Team9nine

Which is what I did again today ? Heavy cloud cover, almost no wind, and back to the same spot from yesterday, which is usually a big “no-no”, unless it’s a numbers lake - this one isn’t - lol. As expected, just a handful of bites, albeit from some chunky fish, on jig and Chatter. As soon as the clouds mysteriously disappeared, so did the almost non-existent bite.

Sounds like you either spooled it on wrong, or you’re just not used to/comfortable with fluorocarbon yet. Seventeen is a bit stiff to work with if it is your first go round with straight fluoro. Try casting it - may just take some time to get used to it coming from braid. Big difference in handling characteristics.

I have a boat ? Local reservoir kind of sucks for bass, so I haven’t had it out in about 5-6 weeks. Just had trailer bearings all replaced, so its ready to roll. Some days it just seems like its more trouble than hitting a shoreline ? …and I’ve only ever had 4 100 bass days - lol

Weather forecast held true today. Highs about 10 degrees cooler than yesterday (78 vs 88), much more cloud cover, though some patches of sun, and east winds 15 gusting to 25 - actually felt pretty enjoyable out there. East winds aside, the bass pretty much didn’t seem to care as I was able to grab around 36 fish in 3 hours. When all was said and done, it was close to a 50/50 split between swim jigs and vibrating jigs.

Fresh is obviously good, arguably best, but as above, once I’ve tied and tested a leader (via fishing), I keep running the same leader until it gets too short, or it incurs some type of obvious damage. This could be several days later, or even a week or two later, before being replaced. If my career depended on it, or I was chasing the world record, I might have a different outlook, but… ?

Mostly sunny and 87 degrees this afternoon, but wanted to make a quick pass on a micro lake and test out a #straightbraidbrigade approach in some heavy Chara for comparison sake (to my normal fluoro setup). Was able to swing on 4 decent bass and hooked up on all of them. Hoping to take the setup out again tomorrow on a larger place with even heavier weed growth as a further test. Forecast is for about 10 degrees cooler and a bit more cloud cover, both of which would be appreciated.

Snapped this pic of one of my ponds that is covered in Chara, mostly from the shoreline out to a depth of about 4’-6’, though it often grows deeper depending on lake…and yes, jigs and Neds are great in this stuff! Caught 4 on jig today out of it (pic below).

“Alien Life Form” that starred in several sitcoms

Around here, there are big differences in silt levels depending on the type of water involved. In the worst cases, nothing bottom oriented works well because anything with weight sinks right into the muck. Weightless, topwater, or anything retrieved off bottom is preferred in those instances. Even a digging crankbait can run under the muck and never be visible to a fish. In waters with much less silt, I prefer things like jigs, Neds, T-rigs, etc., that create little tufts of silt plumes every time they lift or land. Just enough to attract. I’m not a fan of too much disturbance as you can create a large enough cloud to make it difficult for fish to find and isolate your bait. The problem is it’s very hard to know just how much silt is actually on bottom where you’re fishing in most instances, and its probably pretty variable in most areas. Its kind of trial and error unless you’re fishing shallow. I tend to try and locate areas where firmer bottom is available if possible, either by using my depthfinder, or by just knowing certain environmental conditions (current, wind exposed, shell beds, drops, channel turns, etc.).

Chara is one of my favorites as it doesn’t grow very long/tall, and tends to hug bottom, so it’s easy to fish around and over. Crayfish like it, which probably helps attract bass to it, and its pretty brittle due to all the calcium, so its often easy to snap baits cleanly from it. I posted this pic about a week back of the Chara I’m finding and fishing here: The other plant in your last pic is likely curlyleaf pondweed, sometimes called “cabbage” or “curly cabbage” depending on region. One of the first to grow up in spring, but also one of the first to die back in summer. Grows much taller, usually not in as heavy clumps as other vegetation. Great pre-spawn and early summer cover.

We’re stuck between pressure systems here, with highs in the mid eighties, partly cloudy skies, and an ENE wind at 15 mph, gusting to 25 mph. Given the conditions, I decided to head back to the numbers lake with a small swimbait setup. Worked out pretty well as I was able to cast and control my bait in those winds, keeping it just above the Chara that covers the bottom in many areas. Ended up with 26 post spawners in about 2’ish hours of fishing, mostly ‘cookie cutters.’ You know what they say, “Wind from the east, fish will feast” ?

