Shane J

Bluegil colored swim jig with green pumpkin Baby Craw trailer!

fmoore, that section stays un frozen just about all year, but further down river, where the launch is, sometimes gets iced over, making going up impossible. The warm up last week opened up a huge section, too, so it's cleared for take off!

Now that's a nice one right there, Dwight!

Nice feeling to get that first one of the year. Good for you, man, keep it up!

I have a Compre spinning rod, paired with a Stradic, and it's a great rod for a hundred bucks, especially with the warranty.

First, I'll try different presentations with it, and if they still don't hit it, I'll change location. If neither of those gets me bit, I'll switch it up until I start putting together the pieces of the puzzle.

Rage Tail Lizard is the only one I fish. It's been my best producing Carolina Rig bait for a couple years, and is deadly weightless when I can get away with it.

Lately I have been a huge fan of the 7" version of the Thumper, but the 10" is killer in muddy water, or for swimming. Maybe mix it up and get a couple bags of each. I almost always use the cut tail, except when using it at night.

That's funny, because I just ordered $100 worth of baits from Tackle Warehouse. I got 12 more packs of Rage Craws in Falcon Lake Craw color, and 8 packs of 7" Rage Tail Thumpers. Can't run out of those baits!

Thanks everyone! Yeah, good thing there's no closed bass season here, or else I would move! That section of the river is about the only open water in the state that I can get my boat into. In a few more weeks, I'm going to de-winterize the bass boat, and really tear it up!

New PB smallmouth out of the Merrimack River today. 5lbs,6oz. Caught her swimming a Rage Tail Smokin' Rooster on a keel weighted Moaner hook. I put a post in the outing section, too, but also wanted to put this one in here, because you guys know where I'm comin' from!

Yeah, buddy! That's the way to kick off a fishing season! Keep it up!

What do you even need a live well for anyway? It's not like you're gonna tournament fish out of it.

Got out for a couple hours to the non-frozen section of the river today, and the bass cooperated just fine. It was sunny, 31 degrees, with a stiff 10-15mph wind, but I got on 'em pretty good anyway. Landed 11 smallmouth, and 4 largemouths. The smallies were sitting on rocky points, and feeding on baitfish, while the largemouths were a bit deeper in the channel, and feeding on the bottom, but not as aggressively. All my smallmouths came by slowly swimming a Smokin Rooster on a keel weighted hook, and the few largies came on a black and blue jig with Baby Craw. My previous PB smallie was 4-5, and today I got on a 4-6, and then a whopper 5-6! I was pretty much pumped to say the least! Here's the 4-6 And here's my new PB, at 5-6 Here's a couple more... It was a great day! I'm pretty jealous of you guys that get on 5lb+ smallies regularly. These fish fight like beasts!

Nice, nixstyx. The places you listed are great suggestions, and you covered some I would have recommended also. What kind of boat do you have, jaay? That would sway my recommendations heavily. Also, nix is right, for the quickest response from the biggest audience of NH dwellers, hop on in the thread mentioned by nix, and fire away. Hope to see you on the water, bud!

Topwater toad, and punch the weeds with a heavy jig, especially around those trees in the water.

Absolutely!

Nope, not me. I have heard that same thing, and left some plastics on a couple jigs on purpose just to see for myself, and nothing. Not even any off coloring on the hooks after a year. It does sound like a plausible theory, though, just not what I've seen personally.

The Rage Shrimp and Crab are both made of Elaztec and float. The Shrimp is just nuts on a Carolina Rig!

I agree. He's been fishing right along side other boats, and smokin' 'em. The guy is a fishing machine, simple as that.

Just go to the Rage Tail site, and in the Talk Forum section, there is a thread for posting big fish caught on Rage baits. Plus the forum is awesome, and a bunch of great folks. I'm a moderator for the site, so I'm there all the time.

1) Bass Pros 2) Hook N' Look 3) City Limits

Yup, Badcrawdad, myself, and a few more of my friends were in that video.

Just ask your friend, the bait monkey. He'll give you some sound advise on what to do.

The higher speed reels are good for getting control of your fish in a hurry, in order to keep her out of things like heavy cover and dock pilings. The speed will allow you to turn that fish before you lose it. Also, it's great for topwater, burning presentations (like spinnerbaits or lipless cranks), and wake baits. Plus, like was mentioned, anytime you're out of the strike zone, is wasted time, and the high speed makes it easier to get back in where you wanna be faster. I don't use a 7:1 speed reel for everything, but I have found my high speeds (Curado, STX's)to be my favorites.