Bluebasser86

Not sure exactly what you're referring to as a "slash bait". That's often slang for a suspending jerkbait, and there is no such thing as too cold for those.

I fish tons of rocky and log covered bottoms. Trick is to not let it hit the bottom any more than it has to and fish the right head/hook combo so it comes over stuff instead of burying into logs and rocks. Ned Kehde, the guy it's named after, lives right here and fishes a lot of the same lakes I do. You won't find any nice sand bottom lakes here. Obviously, you can't drop them into a brushpile, but they'll come through a lot more than most folks realize with the right jighead and presentation.

Dirty water is when I like red. It's usually better earlier in the year, but it works all year round.

I'm boring, plain old green pumpkin runs away from every other color I've tried. I've done fairly well with morning dawn, oxblood/red, and green weenie too.

Nope ?, they were on Outlet Bait and Tackle for $1.50 a bag a couple years ago. Pretty sure I bought about 20 bags of 4" and several bags of smoke large red flake 5" grubs.

I have bags upon bags of smoke no flake Yamamoto 4" single tail grubs. Scrubbing a grub at Table Rock (and Bull Shoals, Stockton, or Beaver), is a simple but extremely effective technique.

Another nice day Wednesday so the wife, the boys, and I took the boat to a local park lake I haven't fished much but have heard it's been good, it wasn't, not for us anyways. I did hook 3 or 4 heavy fish on a jerkbait that just pulled off for some reason. We were only there for a few hours but only managed a crappie, a small bass, and one more solid fish that had a huge shad in it's throat. My youngest had the honors of cranking her in. Thursday was the nicest day of the year, but the fishing was a grind to start out with. We started on the power plant lake, which typically fishes very tough when it's nice and this day was no exception. I caught a 3.99 on a Ned rig after about a hour on the water. I lost another one off that bank 10 minutes later then had 2 hours of nothing before I got another bite. Wasn't sure it was a bass when I set the hook on it. Fishing the Ned slowly and it was very heavy, but I catch so many flatheads and drum on Ned rigs there that I didn't want to get my hopes up. Finally got a glimpse of her and realized it was a bass just barely hooked in the tip of the lip, but I babied her in and got her lipped. 6.79 pounds on a Ned rigged big TRD and homemade 1/16oz head, my biggest of the year so far. I caught one more 15" fish on the Ned a hour later, then 3 hours of no bites. I knew of another lake that I thought would have a much better bite, and I didn't want the guy that was with me to go home empty handed, so we made the short drive that I wish we'd made sooner. We caught about 30 in 2 hours on my homemade bladed jig and a spinnerbait. I caught 2 over 4 and we had several other solid fish. We went from struggling to torn up thumbs in a hurry.

That's pretty wild. I've doubled with a smallie and white bass, but I couldn't imagine doubling with a striper that size and a solid spotted bass.

Wow this was fun. Good timing, posting it a few hours after my weekend started. Yes, I'm a deputy sheriff, have been since 2007. Spent the entirety of it working in the county jail, because like as @lo n slo pointed out, I'm one of the crazy people who prefers working in the jail over working on the road. I work 2200-0600, so that's why I'm on so late. A lot of down time at work, so I handle the overnight moderating duties also. Not a vampire, don't want anyone else's blood on me if I can avoid it. I don't need to spread any rumors about the other stuff. I've been with my wife since 2008 and married since 2010. I like owning stuff so I'm not trying run around on her any ?

It's pretty rare I get to fish in wind that light, most days there's white caps on the lakes by 10am and 20-30 mph winds. Just a way of life in the midwest unfortunately. The fish don't mind, it's all about what you can tolerate and safely operate in.

I usually fish 1 or 2 days a week.

I kept track one year of every black bass I caught and ended with 2,776. I'm attempting to keep track again this year and have started much slower than I did that year, currently at 211 on the year. I hit 1,000 on April 30th last time I kept track, so April better be a busy month. That time I kept track we had record heat for a couple months of the summer and I basically stopped bass fishing and switched to big catfish on the river at night so I might make up ground there.

Welcome!

If I had to pick 1 for hard baits, I'd have to go with Strike King. 6th Sense and Berkley would be a close 2nd and 3rd.

The new ones are junk. The older ones were much better. Much better baits for similar or even less than what they cost.

Haven't personally but a friend of mine swears by them and catches a bunch of fish with them.

I can't believe a bait company hasn't seen the obvious demand for the stuff and jumped at the chance to be the only company making them? I don't know many guys that know the effectiveness of pork trailers who wouldn't pay $10 a jar for good trailers.

Those are killer trout baits too, but I didn't tell you that

Welcome and thank you for your service!

In a day? Hopefully just a couple, but usually 5-10.

My bass must think they're from the south because they love red, and it's not just during the cold water months either. Just from the past month or so.

I'd go with either Colorado or Indiana, or you could go tandem Colorado/Indiana. My most productive bluegill colored spinnerbait is a Strike King with gold tandem Colorado/Indiana blades.

I use to fish them a ton and caught the heck out of them. Recently rediscovered them and had to buy a couple. Turns out they still catch fish.

Sounds like a bluegill swimbait would be worth a shot.