D4u2s0t

i picked up some shads and tried them for the first time sunday. didn't catch any, but dang, does that bait move some water

yea, the worst part is thinking about what could have been on there, especially knowing that there's huge musky, pickerel, and walleye in the lake. a guy recently pulled a 13.5 pound walleye out,and put it back, a friend of a friend caught a huge musky. i got a 2 foot pickerel that was real skinny on a spinnerbait, but haven't tried much for musky or walleye.

I throw watermellon, buddy throws white, other buddy throws red, all get pretty much equal amounts of fish.

WHAT KNOT ARE YOU TYING???? If your losing fish with 14lb test, its either bad line or a bad knot or your just trying to tank those fish, Or its something with teeth. Maybe the lock nest monster lives in that spot. I would try throwing rope out next time. u ever see a pickerel? I have them in my lake along with musky, and while targeting bass without leaders they will easily rip right through the line. I've had them rip plastics in half clean, and didn't even feel the bite. I've also had them take the hook and all, and again just felt a tiny nibble, and then the line is incredibly light. reel in, gone.

bass are a very aggressive fish. have you ever seen a topwater bite? what happened is not unusual at all. one time I caught a bass, was releasing it, and I swear it turned around, looked me dead in the face, and jumped out of the water at me haha.

from my experience, if they take one color they'll take them all. that being said i use some type of watermelon, because i like how it looks. look through any of these type of posts, or posts about the "best worm" or "Best buzzbait" or "best anything" and you'll get a ton of different answers. the reason for that is plain and simple, there is no best. If 1 or 2 colors were superior, there wouldn't be a bajillion colors to choose from.

well then that's just your preference, which you're entitled to. I fished the shad last night, and if you saw it in the water it would be hard to believe it was a soft plastic. It spit out more water than my friends 10 dollar top notch buzz bait. I like other baits besides the rage tail lineup, but I don't think anyone can say that they don't have better action and more versatility than most other baits out there.

you didn't answer any of my questions. also, if lure selection is not important, which is the whole point of your post, why would you have to cover all the water to "establish a lure preference".

my questions, and i'm seriously asking not just trying to disagree (i value your input, and enjoy reading your posts. thanks!) 1. if lure selection doesn't matter, once he found the sweet spot why did he keep changing lures 2. once you find a good area, should you not take depth into consideration? a buzzbait will work just as well as crawling something off the bottom regardless of depth? sounds to me like he was trying to cover all depths. i know that bass will come some distance to take the bait, but suppose the fish are at 15 feet, wouldn't it make more sense to choose a bait that gets down to 15 feet? 3. why in some sweet spots will certain baits work and others won't, if lure selection is not important? i can throw certain baits all day in some areas that produce nothing. change it up, and start catching fish. thanks, and i look forward to the responses!

looks to be around 3 pounds... always hard to tell from a picture, but definitely doesn't look to be anywhere near 5. either way it's a nice fish

i do both, but probably stand more than sit.

my advice is to just be patient, and remember that the first couple times out there will be a learning curve, just like the first time you fished off the shore and had to find the good spots. even fishing the same spots you're used to, when you're out on the water it seems different.

i agree with what he did 100%, and while i'm not saying it's a good thing to kill someone, regardless, who knows what this guy would have went on to do after he robbed this old man. he could have went home, and changed his life and started being an asset to society. historically, that's not the case. suppose this man robbed the house, and lived on, and went to another house, because 'he doesn't deserve to die'. now suppose it was YOUR house, and he robbed you, traumatized your family, and did god knows what else. you still wouldn't rather have the old man kill this guy and get him off the streets? it's always easy to look in on a situation from the outside and say 'i would do this' or 'i would say that' but when it comes down to it most people would not think that way after the fact. suppose this guy had been robbing houses for a year, raped some girl, stole someones car, etc. i don't know about anyone else, but i would shake the old mans hand and tell him thanks. yea, i'm sure he's not happy about killing someone. but i bet he's happier than knowing the guy got away will his posessions, and can be back at any time. now, that won't happen.

I sometimes just swim it back, i don't think one way is better than the other, just depends what gets it in front of the fish that day.

X2, the first time I caught a smallmouth over 4lbs I thought I had hooked a huge channel cat or a giant carp. Smallmouth are incredible! haha yea... i was out one day, pole bent in half, i said "O crap, that's gonna be a huge one!" was less than 2 pounds haha.

i have some type of soft plastic tied on almost 100% of the time. everyone around says topwater in morning and evening, spinnerbait at this time, crankbait at this time, and while they're walking around tying on new baits, i'm catching fish on my plastics! lol. i love them in all conditions, and all times of day.

a few things you forgot to mention is how deep is the water, what's the temps compared to the rest of the lake, and are you sure there are fish there? what baits are you using? maybe your fishing too deep, or too shallow, or in water that's not holding fish? even though an area may seem like an ideal place for fish to be, without knowing more info it may not be as ideal as it seems. if you've caught 2 fish all year, i'm going to venture out and say the problem is one of 2 things, either your technique, or there's simply no fish. someone with little to no experience should be able to catch more than 2 fish in an area that's holding, spread out over a year.

My lake has a few bubblers in it. d**n i'd be upset if this happened. Luckily my lake is the backup resevoir for the newark watershed, so it undergoes weekly testing and is very clean. But I can't imagine the feeling to go to my favorite lake and to find all the fish belly up. Sorry to hear that

with spinnerbaits, it's important to understand the different types of blades, what they do, how they work, and what conditions to use them. Glen posted a great video about spinnerbaits, I would check it out. I have not caught any bass yet on crankbaits this year, but have got a ton of perch lol. Most of my bigger bass this year (yet to break the 5 pound mark, was ounces away though) have been on soft plastics. I've been doing very well with the rage tail space monkey, and the *** line of trick sticks, 6" flukes, and 6" hogs.

welcome, and where abouts in jersey are you? Start out by telling us what techniques you use, what baits, etc.

depending on how high the weeds are, what about swimming something over the tops? A senko rigged weedless will swim very eratically when jerked, and with practice you can keep it towards the top of the weedline if it's too thick otherwise. or even a spinnerbait kept to the top of the surface.

this is where an informed consumer comes in handy. of course you can only "void" the warrenty on the parts affected directly by the tune, or performance mods. Most people don't know the difference, so they won't fight it, but you would lose that fight if the mods were not the direct cause of the failure. I've had warranty work done on my car that they didn't want to do, but since I knew my rights they just went ahead and fixed it. yea there's the bs ways that scumbag techs can word it to make it stick, but that's just a dirty move. But i've always been honest and have always felt like if it's my fault something broke, I should man up and fix it. Unfortunately, not everyone is like that. as far as handheld tuners, yea they'll help, but they're a waste of money compared to a real tune.

how do you do on live bait? I have fished live bait succesfully in other areas, but on my lakes i've never caught a bass on live bait. 10 seconds after the bait hits the water there's either a perch or a sunny on the line. I don't know if this qualifies, but I think the most underrated is patience and slowing down when the bite is slow. I see guys burning spinnerbaits and topwater, and catch nothing. Moving from spot to spot like they're in a race. Slow it down, have some patience, and the fish will come!

I also find that completely weightless I can't cast them very far. That's fine if you're close to your target and don't need to cast far, but I prefer the weight for the extra casting distance, and the movement. Weightless, they will probably still catch fish, but they don't do much in the water. get a weight on there, and they really come to life!

they're not available yet.