deep

All the ones I've ever bought/ fished did have the model/ year/ megabass or Ito stamped, either on top, or on the belly... I'm not an expert on lipped cranks though, hardly fish them. Maybe they're not megabasses.

If you have the model and the year, they are probably real. I didn't mean to say they'd be explicitly marked "megabass" all the time. It might say Ito too. The actual markings would change over time/ year to year. Anyway, I doubt the knockoff blanks existed 15+ years back.

Something seems off with those Lucky Craft boxes. Maybe older packaging? The ones I buy seem to have a lot more red. The storm baits with the leaping fish inside the O are older prerapalas, the one with the lightning sign is newer. The megabasses seem to be deep-X's and a couple flap slaps. If they're real megabasses, it'd be marked on the bait. (lots of knockoff blanks). A lot of real megabasses actually do not come stock with Katsuage outbarbs; although most 110s do (not the 110jr though).

Spoken for. Thanks!

Get a popper (popmax/ yellow magic/ splash it/.../ rebel popper they all work) and a walking bait (I like the sammy 100 the best, but even a spook is okay) to start. Or an LC gunfish if it's on the list. Probably my favorite bass-sized topwater. Maybe a buzzbait too (I like the boogerman racket buzz the best but you can get a cavitron) and a waking bait like the Roumba. A floating minnow like the original rapala would be good too. I personally find the smaller sizes hard to cast on casting gear, so I use shallow jerkbaits like the 110 silent riser/ 110 high float instead. I messed around with an 110 flashminnow to make it a slow-mid floater and that thing works lights out too. A frog if you have mats/ weeds/ etc. RI swamp donkey or the forum's popular solution the booyah frog. That should cover most bases. I don't think your rod is heavy (as in powerful) enough to fish stuff like ploppers and pompadours etc. As far as jerkbaits are concerned, I probably have over 25 different models. But to keep it simple, you want a shallow-ish bait like a slender pointer/ pointer, a mid-range one like an 110+1, a deep one like a staysee v2/ kvd deepdiver. I also fish a pointer 100XD which gets down even deeper. Not sure how deep your ponds are, plus fishing deeper diving jerkbaits from the shore might get expensive.

If you have a kayak, I'd get a fishfinder and some buoys. Even a grayscale depthfinder is okay, and a lot better than nothing*. You don't want to fish blind, especially in winter. * I had a portable humminbird that I bought used for $50 and got 2.5 years out of it.

Topwaters.

@Team9nine I concede 10-A and 11-A would be easier to fish. How do you fish a bowl-shaped pond? How about a reservoir with silted in channels? The breaklines are still there, just (a lot) less pronounced. Do you consider a "flat" a structure?

Structure: The bottom of the lake with some unusual features that distinguish it from the surrounding bottom area. (Buck Perry) Structure is the bottom of the lake. If you turned over a smooth aluminium bowl and beat it with a heavy object, the resulting bumps and depressions on the inside of the bowl would be comparable to the high spots, ridges, and depressions found on the bottom of structured lakes. (Bill Murphy) All I'm saying is the whole lake bottom is composed of different structures, separated by breaklines. Some structures hold fish certain times of the year, some hold fish all year round, some are rarely/ never visited by fish. Also, I'm pretty sure you don't have to fish on the bottom to fish structure. I do admit I haven't addressed the catching part yet.

It's impossible to not fish structure as long as my cast lands in the water.. (i.e. when I'm not fishing for squirrels as one of my buddies likes to say). Whether or not the structure itself is attractive to fish, or if I'm fishing breaklines and/ or cover (oops should I have said breaks @Team9nine?) at correct depths on said structure (which would increase my odds) are different questions. And don't even get me started on speed. I think those are the questions the OP is interested in though, unfortunately. As far as @Catt's picture is concerned, I see plenty of structures. Humps, flats, inlets. Well they would be structures when the water comes up. There's a ton more (underwater) that I can't see. I don't see very many sharp breaks (breaklines) at a cursory glance, but sharpness is relative obviously. I have no idea- because we don't have the big picture (quite literally)- if I should fish that spot... Agreed. We should blame Buck Perry for that confusion lol. "Break" sounds too much like "breakline". Call all depth or other (light/ O2/ clarity/ temp/ composition/...) changes breaklines and timber, weeds, docks,... etc cover, and realize that they are fundamentally different, and be done with it.

