Bluebasser86

Catfish will eat about anything. Do a Google search about salmon eggs for catfish and I'm sure you'll find something.

I usually switch to a heavier jig or t-rig but squarebills, spinnerbaits, and bladed jigs also join the rotation.

jigs or t-rigged plastics

My biggest largemouth was 10lbs 2ozs from Lake Commendero, Mexico I've hit the 5 pound mark 3 times for smallmouth the most recent was this one. My biggest fish as the title says was one of these 2, both bottomed out a 50 pound scale so not sure which was bigger. Caught on the same day fishing by myself on the Kansas River.

I prefer black but sometimes I'll use black also, and yes they work.

Does Blue Springs have a lot of standing timber? I'm going to have a hard time getting myself to try any of the other lakes right in that area for a little bit until I explore Jacomo a little more I think.

I'm going to go out on a limb and guess that most guys that have an effective rig that doesn't get much love, probably aren't going to share it on a public forum

Get some small diameter leader material that you can tie or heavy fluorocarbon leader material, it's much harder than regular fluoro and should keep them from biting you off a majority of the time.

It's actually nearly 1,000 acres, smaller yes, but not when you can only have up to 25hp motors.

I NEVER fish a trailer hook on a bladed jig, no exceptions. I miss very few fish on them and feel they hang up way worse with the trailer hook.

Fresh cutbait or livebait is the way to go for catfish. I don't eat them so I'm always targeting the largest ones and the real thing is the best way to get them. You can catch them on other stuff, but fresh cutbait or livebait will catch the most. My preferred way to fish cutbait if there isn't too much current or wave action is to use a stout octopus or kahle hook and nothing else. The only thing I may add is a barrel swivel if the bait is rolling a little bit. For live bait I'll either hook them below the dorsal fin or through the nostrils depending on if there is current or not and fish them on a slip sinker rig (basically a heavy Carolina rig).

Are there any pike or pickeral? It certainly doesn't take a huge fish to attack a 12" bullhead. I caught 3 this size on a 7" Slammer Friday.

I have a 7' MH/XF LTB with a 200E7 that balances nicely and fishes a T-rig as well as any rod I've ever owned. Probably one of the only St. Croixs I've ever owned that I felt was rated correctly.

I guess I'm really confused about how the blade on your bladed jig is preventing you from setting the hook? Fish generally overtake them when they strike and the blade never even comes into play. Maybe the hook is dull or too small?

The puppy is just too small of a walker to add anything to and get it to work right still. I'm not a fan of adding stuff to walking baits, but I'm usually moving them too fast for the fish to get a good look at them in the first place.

Havoc Pit Boss in junebug or black and blue

The muddier the water the tighter bass will often hold to cover and will often take several cast to get them to bite. A dark colored bladed jig is one of my favorite muddy water baits.

Last Friday the carp were spawning like crazy in the water willows on the south end of the lake we were fishing. We'd been catching bass really well until we came across the spawning carp, the bite dried up completely then. We got away from the carp and the bite started back up again. I have seen smallmouth follow carp though, probably because they scare up crawdads out of the rocks and grass while they're feeding.

Several species of gar have shorter, wider snouts, specifically the shortnose gar that is often confused with the Alligator gar. I've caught bass around gar lots of times, including some very large ones. Gar will eat smaller bass, but aren't going to mess with adult bass unless it's a large alligator gar, but even those prefer rough fish like carp and buffalo.

I'll give general areas and what I was catching them on at times, but that's as detailed as I get unless you're a good friend. For me sharing specific spots and hot bites is a "I'll scratch your back if you scratch mine," kind of thing. I'll share information with someone, but I expect information back or to be one of the first people you call when you get on a hot bite Shore fishing spots are a whole different animal. They're very limited around here. I might not even share pictures of fish caught from shore, let alone talk about the spot or even what lake they were caught at.

