SirSnookalot

^^ I couldn't argue with 1 single word. ^^ Of all my bass set ups only my heaviest (med spinning) has 15# braid, I hardly ever use it. The others are ml down to ul with lighter braid.

Plumworm, you may just have cabin fever. I'm 69 and retired as well, the difference is I don't have cabin fever. I fish every single day, hardly ever miss. Anyone catching fish 340+ days a year IMO is pretty well zeroed in. I haven't changed what I do in 5-10 or even 30 years, it worked then and it works now. Whether I'm fishing inshore or bass fishing I do it with maybe 6 different lures on a regular basis, all on spinning. I catch something everyday, some days a lot and some days it's more of a struggle, but getting totally skunked is pretty rare. ^^ Don't really care to ^^ If the performance level is up to your standards, why bother?

From a guy that worked outdoors in Michigan 30 some odd years, I wear long underwear when it's 60 degrees in Florida.

Rattling corks can be bought at DSG, pretty cheap, even cheaper and just as effective are the foam bobbers at Walmart. Just ad a leader for your lure, sometimes you may want to add a little weight. Most any lure can be used, about the most popular are Clark spoons. The movement of the cork is the attraction, there is really no need to go spend 6 bucks on a bobber. Going the bait route, a chicken rig tipped with squid is about as good as gets.

I never add or take off a split ring, I use the lure the way it comes out of the package. Loopknot for the majority of my lures but top water I use an ordinary clinch knot.

I have fished several of the places at South County, not too much anymore. Never had much success at the big lake. There is a pond at the entrance Yamato, there used to be a lot of lily pads, I caught a ton of nice bass there. The brush has grown quite a bit and the access to fish isn't too good anymore. The pond by the Daggerwing nature center can be pretty good too. Other than that I'm not too excited to go back there, I think Boca has some better areas to fish.

Check it out with Google Earth using the historical feature.

I agree with you, I lost a lot of pictures myself and I did have them backed up, I haven't been able to find those cd's for about 10 years, lol. I do back up everything on a flash drive. I started on organization this morning, after 30 minutes I still couldn't plan my attack, lol. First thing I'll probably do is delete the the photos in my smartphone that aren't really photo worthy or have no real significant value. As I have albums created in my device deletion and re organization isn't a big deal. As I said my mistake was too many email addresses and too many on line services.

An 8' rod is a ball in the surf but we are not pulling fish out of heavy cover, IMO a shorter is more rod efficient for that. Longer rods are pretty accurate, but not to targets the the size of a tin can lid. There is always discussion about "moving a fish around", a shorter rod with the same power I think does a better job. Fatigue and soreness can be an issue with a longer rod, I don't think too conducive for certain bass techniques. Longer rods a really nice in open water, the nature of the way they are casted is actually less tiring, they are long flowing casts letting the rod do the work, not snap casting.

I'm standing pat on simplicity.

I never knew fishing was so complicated.

I'd rather grille it

If I were a logger this is what I would do. I'm sure every one knows this already, so this is just a reminder. Google has spread sheets and docs, once made they are automatically stored into "Drive. Google has create a map, those maps are stored into Drive automatically as well, in addition your camera can upload pics into your Drive folder. Drive syncs in both directions, pc to phone and phone to pc, again automatically. Whether at home or away you can have all your info with you perfectly updated.

I don't care to fish with anything longer than a 7' rod for bass. I don't need the distance that an 8' or longer rod will give and I don't I get as good a hookset. I use 8' rods all the time just not for bass fishing. Longer rods have longer butts, IMO harder to handle for bass. I fish out of a center console boat, an 8' rod is a bit awkward if there is a bimini top. I use my longer rods only for fishing the surf and off jetties.

That lake isn't that new, I fished it years ago. It had been greatly enlarged since about 2004.

Adam, that was the initial episode that soured me on Shimano. Since that time there have been a few other issues with them that left a bitter taste in my mouth. Shimano, best game in town, well not for me.

I appreciate the suggestions, I've had photobucket, tiny pics, image shack and imgur for years already, with created albums under several email accounts. As much as I have on those services I have even more in my PC that have never been uploaded. My mistake was spreading it around too much, now it's overwhelming. I've disabled auto back up from google + and verizon , just more overlapping. Consolidating is a lot of work, just may have to devote some time to it. I like dropbox with auto upload and can create albums there too.

My total purchases in the last month have been 4 roostertails, 2 are still in the unopened package. I'm catching fish everyday, so much for a bait monkey.

A spread sheet works well. I keep track of my reel maintenance on one but that's about it for me. I choose not to take time away from fishing to record data. Those few moments may or may not cost me a good fish, not worth the gamble.

Summer is when I curtail my bass fishing, actually from May to about mid October. Not only is the bite slower in South Florida the gnats drive me crazy. The noseeums down at the ocean are no picnic, but they don't stay around too long after sun up.

I seldom look at the 100's of my pictures. I've got pics stored in my pc, a few cloud services, google + and my smartphone, a lot of needless overlapping. Not only do I have freshwater and saltwater pictures, I have family pictures, events and all sorts of things. Not all of it is under Sirsnookalot, which adds to the confusion. I want to centralize everything but going thru all of this is a monumental task, that's too time time consuming. I'm thinking about deleting everything (all but my grandchildren) and start from scratch, it's hard to pull that trigger. I wonder why I keep a picture of a 5 pounder laying next to a rod, that's anything but a photo op. I'm leaning towards dropbox.

Exactly how I learned the knot, my dad. Over the years I've only added a few different knots, the only big deal I make is tying them correctly. At least any of the knots I use when tied properly I have 100% confidence. Fish enough and a poorly tied knot is going to get past ya everyone once in a while, that's the human factor.

At the time it happened I posted my displeasure about the voided warranty episode, Bantam swore up and down they don't do that. I didn't buy what he said then and I don't buy it now. Thought this might be an interesting sidebar. I used to fish out of the Palm Beach inlet once a week, there happens to be an Authorized Shimano repair center there, Lott Bros. Lott Bros is quite the tackle shop, I take one of my Shimanos in for repair and the tech tells me he uses nothing but Corrosion Block instead of oil, regardless of reel brand. After his suggestion I started using it, pretty darn good stuff.

All I use is standard clinch for hooks & jig heads, fresh & salt.

This morning I blew it, all my fault as I didn't heed my own advice. Had about 6 or 7 groups of jacks coming in, time wise longer spacing between groups than the last few days. I casted into them instead of ahead, by the time the lure hit the water which was only about 15', they half way to the Bahamas. I wound up only with 2 about 6# each.