Bet @Team9nine would have agreed if Tom wanted breaklines instead of breaks... While I don't fish huge lakes or for smallmouths/ spotted bass, what I look for are structures having deep water access (deepest water in the area) and hopefully with breaks (breaklines) at different depths. Use prior knowledge and/ or seasonal habits to find a structure or two I want to start at. Use the depthfinder to find the depth(s) the fish are at, and then fish structures with breaks at those depths. Works well in an ideal world. In practice, it takes me some/ a lot of trial and error (depending on how well the fish cooperate). I do have a lot of confidence fishing hard jerkbaits for suspended (inactive?) fish (NLMB, don't know about other kinds of bass). Doesn't work all the time, but when it works I swear it works pretty well. Once again the trick is to fish a bait that stays at the correct depth.

893 for upto 3/8 oz jigs in light/ moderate cover. I probably prefer slightly less powerful rods than most folks though. The 873CRR is ~1/2 power heavier.

I drive a 97 Sentra; which works perfectly fine by the way, even cartops my kayak. Please tell me what your sedans/ trucks/ SUVs cost you, and I'll happily return the favor and call you stupid too.

You want a fast-ish rod (moderate fast is fine, but not a parabolic rod) and a somewhat fast reel (5:1 or faster). The 754 Fred's magic stick is okay for the 168 size S-waver. No idea what the Ganterels weigh. You might want a real 5 power (MH) swimbait rod for anything over 1.5 ozs. If you're buying a new rod, I'd research the Okuma MH guide series rods. Cheap, and works great for the small baits you're planning to fish. The 7'6" is faster than the 7'11" in the older cork handled rods. Don't know about the newer models. I used to have a Mattlures MH rod that was great for the 6" baits. They don't make them anymore, but you might be able to find one on Ebay. The Dobyns 795 will probably work great too. I use a GGR Light now; but they don't make them anymore either.

Tough fishing yesterday. Some dinks and a couple 2-2.5# fish.

Used cardiffs go for *well* under $100.

They sponsor ***. EDIT: they sponsor another bass board.

I don't follow solunar charts as such, but I do believe moon phase influences *adult* fish location and activity. By *moon phase* I mean a 3-7 day period, and obviously no fish is active all 24 hours. I feel just being on the water during certain moon phases offers me a better chance (chance, not guarantee) of catching big fish - fishing for big bass is about putting the odds in your favor. However, local weather still plays at least as important a part though. Now how do you find which moon phase is good for you? Look at Murphy's Hannon's or Tom's charts and they are all different lol. My *guess* is because they like(d) to fish differently? depth/ speed. The only practical way to find out what works well *for you* is to fish a few different reservoirs as often and as hard as you can for a few years without any assumptions, plot the 4#+ fish catches on different charts (one for each reservoir), and see if your catches are correlated with the phase of the moon in any way. Disclaimers: On at least one of the lakes I fish, my moon phase theory does not hold good. I have caught adult fish there pretty much every day of the 28 day period. Also, I feel if you can find small/ juvenile bass, you can usually catch them- at least where I'm at- and therefore the moon phase isn't too important in that case. Weather still plays a factor.

If he's up north, he needs a few Pats. (Or so I hear.) What are you looking to spend? There are cheap and easy to acquire baits like hudds and s-wavers. There are slightly or a lot more expensive baits that are also easy to acquire like mattlures and negotiators. Then there are baits that are next to impossible to find for sale, like the Pats and a few others; and therefore the market price is 3-5 times the retail... P.S. Glide baits: hinkle trouts/ shads, HPHs, negotiators (preferably top hook custom), OG 250s (don't buy the abs plastic ones), hiroshimas.

from "Horizontal- an old angle for big bass"- WRB.

Spring up fall down...

Caught a bucketload of dinks walking the banks under the midday sun. Who needs neds lol? Mama, just killed a bass. RIP.

Got tired of catching 3 pounders; so I went to Dink City today for a change, and caught... dinks!

If the tip softness and the action in the E6X JWR casting series are anything like that in the NRX JWR line, that's exactly what you want. Might not be very versatile/ all-around for other techniques though. My personal recommendation in the sub $250 price range would be the 7'6" medium/fast rod from the company that must not be named. Worth it at retail, and I paid ~$150 for it when it was on sale. Also more versatile than the Loomis JWR rods. Admittedly, the only Loomises I've owned are/ were all NRXs.

The fish are still acting funny. Junk fished to catch my first bluegill of the year, half a dozen crappies, and 10-12 bass. A couple in the 3# range.