Shad_Master

A guy that I fished with last year uses a "top to bottom" approach. He starts out with a top water (buzz bait or spook type), then swithches to a spinner bait, then a shawllow crank, a medium crank and then a worm or jig as the day goes on. Once he finds where the fish are located in the water column, he can refine what he is throwing until the conditions change.

The kinami's are made by Gary Yamamoto's son. The story is that he gave his son access to the molds, but not the formula. There are a lot of "knock offs" of Senko's that work just as well. Last week in a tournament, my partner (boater) took second place using "Trick Sticks" from Wolftackle.com. People using Senko's and Kinami's didn't do as well. Was it the bait or was it that we found fish when others didn't. I would suggest it was some of both.

Probably what has helped me the most is belonging to a local club and fishing the tournaments as a non-boater. I got the chance to fish with lots of different guys and learn what they do well and what they do that I haven't tried.

I have thought about this recently as well. It seems like the dinks are all hungry and will bite anything, but the lunkers are hanging back. I have even thought the lunkers are waiting for the dinks to fatten up before eating them I suppose you will get a lot of advice about throwing bigger baits, but I'm not convinced this is the best way to handle it. I will be curious to see what other responses you get.

I caught the same fish three times yesterday morning in about 10 minutes. I know because this little sucker was blind in one eye, had a big hole in his lip and his cheek was all beat to **** when I caught him the first time. He came from the exact same spot each time.

The debate about color is almost as popular as what kind of line is best. One thing that I read years ago is that you have to think of things from the fishes perspective. We sit up here in the world where the lake is a dark mysterious place and we measure the clarity of the water by how far we can see into it. Fish on the otherhand, live in the water and see everything with the wide open sky as the back drop. If the sky is clear, light will penetrate further into the lake and allow the fish to see colors like chartruese, white, etc. But if the sky or water is dingy they need a darker color to make out what they are seeing. To really understand this, think of a full moon night. The fish are looking up and see the back drop caused by the light reflected from the moon. But to us it is just less dark than normal. At these times, a bait like a black buzz bait or a black worm can work great because they will standout from the overall "brightness" that the fish sees.

IMO the biggest problem on "blue bird" days is the oxygen in the water. When water heats up it looses oxygen and the fish will travel to other parts of the lake/pond/etc. for this reason. The fish that are cruising are looking for a comfort zone and are not necessarily looking to feed. As the water cools down (in the shade) it absorbs more oxygen and also provides a point of ambush.

I thought this was a topic about how I had impacted bass fishing ;D. Actually, I don't usually let the shad have any influence on how or where I fish until the fall and then I try to find them stacked up in coves and pockets where the bass are keeping them coralled. This is a deadly combination during the fall.

I always release my fish, 'cause if I don't, I can't catch them tomorrow . But having said that, there is a magic number that I hold dear in my heart and when I reach that magic number, that fish is going on my wall! If it happended to be a record, you can bet I will get it verified and probably put it where other folks can see it.

I go back to my previous post. I have seen bass in a particular area "shut down" after making several casts and then after 20 minutes or so they will turn on again. I either read an article or saw a TV show where Rick Clunn was talking about fish emitting some kind of something in the water after being hooked that will initially turn the fish on but then will cause them to shut down. The advice from this was to put the fish in the livewell until the bite stops and then release them or catch them at one end of the boat and release them at the other end. Maybe someone remembers this discussion and can link us up.

A buddy of mine always says, "don't throw what they bit on yesterday, throw what they're biting on today". In my humble opinion, the only "lures" that fish get "conditioned" to are the wierd ones that they see alot (anybody tried a helicopter lure recently?). If fish got "conditioned" to worms would people stop using night crawlers? I think a lot more has to do with how the baits are presented and how often the "fishermen" are splashing around. Fish have to feed and they will try for anything that looks like food. They also have a predatory instinct that will cause them to strike at things that look like they might be food or a competitor for the food.

Welcom on board, NJBASSDEVIL.

Another thing you can try in this situation is to just pinch off a piece of the Senko to make the bait smaller and texas rig it. I learned this from a member of our club, who won a tournament with a 1/2 Senko a couple of years back.

