Bluebasser86

I've had them do that lots of time when I was younger and fished roostertails a lot. Almost impossible to remove the hook without tearing their mouths up when they're sewn up like that.

Looks like the creek chubs we have around here. They're excellent bait for walleye and catfish. I've never tried to eat one but I'd imagine you could.

Not that I would do it for a sunfish, but you could always cut one or two of those hooks protruding outside of it's mouth to remove the hooks.

Yeah some folks "larger" swimbait is a 5" Shadalicious, others are talking about a Deps 250 or Baitsmith Mag.

If it's like any of their other baits I've tried, it looks great in the package, but is pretty much worthless in the water.

I fish 3 out of mine fairly often, it's a bit cramped even with the single console. Would not want to fish more than that out of it, but most bass boats are geared towards having 1-2 people fishing from them.

My biggest frog bass so far ate the thing like a trout sips a dry fly. Frog just disappeared with barely a ripple. Wasn't quite a big as that monster though!

I was fishing a tiny pond that I found with Google maps on public land by a reservoir. I'd caught some very healthy fish up to 3 pounds, but the size of the pond lead me to believe that was probably as big as they got. I snagged a good sized submerged limb with a Senko, drug the limb most of the way in before my bait popped off. The Senko was pushed up on the bend of the hook, spiraled the whole way in. I was pretty much ready to leave after the commotion I made dragging the limb until a huge wake pushed up behind my bait and I watched a big mouth flare open and suck in my bait. Of course I set the hook back into my kinked up Senko and missed the fish. 1 week to the day later, I returned with nothing but my swimbait rod and several swimbaits intent on covering every inch of that little pond to get that fish to bite. Various retrieves all across the pond with a Deps 175 and weedless 68 Hudd came up empty, so I switched to my Ol' Faithful 7" MS Slammer. First cast was under an overhanging tree that's roots protruded into the water. Waited a solid minute after the splashdown. A single, soft twitch and the bait disappeared into a giant boil. Now I don't know 100% for sure this is the same fish, but because of the size of the pond it came from, odds of there being another this large or bigger are really slim.

So many variables, really hard for me to know because of the wide variety of baits and bodies of water that I fish. It's not crankbaits, 100% certain on that. I would have have to guess it would be either a swinghead with some kind of plastic, usually a beaver or brush hog type bait, a jig, or a bladed jig. I fish all 3 of them from January through December and catch fish the whole time, so odds are it's one of those 3. If jerkbaits worked year round, they would certainly be in the running also.

I bought the first bass boat I found that I could afford, a 92' 451V Ranger with a 150 Merc for 4,500 when I was 17. Boat looked pretty nice, motor never worked right. I sunk another couple thousand into it before selling it for 5k and cutting my losses. I spent 2 years shopping for boats before I bought my current one. Coincidentally enough, a 189 VLO.

Welcome!

Welcome!

I'm actually holding the boat near the shoreline, the picture was just taken out towards the open portion of the lake. That fish came out of 2-4 feet of water fishing a very snaggy riprap dam. Reed beds and weed edges present a different challenge because they're vertical cover the bait can't float over the top of. If the fish are tight to the edges, it would make presenting a light head very difficult.

Must not get hunted down there. Folks hunt them here and , I guess anyways, eat them.

Yeah, need to know what swimbaits we're talking about here.

I'd have a really hard time buying 1 rod to use for popper and frogs. It takes a pretty light rod to fish some poppers correctly, while it takes a stout rod to winch a frog fish out of heavy cover. If I had to have 1 rod for both, I'd probably go with a 7' MH/F with a 7 ratio reel and 30-40 pound braid.

If I had $250 to burn at Cabela's, I'd splurge on some fun stuff, like stock up on oil and lower unit grease for the boat What to get is going to depend a lot on your needs. I already have a ton of stuff I don't use, no reason to add a bunch more. Boat is always going to need oil and maintenance though.

It's almost always windy here, but I still fish the light heads. It's a no feel presentation and they'll hold onto it forever, so wind really isn't an issue for me. You can see the swells my boat was bucking over and the whitecaps in the background of this picture, but still caught the big bass of the tournament on a 1/16oz Ned Rig. The small baits will work on a heavier head no doubt, but don't think you need to upsize just because the wind is blowing.

I prefer a slip bobber or quality bobber with the spring on the bottom to secure the line.

As per usual, I'll be working, but at least I should be home for this evening and get to enjoy some family time if the weather allows. Happy 4th everyone! Take a moment to think about those that aren't able to spend it with their families, so we can spend it with ours.

Welcome!

Welcome! You might try posting in our Central forum, https://www.bassresource.com/bass-fishing-forums/forum/13-central-bass-fishing/ As well as the Tournament Talk forum, https://www.bassresource.com/bass-fishing-forums/forum/25-tournament-talk/

We stayed at Andy Meyer's Lodge. They had some replicas of giants in the lodge. I think the biggest was a 56" fish? I think we're going to try to go to Canada again next year but probably do LOTW this time since it has a better walleye population to keep my dad happy. Obviously a terrific muskie and smallmouth lake as well.

You can store Zman baits in NEW Plano boxes, but if they've been used to store other plastics you're still going to run the risk of them getting damaged or deformed. I leave them in the original pack because that's what it says to do right on the package.

No, you won't have any issues. Zman and Gulp are the only 2 major brands that baits need special care.