of the "open seat this Saturday" types of posts on local fishing forums. Lots of comeradery in the fishing world.

If you Google Maps Irondequiot Bay, and scroll west to Braddocks Bay, you'll see a Bay that is much more open to the big lake, but also has several coves. Go to the east, and there are a few more..Sodus, East, Port, Fairhaven, even Chaumont on the far eastern side of Lake Ontario. Those would be my best examples. For a smaller lakes with bays, and coves, take a look at Oneida to the east, or Chatauqua to the west.

Most bays in my area have several coves. Here is Irondequoit Bay (I refer to it as the city dump in my reports...), off Lake Ontario (to the north). There's at least 20 coves on this four mile long bay. The entire bay is fed by 4-5 creeks, though the main tributary to the south is Irondequoit Creek.

I've witnessed a lot of change over the years with this hobby, and at every increment there have been naysayers. Sometimes they're right - Boron blanks were a fad. Braid didn't make all other lines obsolete. However, catch and release tournaments, graphite blanks, and the Ned Rig (har-har) seem to be here to stay.