Bluebasser86

I use 10-20lb fluoro for most of my plastics, so you should be fine with what you have.

No deer season for me this year, not enough money for the permits, arrows, broadheads, and all that mess. Probably get out and chase some ducks once it gets cold though. Clayton, I've made the same mistake, amazing how hard those little nubs are to see from the stand sometimes.

No longer own the rod or reel I caught my PB largemouth on, still own everything I caught my last PB smallmouth on down to the crankbait it ate.

I back reel because I feel like I have more control of the fish. I can back off of a fish or put more heat on them depending on the situation without messing with the drag. Plus I can have the drag tight to help with hooksets.

Thanks guys, looking forward to helping to keep the forums as great as they are and continuing to do my part to help everyone with advice when I can.

Don't forget to try a wacky rigged bait on a drop shot, that can be a killer at times.

Try a full sized senko or brush hog, both can be killers. It depends a lot on the conditions. Sometimes a small trailer will work a lot better, but sometimes that bulky trailer gets them better.

You mean it's leaning to one side during the retrieve.

Keep walking it and just wind when bass blows up on it. If you feel the fish loading up then you can lean into them, otherwise keep fishing it along and they'll usually keep coming back until one gets the bait. You can try switching to a smaller bait like a Super Spook Jr or a subsurface bait like a Fluke to try to get it easier for the fish to get the bait in their mouth.

Poppers are for fishing targets like stickups or stumps. Walking baits are good for covering water and when fish are really chasing shad and baitfish and clear water. Buzzbaits I like in dirtier water and around heavier cover. Prop baits are good target fishing baits as well and seem to excel when bass are feeding on bluegills.

A buddy of mine went into low 40 degree water for less than a minute when I was a kid. By the time I got him on the bank, it had been less than 5 minutes and he couldn't even bend his knees and could barely talk. It's nothing to mess with and I'm glad your situation turned out for the better, it could have been a lot worse.

A lot of our lakes have an 18" length limit, so that's kind of my mark for a good quality fish, anything over 20" is a great fish.

I've caught 11 in 6 trips to this lake, along with lots of bass over 5 pounds, great little lake.

I might be able to beat that at the Dotte if you give me 4 days

Nice fish! Looks a lot bigger than 3.59 pounds though? Always so hard to tell with pictures though. Great fish either way!

What do you do to save them when they're eating them T rigged??

It's very similar to Strike King's baby carp color. The 100 and 200 is the sizes I'd be looking for. I'll have to see if I can remember to get a picture. It's reddish brown on the back and yellow/gold on the sides and belly.

If you're not going to be fishing much heavy cover I'd go with the 7' M/F. If you're going to be fishing some heavier cover then I'd opt for a 7' MH/F.

Not smallmouth but always fun to get a pair like this!

Took my friend on a surprise birthday fishing trip that his wife planned, I was the assigned guide for the trip. He'd never caught a muskie so that was our objective. Unfortunately, he didn't catch one, although he had a very close call when one clamped down on his Zman Zinker he was pitching for bass. Anyone that's fished any Zman baits knows that bass can't make a brand new Zman look like this. The second day we saw a bunch and I missed one fish twice on a bucktail. Mid afternoon I finally caught a little guy on a squarebill, which was muskie number 10 of my fishing career, all from Missouri Towards the end of the second day I was switching back and forth between tossing a bucktail and pitching a YUM Woolly Bug in and around standing timber. I pitched the Woolly Bug next to a standing tree and got a sharp "tap, tap" and set into what I thought was going to be one of the big bass the lake is so well known for. I can't say I was completely shocked when a solid muskie launched itself next to the boat, surely not disappointed, except for the fact that I didn't have a leader. It was a fight that had me on edge in the heavy timber and no leader. Thankfully I was using 50lb braid and able to put a little more heat on her than I would have been able to with fluoro. Once my buddy was finally able to dig the net out I had her almost worn out and she slid into the net before once again thrashing around wildly and cutting my line like it was sewing thread. Quickly got the fish grips clamped on her and weighed, 17 pounds even. I was holding her at boatside while he dug for the tape when she decided she'd had enough of our antics and bolted, nearly taking the fish grips with her, so no length on her. We ended up seeing 13 muskie that day with my fish being the biggest one we saw. Another guy was targeting them all day and said he'd landed a 38.5" fish, so they must have been pretty active that day.

Be 100% sure you can ID the baitfish you're catching if it is legal. Some invasives look a lot like native baitfish and some small game fish look a lot like baitfish.

I put it directly above the band. If there's no room you can usually get the band to flip down out of the way and then put a zip tie on. You can put it over the band too, it's just a little bulkier.

We had a major cold front move through a few days ago that dumped a ton of cold rain, dropped the water temps 6 degrees in 2 days, air temps have been 20 degrees colder during the day and 30 degrees colder at night. We went yesterday and the smallmouth were eating everything we threw at them. They had pretty much all moved up shallow and had schools of shad pushed up on the banks and were feeding heavily.

Like smalljaw said, your choice is going to depend on the baits you're wanting to fish.

I'd fish a spinnerbait, bladed jig, or squarebill to get those active fish that don't want to break the surface.