Tuckman

SmallieFever, I see in your pic that you are fishing out in front of the state park in branchport...now I know your hotspot

My fishing partner for the team tournaments I do usually rolls into my driveway in the morning with the back of his pickup looking like aisle 5 at bass pro shops. I can usually talk him down to less than a dozen rods, and a tackle bag, but if he feels he needs it Ill let him bring it because confident partners are the only ones that catch fish. In a team event anything that is mine in the boat is his to use too.

V&M Lures makes a shaved beaver that everyone should try out at least once;...slides through the grass alot easier and fish just seem eat it better than one with bumps on it...

I bet the other guys in your bass club are looking at this pic right now and trying to recognize the cove in the background...

I think I might have to try one of these out...I'll soon be in the market for a new master for Mr. Frog... I hope the 7ft heavy can handle 50lb Power Pro 8-)

Paul I have tried to raise smallies in one of our deeper(20ft)ponds and it seems smallies that just dont seem to do very in well in ponds esp. competing with largemouth...On the other hand one of my friends put one big smallie in his pond full of small largemouth and it became the dominate fish and grew very huge in very short time... My own thought on this is that smallies are better at adapting to the environment around thier prey(nomadic foragers), while largemouths are better at adapting to the prey around thier environment.(opportunity foragers) I'm sure there is way more to it than that tho

I've been on the edge of buying a B&R outlaw for a while now, but I cant find out enough info on them either...They claim on thier website that they dont want to disclose where they get their rod blanks from and I really like to know what I got in my hand, so I havent made up my mind yet.

I'm surprised that there was not any largemouth at all in the warm water outlet, maybe it will take a few weeks for them to get out of their winter haunts. The earliest we have hit it is around march 20th and usually get a few. Painted rock is about a mile up the east side, its easy to see cuz' the entire bluff wall has "indian" gafitti on it for like a mile, but it drops of to 80-100ft about 30 yards from shore so they like to winter there. I put a charge on my boat today so if the weather clears I might have to go see whats goin on out there...BTW did you try any hair jigs or grubs today? At least you got out there 8-)

I dont think that there is another smallmouth bait as versitle as a grub...the little swimbaits are good minnow imitators, but I can use a grub as an all around craw/baitfish application top to bottom, spring to fall...I have a fat albert or a kalins tied on everytime I hit smallie water and I do not see that changing anytime soon

Let me kno how you do out there...If the fish are eatin' I might have to go down tmrw 8-) I drove over the canal in Watkins yesterday and it was open just about to the ramp, but not quite, so if your launching out of the canal I hope that the ice melted back about 30 yards overnight, lol. I was down at the Seneca Marine bait shop and they said that people are gettin smallies out in front of the canal on the first big drop, and off painted rock as well so I'd like to give those spots and the cargill plant a try if I get out there...The fish usually winter off the bluff at painted rock so If I cant catch em its not cuz' they aren't there. I bet that waters cold today

For one the gears on your baitcaster are disengaged on the cast. The Quantum baitcasters do have a distinctive whizzing sound when they cast but it is not the gears grinding and it is not because there is something wrong with the reel!!!! I fish hard too and my Quantums reels have served me very well!!! Between the two I would say the Zilloin is the better reel but I have used the Energy reels for several years and they are very good reels!!!! Well this was just my own experience with them...I actually didn't even get the Energy out of the box until this past july, and by october it was toast...the button sticks on the cast, and when I'm ripping the bait in weeds the reel disingages itself causing huge backlashes...the grinding these reel makes is not a factory built in grinding sound unless Quantum intends for me to use it to churn butter as a side job...The two PT 500's have buttons that stick on the cast as well, and the internal gears are shot ; they didn''t last a year...unacceptable for 150-200$ reels. I did have luck with one of the old 70$ PT gold series, which is why I bought these 3... 1 for 4 isnt so bad?... :-? The bad thing is that I bought the Energy NIB off a private dealer so I cant return it...I wont be buying anymore Quantums anytime soon. JMO

Beardog, I hear ya on the dock fishing hassel...When the sun gets high I like to go flip a dinger around the docks in front of the sorority houses at Keuka College...Geez you'd think those girls had never seen a yum dinger before... ;D ;D

Junebug dingers are dynamite

I picked up a new Quantum Energy and two PT 500s last year...all three of them are garbage...I fish hard and Quantum wasnt up to the task...Everyone on the lake knows where I'm throwing traps cuz' they can hear the gears grinding on everycast...My lucks been with Shimano or Abu.

The Finger Lakes are infested with Palegic baitfish, but chautaugua on the other hand is one of the few New York lakes that has not been hit with the palegic baitfish infestation. The fish were gorging on perch and craws when I was there last fall. One awesome thing that goes with not having palegic baitfish is that the smallies feed in shallow year round so you can easily reach them with normal presentations...you can go down an 8ft weedline in midsummer flippin a jig and hit 4-5lb smallies and largemouths alike...thats a dream lake as far as Im concerned

Huskybass thats another fat toad...these fish are prime examples of when the smallies get on a feeding frenzy they eat way faster than they can grow, so they just expand instead ;D

To be considered a priority registrant in any FLW tournament you have to own a Ranger Boat...they have a secondary deal for stratos and champion owners for the stren series, but all the other boat brand owners are left to scrabble over whatever is left...If your in the finals in a FLW major you may have to promote the FLW sponsors regardless of your loyalties.

Zoom Baby Brushhog on a sledhead

Oh Yea...Its more than smokin' in October...The last few years that fall open tourny that Chautauqua Bassmasters hosts has had some unbelievable weights...If you only have 20lbs, you might as well go home early!!!

Try out some green bean sticks...twice the fiber at half the price

Well you guys are all close...I wish that I could say that she was a 7lbr, but I got 6.33 out of her on the cull-em-rite scale, but I'm sure not complaining!. I think if she had another in inch on her she would have cracked 7 though!!! I caught her on one of the original Excalibur #6 Fat Free shads in a citrus color. I had just given the lure an onsite custom paint job with permanant markers(black stripes and orange belly to make it look more like a perch), and that was the ticket...I also caught a 5.9 and a 5.3 off the same spot, same lure, same day!!! Paul Roberts, I did see of those 7 pound smallmouths that Chautaugua is known for... The day after I caught this toad, I was reeling in a "small" 4lbr and the mother of all smallies came up trying to take the crank out of its mouth, she came right up to the boat with the other one and it looked like she was trying to eat the 4lbr!...Me and my buddy caught numerous fish between 5 and 6 lbs in the 3 days we fished Chautaugua, and this big mamma was in another class alltogether...I'll be back for her next fall!!! 8-)

I tied an Owner sled head on back in the summer of '99 and never looked back... ;D

Where did you find that style of head for those swimming jigs??? They look pretty cool.

Gambler has been putting a few sponserships out there now...They might not be as quite fast as an Allison or a Bullet, but they have a ton of creature comforts, storage, a huge front deck, and there wont be many boats passing a Gambler down the lake. Not to mention they just look hella' nasty. On a side note One of my buddies picked up a new Stratos 294PXL with a 200 Vmax on back, and that boat flat out leaves 225's and some 250's in its wake...especially those Heavy Rangers...I think that the reason that the famous "Ranger Ride" is so important is because it takes so long to get to your spot... 8-)

Timmy Horton Dean Rojas Big Show Scroggins