Dwight Hottle

Like others have mentioned you want to be using a MH or H for almost all FL waters because of the vegetation. Most of my MH are rated from 1/4 to 1 oz for lure weights. My H is rated 3/8 to 1.5 oz. I use a Kistler Helium He3-H-73XF for Texas rigged 6" or 7" senkos with a 3/16 or 1/4 ounce worm weight. Most FL lakes are shallow under 10' in depth so you you don't really need 3/4 oz weights unless your pitching or flipping. The NRX+ 895 would be my first choice though the 894 will work. See

@BassKat I used Maxima UG as leader material to braid for many years after a steelhead guide on the Niagara river recommended it to me. As you have discovered it is much stronger than it is rated & has excellent abrasion strength. The only downfall is it can be stiff & coiled. Like Tom I have switched over to Big Game.

April 14th for my first smallmouth in Pa waters of Lake Erie if Mother Nature cooperates.

Congrats on the new position. You should be a lot more at peace & can enjoy life's journey compared to the old job which sounded like a whole lot of frustration.

The funny thing is that none of the bass we caught showed any signs of spawning yet. Yet the spawn is in full swing N & S of where we fished.

If you live in Tenn or Cali you’re screwed unless you fish out of state. And for all you pseudo mathematicians instead of multiplying by 100 just move the decimal two spaces to the right after dividing.

$20-$25 mostly at the 25 price point.

Went fishing for two days with a grade school buddy. We were going to fish lake Kissimmee with shiners both days but the weather dictated a change in plans. Day one was windy with a dropping barometer before the cold front. Wind was 20 miles per hour with gusts at 30 so we fished a smaller lake to help our situation. We decided ahead of time to fish only artificials on day one which consisted of Texas rigged 6" & 7" senkos and a follow up lipless crank (3/4 oz Duo Realis G-Fix) after the bite diminished. The first three hours we only caught smaller males near shoreline cover. Then we made a shift & started fishing a large shell bed off shore in deeper water 4-6 foot deep. Because of the wind a current was set up blowing off shore & the fish were schooled up in a tight area but we had to cast into the wind to fish it properly. We had a stellar day with good numbers & quality fish. The 2nd day we fished the same area with live shinner the bait of choice in Florida for bigs. The weather went from cloudy windy & warm to clear sky's with temps in the mid 50's to a max of 70 on the second day. We had pretty good numbers for half of the day then it really slowed down. We also had some big gars to keep us entertained. We were surprised that that the artifical bite was much better than the live shinner bite but that's fishing. Sometimes the obvious is not so obvious. First picture is day one. Second pic day 2.

Canada requires S hooks with a snap or clevis so the hook is closed for safety on chains.

Welcome back RT we all share your new addiction.

Go with 10 lb braid. It breaks any where from 17 to 20+. You could go even lower considering your goal is finesse. If you don’t want deal with all the known defiencies of fluorocarbon consider using 8-10 lb mono for leader material.

Good choice

d**n the Eagles defense looks like OSU.

If you want to add 5 feet of depth to your deep diving jerk baits reduce the line size to a smaller diameter & increase the length of line out. For example 10lb braid or 8lb braid will get the baits deeper as you reduce the line diameter. Longer casts or strolling with longer leads will help too. I can hit bottom in 18-20 fow with a deep diving husky jerk or Smithwick deep diver using 10lb braid & 150 feet of line out. You can also use Nishine weights added to your split rings.

Chains for sure.

I agree with Tom's @WRB answer that catch & release has a negative influence on ponds & smaller bodies of water. Larger lakes don't seem to suffer from catch & release or delayed mortality from being caught.

I met Shane Hoelzle down at Lake Baccarac. At the time he was living in Washington State. He and his tournament partner Jestin Brown hold the Canadian record for a two day tournament at 64-06. That's 33-02 the first day & 31-04 the second. They had two over 8lbs & one over 7lbs. They were fishing in British Columbia waters. The lake is located in both Washington State & BC Canada. That's 10 smallmouth weighing 64lbs-6ounces.

Devastating news that I can really relate to. When I was diagnosed back in 2015 esophegal cancer was a death sentence for most. But modern medicine had a solution for me. Keep an open mind & pursue all your medical options. There is hope. I’m praying for your best outcome. Share as much as you can because we all care.

And Ohio State wins their 9th national championship!

The cream always rises to the top. Go bucks. Congratulations on your 9th national championship.

I have had my share of big fish lost & they all hurt when it happens. I lost a really big lake trout ( 50lb class ) that I had on for a long time before she breached & threw my bait back at me. I also lost a trophy pike well over 30lb when she came to the boat cradle opened her mouth & the bait came out. Both of those fish I saw as did my boat mates. On the bass side of things I have lost several big small mouth that I could not control & subsequently frayed my leader in the rocks. Never saw them but knew from the fight & my inability to control them that they were very likely new PB's. Onto the large mouth species I lost two giants down at Lake Bacarrac. One bent a 2X treble hook out on a lipless crank & the other pulled a spinner bait loose after pulling a smoked drag run. Those two really hurt then & still do when I recall the memories. I had a similar surging rod pulling drag largemouth on a glide bait that pulled off fishing a deep water basin off a water control structure here in Florida. Early this month I dumped a DD largemouth while fishing a live shiner. She hit in a shaded cove & started pulling strong left when she came out of the water tail walking. Suddenly she was off. I reeled in the braid & noticed the trokar hook was gone but the polamar knot was still intact. We could only surmise that the knot slipped off at the gap left that forms the hook eye. I was really PO'd at that set of circumstance because it really was out of my controll. But like @A-Jay said in his post our failures make our victories so much sweeter.

Funny thing is El Salto is fishing better than Baccarac according to some sources that have a presence on both lakes. I'm talking about DD's caught.

Yes @TnRiver46 in white.

Jerk baits both hard & soft Swim baits Crank baits Blade baits including blade/jig

Just in case anyone does not know David Hayes world record smallmouth weighing 11 lbs-15 ounces was caught trolling a deep diver crank bait. If you don’t want to troll so be it. It’s your choice but I for one need all the advantages I can utilise to catch bigger fish. I have proof that it works, just ask @A-Jay.