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I love night fishing and make great effort to do so whenever my schedule allows. Hitting the water at 3am is my idea of night fishing, though. I learned how to feel my lures better and it made me more effective at worming and slow rolling heavy spinnerbaits. I also learned you should NEVER use treble-hooked topwater lures unless you're wearing shop glasses for eye protection. It's awfully easy to launch a topwater at yourself in the dark.

A hissing river Snapping Turtle with a shell that was about 18" front to back. I couldn't remove the hook. It was hooked twice in the neck with a Husky Jerk. That thing was ANGRY and very scary. I was 13 or 14 and wading in knee deep water, far from any solid shoreline. It was flailing and it clawed a small hole in my waders. I cut the line and wished the turtle luck.

Well put, Raul.

This is all good to know.

Premier > Mojo

Agreed. Unless the fish is a dink, I find myself leading fish into deeper water and playing them more patiently on MM rods than with any other baitcasting setup I've used. It took a little while to get the hang of how I need to position the boat with MM cranking sticks, because you cannot steer fish away from cover with these things.

I prefer to use 7'5", 7'6", and 7'11" MH and H rods for my T Rigs and jigs, but a shorter rod gives a different feel. I could see how some would prefer it. With a 6'6" rod, you have to work the rod a little more to give the bait action than you would with a 7'6", and it feels to me like you have more precise control over the action of the lure. With a longer rod, you barely have to twitch the rod it seems to get the T-Rig to hop 6". It takes a little getting used to when you start using long rods for jigging and worming. This is the same reason why I feel most comfortable using a 6' spin rod for shaky worms, because I feel I have a little better control and it's easier to keep the action subtle.

Did you keep the receipt?

One of the best. That color combo makes a good spinnerbait skirt, also. A little bit of orange nail polish on the belly doesn't hurt either.

Heck, you live right on the St. Croix. There's plenty of good bassin in your backyard. Get you self some felt bottom wading boots and some canvas waders or light, loose hunting pants and try wading. The boots are important. They will keep you upright. Old Nikes will not. Get a few of these buzzbaits, a couple gold shiner spinnerbaits, a few X Raps and small lipless crankbaits, some watermelon and smoke tube jigs, and some white Zoom Super Flukes and put them in a fanny pack. Look for structure, something out of the ordinary. Tributaries, wingdams, islands, backwaters, bridges, boulder fields, shallow riffles and the deep pools behind them, etc. http://www.basspro.com/webapp/wcs/stores/servlet/Product_10151_-1_10001_58847_100006000_100000000_100006000_100-6-0 The Mississippi nearest to you is dammed up for hydroelectricity and shipping and is much deeper than the St. Croix. You'll likely need a boat to cover any ground. The Miss gets shallower above Monticello, and fishing is terrific on the Little Falls to St. Cloud stretch, but thats a pretty long haul. You don't have to travel to the Mississippi. Hit up the St. Croix and it's tribs. Wade slow with short steps, be careful until you find your feet. You'll find some hawgs that have never seen lures in some unlikely places if you're willing to get a little adventurous and do some hiking. http://www.mnmississippiriver.com/

Good to know. I've only used the 4, 6, and 17# tests. I like the lighter tests quite a bit, but I wasn't happy at all with the 17# test for pitching. My distance was very limited and the memory was like nothing I've used before, and I ended up stripping it off after a few trips and using it for C Rig leaders around nasty snags.

I read online : that P-Line CXX has greater strength then what it lists, and that the breaking point of the 6# test line is closer to 10 lbs. I'm very skeptical. Is this nonsense? This would be a terrific selling point if it were true, yet it's not being used to market CXX. Thanks for being patient.

