Team9nine

Buddy was probably in an area without reception, and his observer had to enter his entire catch immediately upon getting it back. You’d be lucky to land/weigh/record a single fish in under a minute.

AMEN 🙏 No sense standing around at the ramp for half an hour waiting for clues and smelling the air. Just drop the boat in the water, fire up the transducers, and see what’s REALLY going on down there 😉

Looks like there were 2 taken in March 2021, and one in March 2019. Those appear to be the most recent ones.

Context - they can spin them however they want. Nobody can really even define their actual meaning, sponsors included, but I’m sure their “advisory panel” will take them all into consideration when making their ‘recommendations’ at the end of the season 😉 😆 Bass Resource Public Service Announcement: If you were exposed to Bassmaster’s social media impressions at the recent Toledo Bend event, or felt like you were wrongly “engaged,” you might be entitled to compensation 👨‍⚖️

This is all just posturing by the league because of the FFS debate. The numbers are largely meaningless as both sides were watching so they’d have ammo for their Monday morning social media posts…plus you probably have to add in the Milliken effect.

I had to crop that picture above the knees to keep the file size down 😉

…but the little fanny packs aren’t bad if you need to carry a larger selection of lures. I’ve used them on and off over the years.

No surprise IMO - Milliken probably brought in a bunch of that with his followers, then everybody on both sides of the discussion had to tune in so they could support their arguments/discussion points - lol. It would be similar to the likely presidential candidates televising a debate - record numbers because both sides, polar opposites, would want to be able to trash talk the other side the next day 😆 This was win-win for everyone involved.

Probably be too late by then, and he’ll just get treated by the peanut gallery the way Randy does now…but it will still likely be entertaining

Trying to take advantage of the pre-spawn window that is probably going to begin closing over the next 30 days. They’ll drop a lot of weight and then start scattering, and likely lose even more wt over the summer. Managed 4 over 2 pounds yesterday afternoon, topped by a 2.40 lb. fish. Lots of rain in the forecast, but should get one more shot at them Thursday if the forecast holds.

With all the lead on that front treble, I could see nose down intentions. But then why remove that split ring, also? Just remove the back two and leave the front on, or even add a second one. Could probably get away with a little less lead wrap around the front hook that way, which would also help hooking percentage for that hook in my mind by not filling the gap as much. The braid connection on that front treble is longer, too. Coincidence or intentional? I'm thinking maybe a combination of the two theories - leverage plus specific buoyancy/tilt/presentation.

I don't believe anyone has mentioned this yet, but I found this picture online of the jerkbait Milliken was using at the TB Elite Series event and found it interesting - no split rings. All trebles attached via heavy braid. I'd guess this is to try and minimize the chances of a bass throwing or torquing the bait out of his mouth, similar to the treble arrangement guys use on some swimbaits. Anybody else done or tried this?

Just curious about adoption rate among forum members. I saw a similar thing on a crappie forum and it was literally a 50/50 split. No explanation, comments or discussion even needed 😁

It will all be fine in the end. Bassmaster has an advisory board studying this subject all year, and they’ll report their findings and recommendations at the end of the season 😉 wink, wink, nod, nod

Backside of a high pressure system. SW winds sustained at 15-20 mph with regular gusts to almost 30 mph - was not fun for boat control, but high hit 71 which was nice. Fish didn’t seem to like the frontal conditions either. Only caught two bass and half a dozen crappie, but a couple of them were decent (3 lb. bass; 2.73 lb. crappie). Rain 3 of the next 4 days might really hamper any further trips this week.

There have been over 50 instances of hitting the century mark according to Bassmaster. Lake Fork has given up over half a dozen of those, including all the recent events from 2020-2022. All the predictions I’ve seen have said it will be achieved yet again in this upcoming event. Not sure if there is anything special about the first event giving up 100 though.

Just watched for 30 minutes; boring as hell. Those play-by-play commentators are terrible - lol. I never saw a screen shot during that time. In boat coverage just so-so. No anglers explaining anything. Maybe I just picked the wrong 30 minutes to watch. I’ll just stick to BassTrak the rest of the afternoon…or go fishing myself 😆

No, but I’ve fished with a rod that had no reel many times 😉

Just a few crappie bites today, but two of them were the right ones A new PB at 3.46 lbs (top 2 pics), and another at 2.53 lbs. (last pic)

Sustained winds of 16-20 mph with gusts regularly over 30 mph almost made me stay home; but partly cloudy skies and temps in the mid sixties made me go. Spent most of the afternoon chasing bass and was able to land 4 keepers between 1.5-2.5 pounds. Managed a couple crappie, too, but I’ll post those in the Other Fish Species thread. Damiki-type stuff continues to be the best for me, but largest today came on Ned.

Crappie didn’t want to come out and play today, but thankfully the bass were a little more cooperative. Water slowly bumping up into the low 50s here and starting to clear nicely. Now, if I can just get the right exposure setting for my pics 🤔

Proud backreeler here 😎 Not many trips where I don’t use the switch at some point in the day for some reason. I’ll keep buying reels with the switch as long as they keep making them. If your companies reel doesn’t have an A/R switch, I’ll buy someone else's brand who does

Massive high pressure dominating the eastern half of the country bringing high blue skies, light north winds, and high barometer readings. Wasn’t sure how bad it would affect things, but didn’t have my hopes too high. So I was pleasantly surprised when I got 4 keeper largemouth, 3 of them between 3-3.5 pounds and then a 16 incher. Also scored a couple more 2 lb. plus crappie.

I’m fairly convinced the red (orange) color deal is primarily a marketing campaign gone overboard, designed to sell more baits. Iterations in the past such as ‘bleeding’ baits and red hooks all ran a similar course, getting a bit crazy at their peak. That said, there are 3 situations I believe where the red/orange colors truly have value. 1. Fishing around any green vegetation, which is frequently a clear(er) water situation. Traps over emerging vegetation in spring would be a prime example. Red and green are complementary colors, two colors that are on opposite sides of the color wheel. This combination provides a high contrast and high impact color combination – and I believe that’s the biggest reason for the effectiveness of red baits in that situation. In clear natural lakes with well developed weedlines, red plastic worms always seemed to work well, too. 2. Muddy or clay stained water. This is a brown/orange/ red situation. The reddish/orange/brown water color we see is because of the reflected light, and so oddly enough, those colors will actually stand out well instead of being absorbed, especially in shallow enough water able to receive light penetration or scattering. 3. Local color preference. It seems like in certain bodies of water, bass have a penchant for certain colors, and there may not be any obvious reason for it. You really only find these things out by trial and error. But certain waters bass may just prefer red or orange color baits. I believe I’ve found one local lake that seems to be displaying this preference.

Back in Indiana, it was the same way - April and May when the fish were close to, or actually spawning, drew the crappie crowds. I think they’re mostly shallow water cove fishermen.