A buddy and I decided to try Jacomo last Friday. I've been wanting to fish it for awhile but never have decided to pop for the permit. Since I'm not buying a Wyco or Wabaunsee year pass I figured I could swing the permit out there. It's a really nice lake and the 25ph max restriction keeps a lot of bigger boats off the water. $62.50 for a year pass for my jonboat and 15hp motor, about $40 less than either of the other 2 lakes. It must be a popular lake though, I was parking the truck at 0503 and we were boat number 3 on the water! With neither of us having any experience on the water we just put the trolling motor down and started fishing. About 2 minutes into the morning I put a chunky 16 incher into the boat on a Big Head Wobbler, followed quickly by another very similar fish on a homemade finesse jig. The size of those first two fish gave me the confidence I needed to start lobbing my 7" Slammer around. Didn't take long before the first fish of the morning smashed into it. Lots of the fish we ended up catching looked like this one, appeared to be recovering very well from the spawn. Just a few cast later, another toilet bowl flush, and another future Wal Mart Girl. They weren't all fatties though, don't know why it looks like I was taking pictures with a potato We fished south, picking up fish pretty steady, until we ran into the spawning carp. They were everywhere absolutely trashing the shorelines with their shenanigans. We decided to idle across the lake to try to get away from them. Since we were just idling I left the trolling motor down, mistake. We got to the other side, step on the motor, I hear a higher pitched whirling sound than I should and we go nowhere. Pulled the motor up, no prop No idea what happened. Run back to the ramp, no props in the marina, no problem since BPS is 10 minutes away. Get there at 0730, doesn't open until 9 . Run to Wal Mart, 2 size props, both for Minn Kota . Messaging Cbass the whole time and he tells me there's a marine shop that opens at 0830 right by me so I ran there, they had 1 Motorguide prop and it was 20% off because they weren't going to carry trolling motor props anymore Back to the water and back in business. We cut straight across the lake to a steeper rock bank, first cast with a shakyhead I was back on fish. Shakyhead started boating good numbers of solid fish so I put on an 1/8oz Rocker head with a baby brush hog, first fish with it. 5 1/2 pounds, biggest largemouth of the year so far. We continued steadily putting fish in the boat on shakyheads, Slammer, wacky rig, senko, and Rocker head with a baby brush hog. Going across the dam I set into a fish that just didn't move. She started to come up, shook her head and the hook popped, probably in the 7lb range. Next cast, another bite, 5 pounder slashes across the surface and pulls off. Several more fish across the dam but nothing that big. Got to a boulder bank with lots of water willow, pulled the Slammer back out. Got a couple quick ones before it got destroyed as soon as I started the retrieve. A 6-7 pound fish wallowed on the top, steamrolled into the water willows and pulled off . Should have had a high 20 to nearing 30 pound bag, instead ended up probably around 18-20 pounds, still a great day.

A buddy and I decided to try Jacomo last Friday. I've been wanting to fish it for awhile but never have decided to pop for the permit. Since I'm not buying a Wyco or Wabaunsee year pass I figured I could swing the permit out there. It's a really nice lake and the 25ph max restriction keeps a lot of bigger boats off the water. $62.50 for a year pass for my jonboat and 15hp motor, about $40 less than either of the other 2 lakes. It must be a popular lake though, I was parking the truck at 0503 and we were boat number 3 on the water! With neither of us having any experience on the water we just put the trolling motor down and started fishing. About 2 minutes into the morning I put a chunky 16 incher into the boat on a Big Head Wobbler, followed quickly by another very similar fish on a homemade finesse jig. The size of those first two fish gave me the confidence I needed to start lobbing my 7" Slammer around. Didn't take long before the first fish of the morning smashed into it. Lots of the fish we ended up catching looked like this one, appeared to be recovering very well from the spawn. Just a few cast later, another toilet bowl flush, and another future Wal Mart Girl. They weren't all fatties though, don't know why it looks like I was taking pictures with a potato We fished south, picking up fish pretty steady, until we ran into the spawning carp. They were everywhere absolutely trashing the shorelines with their shenanigans. We decided to idle across the lake to try to get away from them. Since we were just idling I left the trolling motor down, mistake. We got to the other side, step on the motor, I hear a higher pitched whirling sound than I should and we go nowhere. Pulled the motor up, no prop No idea what happened. Run back to the ramp, no props in the marina, no problem since BPS is 10 minutes away. Get there at 0730, doesn't open until 9 . Run to Wal Mart, 2 size props, both for Minn Kota . Messaging Cbass the whole time and he tells me there's a marine shop that opens at 0830 right by me so I ran there, they had 1 Motorguide prop and it was 20% off because they weren't going to carry trolling motor props anymore Back to the water and back in business. We cut straight across the lake to a steeper rock bank, first cast with a shakyhead I was back on fish. Shakyhead started boating good numbers of solid fish so I put on an 1/4oz Rocker head with a baby brush hog, first fish with it. 5 1/2 pounds, biggest largemouth of the year so far. We continued steadily putting fish in the boat on shakyheads, Slammer, wacky rig, senko, and Rocker head with a baby brush hog. Going across the dam I set into a fish that just didn't move. She started to come up, shook her head and the hook popped, probably in the 7lb range. Next cast, another bite, 5 pounder slashes across the surface and pulls off. Several more fish across the dam but nothing that big. Got to a boulder bank with lots of water willow, pulled the Slammer back out. Got a couple quick ones before it got destroyed as soon as I started the retrieve. A 6-7 pound fish wallowed on the top, steamrolled into the water willows and pulled off . Should have had a high 20 to nearing 30 pound bag, instead ended up probably around 18-20 pounds, still a great day.

