senko_77

That is a plump fish Chris! What kind of jerkbaits are you gettin em with? Are they shallow or deep divers?

Dude that black stripe running down that bass is amazing. That would be one of the times I would consider mounting. I wan't to get a skin mount of a good looking fish rather than a big fish. Beautiful fish man! Can't wait till the Working Girls start smackin em!

My biggest problem with the bait is the same as Randall. It spirals on the cast and if there is heavy wind, it can be a problem. You can still get some distance on it, but I really wish they could have solved this before they put it in production. I think it is worth the $20, but I have not had the opportunity to try the Tru-Tungsten Shad or the Reaction Strike so I can't honestly compare them.

Lol. All the people who said it was a one time deal were completely uninformed/uneducated when they made that statement ;D That fish is a pig. Anyone know what he caught it on?

That's a straight toad dude! Congrats!

Everyone's answer is correct. It's the "threadfin" of threadfin and gizzard shad. It's these little details that Spro puts on their baits that make me love the company.

RW, I believe that too. I think that a lipless crankbait will draw fish in with it sound, kinda like how the swimbait guys in California move fish around a point to get a perfect angle. KMS - Just another thing to think about, a lot of times you can use the lipless crankbait to catch inactive fish. It's an excellent reaction bait and if you put it in front of a big girl and give it a pop, they will hit the bait 9 times out of 10. I was out fishing yesterday and the fish wouldn't hit anything, including a c-rig. I pulled out the trap and started ripping it through shallow areas where I though the females would be sitting before they spawn, and everytime I would hit a clump of grass or wood, I would rip it, and a big fish would load up. So basically, don't just think it catches actively feeding fish, because if you use the right retrieve, it will catch fish in a negative feeding mood that even a worm might not catch. ;D

YES!!!! It sounds like you can get a good spinnerbait bite going with the cloud cover. Good luck man!

Thug smallies, Thad! You a Sox fan?

That's a fine lookin fish Chris! Glad ya'll smacked em dude. Cya in a month!

jerkbaits, jerkbaits, jerkbaits, and jerkbaits

Lunker Lure buzzbait or a Spro Bronzeye twitched around shallow wood. I really like a buzzbait in the early spring, but I use it extremely slow. Has anyone ever had experience with that buzzbait made by Warrior? I fished with a guy at Lake Murray who was fishing this thing and he was CRAWLING it on the top. I have never seen a buzzbait move so slow. He spanked me with that thing too. I am going to be buying some soon. http://warriorbaits.com/

NWA 8-) LOL. Hit Em Up by Tupac

Gamakatsu for sure. PM if you need me to send some to you. I have a bunch of the 1/0 trebles if you wanna test them out.

I listen to my ipod all the time on the water, especially in tournaments. It helps me get in the zone and pumps me up. I have certain songs for certain situations.

1) When you use a splitshot, how do you work the rod? Same as a texas rig or more of a side/twitching motion? Do you use it on a baitcaster or spinning reel? I cant get a splitshot to cast on a baitcaster, only a spinning rod which makes me warry of using it. I guess Im paranoid that someday the big one will catch me on 10 or 12lb monofilament in weeds/sticks and Ill end up loosing a fish of a lifetime. Im much more confident on my baitcasters with 50lb braid and 20lb florocarbon leader. 2) I do use lipless crank baits a good bit and Ive heard everyone say to "rip it over the vegitation" but what about all the junk you get on there? Every time I get it to the boat it has vegitation hanging or is completly balled up in weeds. Do you just ignore that and keep pulling it off before casting back out or is there some trick I am missing? Maybe I should learn to be more aware of how deep I am fishing it and keep it closer to the tops of the weeds. Thats can be hard...maybe part of the learning curve. 3) I use stick baits all the time, love em. Lost my biggest fish on one over submerged grass. Casted out, bent over to get a swig of water and looked up to see the biggest bass Ive ever seen in real life (at least 8lbs is my guess) coming out of the water shaking its head with a senko. As I frantically tried to take up the slack I saw the senko with hook fly out of its mouth and splash about 2 feet away from the fish. To add insult to injury it swirled and did a little half hop again just to re-affirm that it was gigantic. I let loose a triad of cuss words and almost threw my rod in the water before I came to. A guy down the way that was pretty close by when it happend trolled past a little later and said "man, that was a big fish ya lost there, that thing musta been 10lbs!" :'( Oddly enough that incident probably drives me to fish longer and harder than all the ones I have landed Work the split-shot rig with tiny twitches of the rod tip and reel in slowly to keep picking up the slack. Most of the bites are realy soft so pay attention the whole time. I fish it on a spinning reel. If you are worried about hooking a good one and losing it in the grass, put 15-20lb braid with a 12lb Flouro leader. That should give you enough to get the big girls out of there. First off, a bait like the Spro Aruku Shad is made for fishing in grass so it's more weedless than other baits in it's class. What I do to make it more weedless is to take both hooks off and to put a #1 Gamakatsu treble hook on there. It will weigh down the nose even more and make it so the hook points snag less grass. When you cast it out, keep your rod tip up high to control the depth and experiment with retrieve speeds until you feel the bait touching the grass and you only get a small amount on the hooks after some of your retrieves. Bummer about that big fish man! Losing a big one like that is what keeps the fire burning. But the good thing is if you fooled her once, you can do it again. I'm sure she's got some friends in there too that wanna be caught!

