Bluebasser86

Xcaliber XR50 and XRK50 are about the only lipless baits I use. Ghost, Rayburn red, gold black back, and silver blue back. I've been using the Academy squarebills a ton lately and they have been great producers. The Series 3 Luck E Strike Squarebill in copper perch is a killer and so is the sunfish and green copper shad. Strike King 1.5 in green gizzard shad is one of my all time favorite cranks. Honestly I own almost every bait they make in green gizzard shad, the 1.5 and Series 5 are my two favorites. Spro Little Jons and Fat Jons are great baits. A chartreuse black back Fat Jon fooled the fish in my avatar.

Super Fluke Arkansas Shiner

Post a sign that you found one, no pictures or anything, with your number. If someone calls ask them to give you some clear identifiers about the bag to prove it's theirs. I'm sure someone is devastated they lost their bag, I know I would be.

For those of you that are going to be at Miola tomorrow. I was out there this morning, yesterday, whatever you want to call it at this time in the morning. Water was 71 degrees, felt a lot colder when I was unloading the boat. Caught a fish my first cast off the pier by the ramp on a Californian Pit Boss, couple more right by the ramp on a Baby Gill Big Head Wobbler. Nothing on a spinnerbait, buzzbait, trap, jig, or frog. Couldn't catch one flipping into the weeds either. Saw a lot of movement in the weeds but it always turned out to be a carp. The Baby Gill and Pit Boss were the best deal for me, caught a few on a squarebill too. The docks were surprisingly unproductive, but that might just be because it was cloudy so there was no reason for them to be under the docks. Went way up the creek at the north end, looks good, fish I caught were FAT and healthy, just not many of them. Good water in that creek though, 2-3.5 feet as far as I went back there with lots of laydowns and undercut banks. Didn't cover as much water as I wanted to, never made it to the dam and I was running with the trolling motor on 5 most of the morning just trying to look around. Was hoping to try to look for some deeper stuff but ran out of time. Didn't catch many but the ones I caught were healthy and choking the bait. I think a popper would have worked well but I never slowed down enough to fish one.

Don't even have to get a license in a lot of states.

I know that can't be true, you wouldn't be alive to tell the story

And all I wanted to do was put a cutout into the back of the garage so I could fit a bigger boat in there Great job though, that will be super handy!

FWIW I've been fishing mine on a 7' MH/F rod with a 6.2:1 ratio reel and 14lb copolymer line.

I use an insert tube head for most tubes that small. Another option is a 2/0 Mustad Big Mouth Tube Hook and push a bell sinker up inside the tube. Run the hook through the top of the hook and through the eye of the sinker and just T rig it like normal. Gives the tube a really unique action and catches a TON of smallmouth at times.

A weighless Havoc Pit Boss buzzed across the surface can be a killer bait at times. Sounds like it would have been a great option for you in that situation.

Anything works in the fall up until about about low 50 degree water temps. It's when moving baits really start to shine though.

My biggest accomplishment would probably be my 5 bass limit that went 30lbs 2ozs in Kansas. I've caught bigger 5 bass bags, but that just doesn't happen in KS. I used to teach a lot of first time fishing classes, which in itself was fun, but once had an 8 year old girl catch a 4.5lb largemouth on her first cast ever with a spinning reel and an artificial lure. I had to jump in and dig it out of the weeds under the dock that it had dove into but I didn't even have to think twice about it. She got her picture in the newspaper with it, her dad paid to have a replica made of the fish and framed a picture of it to put up in their house. I've taught a lot of folks but that one sticks out the most and was one of my proudest moments.

If it's adults putting themselves at risk I'll just let natural selection try to run it's course. Now if there's kids involved I'm going to say something. If someone wants to put their own life at risk, fine, but kids have no say in it and trust and depend on their parents or the "adult" in that situation to not put them in serious risk like that.

Another member from the KC area just caught a 25lb grass carp a couple weeks ago on a bone colored crankbait that hit the bait as soon as he started cranking it away from the bank and had the bait fully in it's mouth. Probably just a coincidence, but it does seem pretty odd.

Yeah it takes maybe 5 minutes to do a true no wake idle from the ramp to as far as you can go up either arm, probably not that long. You can always just put the trolling motor down and catch fish all the way around the lake as well. Coty and I couldn't keep them away from a baby brush hog when we were out there for the tournament. Color apparently didn't matter either as I was catching them on Killer Blue and he was using Watermelon Purple and they didn't seem to show a preference to either. In just the 3 hours during the tournament we had out there we had 3 fish over 18" caught, one was the 4.5 already posted, plus one almost 4 caught by Chris and Coty had the big bass of the night that was just shy of 5. I believe all 3 of them were caught on topwater also, hard to complain about that

The topwater bite is just starting to heat up around here. I've been doing pretty well all summer long on frogs and walking baits but lately a buzzbait and popper have really started to catch good numbers for me.

My wife and I waited until we bought a house to get a dog. I'm not a fan of putting a dog in a crate, I feel guilty and hate it probably more than my dog does. I've always had high energy dogs like labs and retrievers though, I'm sure other breeds might not care. In my experience, high energy dogs will find negative ways to spend their energy if not allowed to run and play, like chewing and destroying shoes and furniture. You can give them toys and rawhides, which will help, but it only takes one time of them being bored before you come home and the couch is torn apart or the carpet is ripped up everywhere. If you decide you can't wait, just plan on taking the dog on long walks and playing with it a lot. I take our Golden into the field behind our house at least twice a day, regardless of weather, and throw a tennis ball for her until she stops bringing the ball back to me so I know she's content and burnt up a good amount of energy. On top of that she gets to go on frequent walks and I wouldn't go fishing without her.

I've spent a lot of days sight fishing carp, drum, and gar out of creeks and small rivers. They might not be a desirable species in some people's eyes, but a 5lb carp will out pull a 10lb largemouth any day of the week.

It wasn't a bone colored spook was it? We're starting to see a correlation between grass carp eating bone colored baits around here. I caught this whale on a bone colored 168 S Waver last year, watched it shoot off the bottom and T bone my bait, otherwise I would have never believed it actually tried to eat my swimbait.

Guys around here catch them long poling Original Rapalas across the surface along the dams of bigger reservoirs in the spring. Guy that runs a local weeknight tournament caught a 5 pound walleye on a spook out of the middle of a school of fish chasing shad on the surface a few years ago. They're very aggressive when they decide to eat.

This was before video cell phones were really popular, otherwise my buddy that was with me probably would have gotten it all on camera. We had both our trucks, and thankfully with the help of the boat being almost weightless in the water we were able to get the nose of the boat onto the end of the trailer and winch it up far enough that the sides were out of the water and let the bilge do the rest before we cranked it up the rest of the way. Whole event took less than 30 minutes and it actually did very little damage other than having to take the gas tank out because it had gotten water in it.

BPS Stick O's are the main stick worm I use. I wouldn't buy that kit but that's mainly because I like to choose my own colors and terminal tackle.

Same for me. Never a trailer on a buzzbait, rarely on a spinnerbait, always on a jig and bladed jig.

Zell Pop, Cavitron, Spro Bronzeye Shad, MS Slammer, One Knocker Spook, Super Spook JR.

I like the Do It skirts, Cabela's carries them. They're banded skirts so you can just slip them on. Buy some tiny wire ties or zip ties at the hardware store and zip tie them on so you don't have to worry about them falling off again.