Bluebasser86

Green pumpkin and black and blue in soft plastics. White for spinnerbaits, black for buzzbaits Bone or White for jerkbaits and topwaters Shad or chartreuse black back for cranks

Pretty bait. I can't get them to eat gill swimbaits to save my life here or I'd have to check it out.

You inspired me to toss one around a little this morning. Caught several on it, all small, but still fun.

They did exactly that for both Classics at Grand Lake, OK. Launching at Wolf Creek in Grove, then doing weigh in at the BOK Center in Tulsa about 1.5 hours away. There was no issues, very few fish lost thanks to the large transport tanks that they moved the fish back to the lake in. Anglers can have someone drive them back and forth, they don't have to drive themselves in their trucks. It's getting a big repetitive it seems. I don't why they don't do a Classic on Table Rock or LOZ, both are excellent winter fisheries, plenty big with plenty of amenities by the lakes, and it would be something different for a change. Toledo Bend or Texoma would be another couple that I'd think they'd should consider.

I didn't know there was 114 bass in Illinois ? Joking aside, penalties for fish and game violations are a joke. They need to figure the value of each fish up if it was raised in a hatchery to be stocked, man hours and all that, and charge the same way as they do with any type of theft (in Kansas if the total value is over $1,000 in merchandise stolen, it's a felony no matter how petty the items stolen may seem to be). Equipment used should be viewed like tools used in the commission of any crime, as evidence that is seized and not returned, rods, reels, lures, boat, truck, all of it when you get to something of this scale.

Wind is a way of life here. 15mph is a gentle breeze. I don't know what to do with myself when I get a day on the water and it's calm, and usually the fish don't seem to know what to do either.

We had a pretty lengthy discussion on them not long ago. I was not impressed from my limited time using them, but obviously there's some very recognizable pros putting their names on them and teaming up with them so there's that.

It doesn't have prominent lines of spots below the lateral line or scales on the base of the dorsal, which are both identifiers of a spotted bass. It has some darker and lighter scales in spots below the lateral line, but nothing even close to the rows of spots on a spotted bass. LMB almost always have some degree of difference in scale coloration (see picture below). The close up picture of the face also gives another dead giveaway it's a largemouth and not a spot. The scales are the same size, or close to the same size as the rest of the body. If it was a spot the scales are tiny, so small they almost appear to not have scales on their cheeks in pictures.

My enthusiastic egg hunters.

I hate the term "breezy". The weather people seem to love using it anytime we have gale force winds though. It's windy, that's what it is, windy. My wife's flower pots blew over, the 200 acre lake on my drive home from work had white caps on it, and whole trees where rocking violently back and forth in the wind, nothing "breezy", about what was going on outside.

I use a modified poison jig mold to pour mine without the split ring. They're much more of a hassle to do, and I feel like I catch more big fish on the ones with the split ring though.

They're best in shallow water imo, especially around vegetation. White with a chartreuse trailer in lakes without shad is a great fish producer for me.

10 packs of green pumpkin and watermelon Powerbait Maxscent "The General" worms at Wal-Mart this morning for $1.50 a pack, score!

It's a largemouth

Are you referring to a float tube like this;

Fish it all day, I catch most of my biggest topwater fish during the middle of the day when you're not "supposed" to fish topwater. My biggest buzzbait bass was right around lunch time, an ounce shy of 6. Some of my best days fishing a Slammer have been middle of bright sunny days too.

I don't change the leader length, usually 3-4 feet regardless of braid color. I only use it on spinning gear, casting gear is straight braid 100% of the time if I'm using braid regardless of braid color.

I was fishing a small pond with the toadrunner too. The lake I was on Friday is about 200 acres and was 60 degrees, so we're right there.

Sometimes I like to show everyone that I know how to catch fish other than bass pretty well too Put 37 of these guys in the boat Friday, along with some white bass, largemouth, and a crappie. Almost all of them were caught casting in less than 5' of water in the middle of a bright, sunny, post cold front day. They were not shy at all either, had to use pliers to get my bait back from a lot of them.

I've never used wax worms for them, never needed to honestly, but I'd use them to tip a small jig if I was going to use them under a bobber.

I've always just used canned corn, they eat it as good as anything I've found (other than mulberries when they're dropping).

Couple of my better ones at Hillsdale Thursday in the hurricane. I dumped the biggest one next to the boat. Caught a whole pile of these things Friday. All released to get bigger. I was fishing with a local writer for In-Fisherman trying to help him crack the Kansas walleye/saugeye/sauger code, I think I helped him a little.

That fish is borderline skinny for what I'm use to seeing at some of the local lakes that are packed with big gizzard shad if it's 18" and 3 pounds. Not unusual for a fish to be 16" and 3 pounds. 18" fish will usually be over 4. It's usually the pond fish that are skinny and sickly looking here from lack of forage and overpopulation around here.

JJ's colors baits much better than Spike It. There's times each year when some chartreuse JJ's 100% gets me more bites than I would get without it.

Jerkbaits are my favorite, followed by a spinnerbait.