If there is a place on your pond where the runoff comes in, this can be a good place to try after the rain. The pond I fish in is an overflow from a golf course water hazard across the street (private) but there is a culvert where the water comes into the pond. after a rain the fish will head to this spot and are usually pretty active as they key in on stuff being washed in through the pipe. Some times I have even let my bait swing back into the pipe while standing on top and pulled fish out of there.

One thing that I tried over the weekend that might help. Try drop shottin. Set your sinker low enough so that you are just over the weeds and dangle a small plastic bait in front of the fish. Caught four in a heavily pressured pond like this in about 45 minutes yesterday. You will need a small hook (Gamagatsu finesse - 1/0). Just fish it slow and don't worry about the gorilla snot you pull up from the bottom.

This can be very frustrating, especially if the boater is fishing a different style than you and it catching fish. If the boater isn't catching fish, speak up and let him know what your suggestions are. I am currently in 5th place overall for my club (after two tournaments) and one of only two non-boaters in the top ten. This may not hold up all year, but what I have done is try to compliment what my boater is doing. If he's throwing spinner baits, I will try throwing cranks. If he is throwing jigs, I will fish a tex-rig, etc. This way I can try to adapt to what is being presented and make the most of it. Talk to your boater, find out what his style is and try to compliment the style.

I'm a firm believer in "when in doubt, set the hook". It really just comes with practice and you will eventually get the hang of it (at least I hope I will :-[). When setting the hook, I was taught "yank on it like it just slapped your Grandma". The other night I set the hook on one and had a real good look at it as it went flying past my face (about a 5"er ;D). I haven't tried Yum Dingers yet, but recently bought a bag of 6" ones that I am holding on to until I need a kicker to finish out my tournament card. But I have used Work Tackle Trick Sticks which are a Senko imitation and can be purchased on line from Wolf Tackle out of Lincoln, NE. They work great and are lots cheaper than Senko's. Don't get me wrong, I still keep some Senko's in my tackle bag, but these are a good alternative.

There is a fella in my local club that has a Stratos and if he is any example, you will not be able to tear this boat up. He abuses his pretty badly and it still keeps humming along. Not sure what would happen if he actually took care of it

Yeah, I forgot about Stockton.

Not sure what you mean by "central Missouri", but you may want to try Truman Lake or Lake of the Ozarks. Both of these are great spots for hookin a hawg. As for stepping up your catch, what baits are you using? I would concentrate on jigs and soft plastics to pull in the bigger ones and don't be afraid to use bigger baits to catch bigger fish.

For a couple of years now my "trophy" standard has been 8.5 lbs. I have come close a couple of times and have considered having a reproduction made of a 6.5 lb'er that I pulled in last year and have measurements and pictures of, but I am still holding out.

I just bought a boat from one of the guys in my club. He hasn't been able to use it for a couple of years due to health reasons and the motor has had to have some minor work done. How long will the oil in the reserve hold up? Should I replace it before putting the motor to work? It does not appear to have any water or dirt in it and the reserve is full.

A lot of it just comes with experience on that particular body of water. If I am having a tough day, I may change baits 30 or 40 times until I find something that seems attractive. I also try to keep a mental notebook (because I am too lazy to keep a real one :-[) about what worked where and when and will start with that. Also, I have a tendency to be stubborn and sometimes will stay with something longer than I should when it is not working. This past week end I lucked out and started hitting fish right away. But when things slowed down, I made a change but kept in mind that the bait they had been hitting on had red flakes. I had tried a green bait with gold flake in the same area and got nothing. So when I changed, I made sure that it was to something with some red on it and they started hitting the new bait. Also, keep in mind the structure and cover that you are fishing. If the area has lots of weeds, reeds, etc. you may want to try someing with some wiggle in it like a lizard or a crawdad. If you know what the forage is, this can help you also.

I have even left the motor down on windy days while fishing in an area with lots of laydowns to serve as an anchor.

I have an '88 Tournament V 18' Tracker that I just bought from a guy who weighs 350# easy and has fished it pretty hard over the years. Unfortunately he fell in a 20' Triton a couple of years back and has had to cut down considerably on his fishing. For my $ Tracker's are a very stable boat and you should have no problems.