I don't really know how to tell the difference unless it's obvious. I always try to give the benefit of the doubt because I've taken plenty of pictures of big fish that looked small and vice versa. If I catch a big fish and weigh it I don't care what others say anyways.

Yes, it was a small tournament/get together for guys off the forum in the KC area so we had a weigh in and prizes at the end of the day before the fish were released. http://www.bassresource.com/bass-fishing-forums/topic/129650-kc-spring-get-together/

We had a lot of fun and caught a lot of fish. Chris and I got down early Thursday and put in at Wolf Creek. Chris caught a stocky 16" fish on a buzzbait his 3rd cast and that was the last bass either of us caught until about 10. We fished all kinds of baits and different areas looking for fish with a couple misses and lost fish to show for it. We ran down towards Honey Creek and decided to stop in a smaller cove on the way there. I had been fishing a 1/2oz brush jig in Texas craw but decided to switch to a 7/16oz finesse jig in PB&J. We opted for a bank with chunk rock mixed with small gravel in hopes of finding fish that were just finishing spawning. They must have been as we finally started to catch some fish! I found a brushpile with my jig and after 3 repeated cast finally caught my first bass of the trip. After that I went on a hot streak with several more fish, most of them keepers, that were thumping my jig. One of my biggest from Thursday. You can see from my line that it had swallowed my jig too. Most of the banks we fished looked like the one in the background with a little more chunk rock mixed and and quite a few docks. We ran to Honey Creek and decided to crank the riprap of the bridge, that was a good move, lots of fish like this one on a DT6. Also caught a couple nice ones off the Honey Creek Resort dock pilings. After that it got really tough tough. I think we went without a keeper, and not many shorts either, for the next few hours. After hitting several spots in Honey Creek we ran to Courthouse Hollow where the cabin is. The first cut we tried produced 3 keepers on a wacky rig. When we came out that cut it had started to lightning and thunder so we ran back and loaded up. Friday we made the drive to the dam to fish new water. We decided to start in Duck Creek, best move we made. We had 12-15 pounds in the boat in the first 15 minutes, catching at least one keeper and up to 3 off almost every dock we fished in the first little cut. Wacky rigs and poppers were doing serious work in the morning. Chris got our biggest spot of the trip out from under a walkway on a wacky rig. The walkways and banks that looked like the one behind him in 8-14 feet of water were key for us. Our plastics had to have some purple in them to, from purple color to purple flake. Friday was a crazy day with between 75-100 fish coming to the boat on a variety of baits. It actually got to the point we were seeing what they wouldn't eat on our shakyheads or Rocker heads, we didn't find much they wouldn't eat. Over half the fish we caught were keepers as well. We tried Drowning Creek for awhile and only caught a couple dinks and one keeper before we went to Lawhead Hollow. Keepers started coming to the boat quickly again including our biggest of the day at 3.96 pounds on a magnum trick worm and Rocker head. Saturday we decided to go back to Duck after the great day on Friday. We had to work a lot harder for them Saturday but the quality was a little better. We had a limit by about 8:30 and culled one shortly after that before hitting a long dry spell of either shorts or no fish. We ran around to some different areas we hadn't fished before and found nothing. With about 2 hours left we ran back to the same stretch of docks in Duck, doing the same thing, and culled 2 more times including our second biggest of the day. Chris and I ended up with 15.78 pounds for day 1. Scroggs and Zander had a successful day with both of them catching keepers. Sunday we decided to have everyone launch from the same ramp in Courthouse Hollow near the Cabins. Chris and I had very little to go off since we hadn't fished there much but we decided to look for stuff that looked the same and it paid off. We ran into Dinosaur and fished into a little cut. Biggest problem we were having was short fish. I was catching short spots about every cast with a Zell pop and wacky rig. Lost a keeper largemouth at the boat on a wacky rig before boating a keeper on the Zell pop. We fished all the way to the back of the cut before Chris caught a solid fish on a 10" worm. We picked up another keeper on a wacky rig before running over to the east side of Shangri-La Marina. We caught 3 more keepers, including our biggest of the day, and culled twice, all on a 10" candy bug Zoom Ol' Monster on a Rocker head. Ran to one more cove where we culled again before heading back to Courthouse where we culled one last time about 5 minutes before weigh in. Chris and I had almost 30 pounds in 2 days for first place. Jon and Christopher were in second with around 25 pounds and Christopher had big bass for the weekend with a 4lb 15oz fish on a wacky rig. The motley crew that was left by final weigh in.