My 3 favorite ways to work submerged grass are.... 1. Split-shot rig. I like a 1/32 or 1/64oz water gremlin bullshot weight and I use a Gamakatsu 1/0 ewg hook. It's a super finesse rig that the fish can't stand. It has a real natural fall and movement when you barely twitch it. Plus, because it's so light it won't burry down in the grass. I like using a straight tailed worm like the *** Finesse worm. 2. Wacky rigged cigar type worm like the *** Trick Stick. Pop this thing on a 2/0 Gamakatsu Widegap Finesse hook and your in business. I throw this when I think the fish are suspended over the grass. When it falls past their faces, they are done. 3. GYCB Swimmin' Senko. Take this bait and swim it over the top of the vegetation, and then kill it when you get to a hole or other oddity. The Swimmin Senko slays the fish because you basically have a weedless crankbait, and when you kill it, it falls just like a regular senko style bait. I know you said you only want advice on soft plastics, but I gotta ask if you've tried lipless crankbaits? If you haven't go pick up some Spro Aruku Shads and rip it through the grass......and hold on. Hope this helps man. Good luck.

Lol. Ya'll need to lighten up a bit. You can't tell me that at 16-18, you and your friends wouldn't have hesitated to do this. I'm sure that every one of us here has done our fair share of hell raising. Yes it's wrong, but it's hilarious.

Lol. I really love the fact that people are putting this next to the flying lure and helicopter lure. I am not sponsored by them, so I don't have to sell one bait. If you wouldn't mind, please don't use this bait so the next time I am fishing a tournament against you, I have a serious advantage!!!!

Man the weather has been whack the last 2 days! I fished a BFL yesterday and it rained hard all day and at weigh-in it was 78 degrees. Now it's in the low 30's and we have about 3-4inches of snow and the roads are all icy. Pretty cool stuff and pretty rare to see snow in central Georgia on the first of March!

If you have a company or 2 that you use exclusively, slap their logo on your shirt. if you have some success and get your name/pics out there, you may be approached by the company. This is how Spro/Gamakatsu sponsored me. I wore their shirt and they contacted me. Good luck man. The BFL's are great. Your gonna have a blast.

The Save Phaces are awesome for a co-angler. I used one all last year and it really helped out with windburn. Like the other guys said, the motorcycle helmet is way warmer when it's chilly out but I think they are to hot for summer.

Cruising schools of bass are tough to catch when you can see them. Don't try to throw at the school you can see. Fan cast the area and try and hit a group of fish that you haven't seen yet. The reason they are spooked by your bait is because if you can see them, then they see you. Make sure the bait your throwing lands gently in the water. Use side arm casts to keep the bait low to the water and slowly feather it in. This will spook them a lot less.

Ike fished the Laser Lure shallow diver on days 1 & 2 and when the front came through on Saturday night, he switched to all soft plastics on day 3. His decision was perfect and is why he almost won the thing from 9th place. The Laser Lure would have been a dumb choice for day 3.

The lure has Lucky Craft quality so when the light goes out, you have a real nice bait. They are absolutely worth the money IMO. Like someone said before, the blinking popper early morning or late in the day is just stupid awesome. The fish kill it.