I use Google maps and their measuring tool. I start at the corner of my driveway and then just measure in one direction or the other down the sidewalk using the computer. Measure however many feet you want, then you’ll have an endpoint. Now just take your spool outside along with rod and reel. I place my spool on the shaft of a landscape light and just walk off the distance to my endpoint, holding the end of the line as it rolls off the spool as I walk. Set the line down and come back, cut the line, then immediately attach it to my backing and reel it onto the spool - done! Takes about 4-5 minutes, and always makes for good conversation with the neighbors ?

Throw the spool on the boat floor or in a box and go. Doesn’t seem to matter how you load braid. It DOES matter with the nylon, copolys or fluoros - spool in same direction as reel rotation. You might have a bad roller bearing. Some reel brands/types don’t seem to handle braid as well, also.

Don Iovino and Charlie Brewer are probably the two most responsible for that aspect from a historical point of view. In my book, Charlie still gets the credit for first coining the term back in 1973. Lots of variations on the theme and the definition over the years, and it continues to change to this day.

Hard to say for certain, but i just looked at the results from all the river events in the Hoosier division BFLs over the last 20+ years, and it has been very rare that it ever takes more than 8+ pounds a day to win, whether Rocky Pt, Madison, Lawrenceburg or Tanners Cr., regardless of the month fished. The place just sucks, and has sucked for a long period of time ? Not certain when the carp got in there, but they certainly aren’t helping, I’m sure. They probably affect the smallies and spots on the main river worse than the largemouth in the embayments, maybe? Flooding and siltation are also a big problem. Bass recruitment has always been low, and even the hundreds of thousands of bass stocked into that pool over the years rarely seemed to help. I fished it a lot in the 1980s and 1990s, and it didn’t seem quite as bad - almost always tough, but there were fish to be had. Just seems like these days, getting a keeper or two is a struggle. I saw the results from this weekend (Tanners) and nearly 50 boaters blanked, including many of the well recognized “sticks.” Only 8 pounds to win, a pair of 6 pound sacks for 2nd and 3rd, then everyone else 5 lbs and change or less. I don’t even know why anyone bothers spending their time and money to fish there anymore - lol.

And he got it from… LOL ? “Buzzbait - jig, buzzbait - jig”

As long as you thread them on straight and have the hook come out the end between the tails, they’ll still work fine. I have a few buzzbaits with extra long hook shanks to replace using a trailer hook, and all is good as long as the two tails extend back past the skirt. You actually want the bulk of the trailer body on the hook shank for better hookups. Using thin worms like Roboworms works fine also - minimal drag, good color combos, and a little extra weight for casting distance.

Zoom split tail trailers are about all I use - sometimes even just an old piece of plastic worm. Buzzbaits tend to pull better quality bites.

Hard to beat the old Coleman Crawdad if you can find one…

Buzzbaits in the spring; buzzbaits in the summer; buzzbaits in the fall; buzzbaits at night; buzzbaits when it's sunny; buzzbaits when it’s cloudy. There’s hardly ever a bad time to throw them. One of my all-time favorites ? I’ve heard of dummer ideas - lol

Warm temps, but cloudy skies, an east breeze - even a few sprinkles. Hit a numbers spot and caught two dozen on finesse spin gear. Fun trip, with no expectations for a big bite. Takes all the pressure off ?

I’m sure they're not helping, but the Ohio River has mostly always sucked, and likely always will. Keep in mind the McAlpine pool is where George Cochran won the 3-day Bassmaster Classic with 14 bass weighing 15 pounds ? The water quality tends to suck; the river fluctuations tend to suck; and the spawning habitat tends to suck. Oh, and the bass population in general tends to suck ? My experience fishing “the river” over many years is that it runs in cycles, good and bad, for several years at a time. It seems like the best years are during periods of minimal flooding, decent water clarity, and an abundance of shallow water vegetation, especially on the main river. That ‘stability’ seems to help the spawning and recruitment out, which eventually translates to decent fishing…then you get a bad year or two of environmental conditions, and fishing sucks again for a period of time (years). Life as a bass in the river is tough, and most never live more than a few years it seems. From tourney results I’ve seen, it seems the river has been in a down cycle for a while. I’m glad I no longer have to fish down there ?

See if either of these old posts help:

I’m not sure which BR group has become the most entertaining these days, the #ihatefluoro guys or the #straightbraidbrigade

See if you can manually adjust scroll speed - turn it up faster if you can. That will “stretch out” the readings and should help arching. You might also try switching to 83/200 kHz dual transducer freq. if that’s an option on your unit. On some models that makes a big difference in arch readings due to the influence of the wider cone angle input.