I don't use all spinning combos, but I have a few. 7' MHF St. Croix Avid/Shimano Sustain 2500/20 lb braid. For dock skipping and snap jigging heavy tube jigs. 6' MF Loomis GLX/Shimano Sustain 2500/10-15 lb braid with 8 lb. fluoro leader. For shake worms. 7' 6" MLF Custom/Shimano Saros 2500/8 lb fluoro. For drop shot, tube jigs, and flukes. Originally for river smallie wade-fishing. 6' 6" MLF St. Croix Premier/old Shimano Stradic 2500/8 lb. CXX. For small, light jerkbaits and poppers in light cover. 6' LF Scheels Guide Series/Pflueger Maxx/4-6 lb. CXX. For panfish and occasional light finesse bass fishing.

The whole line feels like cranking sticks.

I don't agree. I have owned a handful of flyrods and used many more, including mid to high-end Sage and St. Croix rods. The guides on these are straight as an arrow. When stripping line, the line is held against the cork handle by the index finger of the hand holding the rod, and stripped straight down with the other hand. This is the flyfisherman's "anti-reverse." Holding the line next to the reel would negate any advantage of off-center guides.

I usually fill the spool about 40-60% with mono backing. Some may prefer not to feel it, but I want to be able to just barely begin feeling the bump on the spool from the knot after I've thrown my longest cast and stripped off 10 more yards. This way I conserve a little so I can respool frequently without breaking the bank. It takes a little trial and error with each reel, but once the backing length is figured out, it stays on the reels for a long time.

Thanks for voting people. I ask because I had restored the handles on all of my rods and I was thinking of sealing them. I found this on the Rodbuildingforum.com and gave it a try to get some of the hand-oil gloss off of the cork handles of my older rods. I was very gentle and careful not to remove anymore cork then I had to. I did the sanding it a bucket of water to note exactly how much cork was being removed, which was surprisingly little. I tried it on St. Croix, G. Loomis, Shimano, and Dobyns rods with no ill effect. Not a bad little trick for those who may be selling used rods online. Here's the quote on how to restore you rod handles to like-new condition: "I have been building, refinishing and restoring (Bamboo) fly rods for almost 20 years. I learned this craft from a notable bamboo rod historian and restorer in Sisters, Oregon. Our technique is to use Super Fine-400 Grit wet-or-dry automotive sandpaper...wet. 1st: protect all other rod surfaces (reel seats, hook keepers, bamboo ,glass or graphite) from errant abrasion with regular masking tape, leaving only the cork you wish to clean exposed. Next soak a small 4" x 6" pc of 400 grit sand paper under running water. I prefer warm water at the kitchen sink. Then place the cork under the warm running water while avoiding wetting the the masked areas as much as possible. Begin to sand lightly "long-ways", parallel to the rod while simultaneously rotating the grip. Rinse often to re-wet and check progress. Do not sand around the the grip(perpendicular to the shaft) as it may dislodge cork pith. I do not use any type of soap or detergent as I believe it can leave undesirable residue. This technique scarcely removes any cork material and can smooth out unwanted ridges from improperly cared for grips. Pat dry with a towel and let air dry. If done properly, when dry, your result will be silky-smooth grip. Better than original. Repeat if necessary then carefully remove masking tape ASAP. I do this to all the grips on all my rods, even after a season's use. Patina is nice, but over-rated, except on unfishable rods, like antiques or collectibles too valuable to fish anymore, anyway. LAST and MOST IMPORTANTLY. NEVER use any kind of a scrub brush as it will remove the softer cork material and cause unsightly ridges that can de-valuate your rod. If this has has already occurred, the above technique can help reverse that process. I believe you will be pleasantly surprised by the results. Good luck."

Yeah, that might be the best bet. My experiences with Shimano customer service have been good so far with the one defective reel that I had years ago. Ern is right, too. It doesn't take long for some receipts to fade and become illegible, even when stored in a folder in a file cabinet.

