Bluebasser86

I like watching for them, but the problem is they all like to get in the middle of the road while I'm driving in the dark. Nothing like having a big, black angus standing in the middle of a dark country road or a big deer darting our right in front of the truck while pulling a boat down the highway at 75mph.

Find a leader knot that works for you and they're not really that big of headache. The benefits of braid to leader on a spinning reel make it worthwhile. You'll never find a leader on any of my casting rods.

Pretty, love it when they get the bars on them.

Not only does it not break them down, it makes them last longer because they slip through the fish's teeth easier when you set the hook and allows better hooksets.

I usually too busy watching for deer, coyotes, dogs, armadillos, cows, ect to let my mind wander.

Thanks for the kind words guys. It is not something I do for a living or would ever want to do for a living as it is a lot of work for very little profit at the scale I do it at. We have several site sponsors that are likely very capable of producing the same things I do. As I'm not a site sponsor and also a Mod, I'm going to close this one down as it's a pretty obvious conflict of interest.

Dang, that could have been way worse.

I have 2 Edge boxes in my kayak box that are on their side, one being the terminal box. If it opened it would be a disaster inside my kayak box. It never has and I have no concerns of it happening though.

Any small popper makes a good grasshopper imitation.

I use 3.8-5" paddletails on the back of mine sometimes. I use a lot of different trailers but paddletails are a good option for sure.

La Cygne, or the The Swan as we affectionately call it (Le Cygne is French for "The Swan"). The lake record was caught just a few years ago during a tournament.

Fished one of my favorite lakes 2 weeks ago in a tournament, barely eked out 40" of bass, still got 2nd place and big bass with only 3 fish. Went back last Saturday and had a 17-18 pound bag in the same areas doing the same stuff. Some days they bite your junk, some days they don't.

I'm always on the hunt for new water.

I'm guessing you don't fish around spots or smallmouth much? I've had lots of big smallmouth and spots tap, tap, tap, tap, tap, my bait until I decided to swing on them only to be surprised by the amount of weight I found on the other end of my line.

I have wanted one of these since they released them but they've been impossible to find. Finally stumbled on one on Ebay and lucked out, won a 2500 for $70. Going on my new St. Croix Bass X. https://www.tacklewarehouse.com/Okuma_ITX_Carbon_Spinning_Reel/descpage-OITX.html

It's a square peg, round hole situation. A Dinger may not be as good of a wacky rig bait as a GYCB Senko, but it's BETTER for a Neko, weighted T-rig, shakyhead, bubba shot, basically everything except a weightless presentation, and even then the Dinger wins out if they want a slower fall. The Christie Craw is more a kicking action instead of a flapping action of the Rage Craw. Both excellent baits. I use a ton of Christie Craws every year on the back of my jigs.

I use these on a lot of my hard baits. They're great hooks for the money. Any of the Eagle Claw hooks with the BP (black platinum) designation are really nice hooks.

Thanks, it has a reputation as one of the toughest lakes around to get bit but it has some of the biggest fish around too. One of the only lakes in Kansas with a legit chance at a DD fish every time you go.

#1 right here! I never could get bit on a DS because I just did too much with it. Thanks to the great members here and reading through post about it, I believe it was @A-Jayor @J Francho that said something to the effect of imagining the weight as an anchor and you're only trying to move the bait and not the weight. I was almost doing more like the weight was a shakyhead, dragging and shaking it along with the bait, which was doing way too much. Once I slowed down and treated the weight like a stationary anchor, the bites started happening. The other lesson in it was no matter how much you think you no or how experienced you might be, you can always learn something new and these forums are a great place to do it.

This is the same way I am. I use my net a lot in my kayak though. A bass flopping around on the floor of a boat with a hook in it's mouth is a lot different than a bass flopping around the floor of a kayak with a hook in it's mouth. I had one almost put a bladed jig hook in the back of my calf when I dropped it and it started flopping, something I hadn't really considered until it happened.

Welcome!

No it's a Lightning Rod Shock.

Thought I kept missing a bass near a clump of grass, should have known it was a warmouth when it came back a third time.

It happens with tournament guys, recreational fishermen, and recreational boaters. My last kayak tournament I got cut off badly on 2 different occasions by recreation boat fishermen. One claimed to have not seen me in my chartreuse shirt and orange kayak and was kind enough to fish down the bank that I had just been down. The other jumped right in front of me and fished the same direction I was going on one of my best spots. He saw me, I wasn't tucked into the shoreline or anything, he just didn't care. Then I have completely oblivious recreation people like this. I know @A-Jay has a good one from a run in with pontoon.

6' 10" ML/XF St. Croix LTB Daiwa Tatula LT 2500 Seaguar Smackdown Flash Green 20lb Seaguar Gold Label 8lb