I know what you mean, Stan. Sometimes it is fun to downsize tackle for a good fight. It does take some skill and patience to land bass on L and UL gear, and it gives you an appreciation of the fishes strength after you've maybe started taking it for granted after hauling them in with ease on heavier tackle. I sometimes skip 1/16 oz finesse tube jigs to docks on L power rods and 6# line not only for the added challenge, but also because it's a killer cold front presentation. But for the most part, I try my best to get as many bites as possible, and lip every bass that strikes my lure. Getting the bass in my hands is what is the most fun for me, and I hate when they shake the lure. That's why I usually horse them in and toss em back after a few seconds and recast.

Viscous can't be any worse than Berkley Vanish fluoro!

Try setting one of these in the lake, baited with a can of cat food. Tie a 1 liter pop bottle to a rope so that the bottle hangs a foot under the surface so people won't likely spot it and ****** it. I started doing this last year and found that many craws do have significant blue coloring to them. Many of the craws that I caught were dark olive and gray with blue-gray bellies and some hints of purple and bright green around the claws. I got a pretty good idea what color and size craws were living on my favorite rockpiles, and best matched them up with green pumpkin/blue belly jigs with junebug trailers. http://crawfishbaitshop.com/ Edit: They have these same Frabill traps at Cabela's but I wasn't able to link them because of the BR rules against all-caps posts.

I don't really see the use in buying swim jigs. A 3/16 or 1/4 standard jig with a pointed head does practically the same thing IMO. The little bit of lift from the flattened, planing head of a swim jig is insignificant. I often skip 1/4 oz grass jigs with trimmed skirts and small beavers or grubs as trailers under docks, and swim them out erratically. They work very well under docks that have quite a few of those pesky chains that tend to snag tube jigs and wacky Senkos. I did have some luck using white 1/4 grass jigs with smoke or white single-tail 4" grubs last year when the bite was slow in the early fall transition period. The fish weren't chasing or hitting spinnerbaits or lipless cranks, but they would hit a similar profile swim jig with a good sized trailer fished with a lift drop motion.

That could be what's happening in my favorite local lake. It's actually two small connected lakes totaling about 400 acres , much of which is less than 4' deep. The lake is almost entirely surrounded by corn and alfalfa fields, plus a small bird preserve. Right away when I first saw the pea-soup green water, I knew that the water was heavily affected by farm runoff because most of the local lakes have very clear water and this one has 1-2' visibility. Aside from a few mucky bays with moderate lily pad growth, the lake is almost devoid of significant weed growth. The only weeds are a handful of sporadic coontail clumps that are only a foot or two wide. But this lake provides the best bass fishing locally, with a 3 lb daily averages being common, with 4 and 5 lb fish almost every trip and rarely a fish under 1.5 lbs. I always wondered why the lake could be so rich in plankton yet have so few weeds. But I wish more lakes had that heavy phosphorus content. They make for great Run and Gun fishing. Anybody have any thoughts on this?

Has anybody with a broken rod had their warranty claim denied because they failed to produce a valid sales receipt, either with an over-the-counter claim or from Shimano themselves? I've heard many people say that they've returned their rods to BPS or Cabela's for an immediate exchange from stock without any hassle, even if they weren't the original owner. Some were turned away simply because it's up to the store if they want to issue OTC exchanges on Shimano rods, receipt or not. But the 2010 catalog says you need a dated sales receipt. Here is a PDF file of the entire 2010 Shimano catalog. The warranty info is on page 3. http://fish.shimano.com/publish/content/global_fish/en/us/index/customer_service0/catalogs.download.-mainParsys-000107-downloadFile.html/Shimano_2010_Catalog.pdf

The clacker is usually a brass bead that knocks against the glass bead, making more noise than just the main sinker and glass bead will. It goes like this. Main sinker - 1 or 2 glass beads - clacker - plastic bead - knot. An example of the clacker/ticker. http://cgi.ebay.com/TUNGSTEN-CAROLINA-CLACKER-BEADS,-TICKER,-1-OZ,-2-RIGS_W0QQitemZ120541683618QQcmdZViewItemQQimsxZ20100313?IMSfp=TL100313131007r28715