Bluebasser86

I've shot a few almost twice that size from Wyco. One night I shot what I thought was a big one, another guy brought in a mid 70 pound fish. Sometimes I'll have people who want them to eat or use for cutbait, fertilizer, whatever, and I'll give them away. Sometimes I'll find a spot away from everyone and let nature take it's course. They're very destructive, and the state spends thousands of dollars a year on rough fish removal programs, so I don't feel bad leaving them for the raccoons and turtles, they have to eat too afterall. I mostly use 7 or 8 foot nets. I find them easiest to handle for throwing, while being large enough to be effective.

My findings so far with KK, they cast a mile, but they're not real forgiving to mistakes. I have a couple decades of baitcaster use under my belt, so I've been able to use them without much issues, but I do have to pay more attention to them when casting than some of my other reels. You have to have them set right and use the educated thumb to keep them reigned in.

I was lucky and got one as soon as they came out, maybe even before the real release. Been fishing it ever since and loving it. It cast very nicely, I like the look and feel of the reel, and it's handled some nice fish very well. I'm hoping they come out with some different speeds in this and the regular President baitcaster. Hopefully they'll have some lefties out soon to help the wronghanders in the group My biggest fish of the year so far I was fishing a jig using my XT.

If money isn't an option, Rage Bug. If I'm paying out of pocket (and assuming Berkley didn't discontinue ALL my favorite colors), I'd take the Pit Boss.

I release them without touching them if possible. They're a blast to catch, but I wouldn't feed that nasty mess to my dog. Just a colorful shad to me.

Were you on Grand Lake, OK?

They certainly aren't as smart as it seems like they are some days.

I agree, much more fun than having to haul fish around all day and exponentially increase the risk of killing them for a couple bucks.

Welcome!

I haven't as much as I used to but I love bowfishing, especially for big gar that seem to be hard to find most places. Bighead and silvers on the river are fun, but I don't have the boat for it anymore. Used to go to Perry a few times every summer to bowfish at night. We shot some monster buffalo out there along with boatloads of carp and drum. I usually take mine to Hillsdale when I go and try to whack 10-20 of those bookend 5 pound carp that seem to be in every inch of that lake. Used to be able to bowfish Wyco, where the grass carp look like small whales. They're fun to shoot, but their pulling power and soft skin makes them tough to land. I shot a decent one off the dam at La Cygne last year.

Exactly, even with the keepers and painting them, they're still below $.10 a head. It's how time consuming they are to make that is so frustrating. I wish Do-It or someone would listen to the actual needs of people fishing a Ned Rig (what is really considered a Ned Rig, not what they built this first mold for). I'd like the smaller sizes, but I also can tell that the keeper may not work in anything smaller. In that case, I wish they'd make like a 6-8 cavity of just 1/16 so I could get my main needs taken care of quickly. Pouring 1 tiny head at a time is mind numbing.

I've had good luck with US Boatwerks, but not sure they'll work on it or not.

It doesn't lay well on the spool mostly. Likes to dig into itself. I believe Fireline was designed for spinning gear though. Just issues that I've personally had, you might not experience any problems. I haven't used it in years either, so those problems may be a thing of the past.

We had a small group of friends down at Table Rock this past weekend for a buddy "tournament" that we ran MLF style but still only tracking our biggest 5. @gardnerjigman had never fished Table Rock before, and after this trip, he's completely spoiled. We never caught fewer than 30 fish in a day, both managed 5 fish limits each day, including several solid fish in the 3-4 pound range. I was concentrating on channel swings at first when we got to the lake Thursday around noon and managed to find one little cut that they'd corralled shad into. I did alright for myself there, but Coty would have had a high teens bag by himself, all on a 3/8oz underspin and 3.8 Keitech. He caught the 3.68lb smallmouth, and 4.20lb largemouth on back to back cast. It was pretty unreal. Friday we fished around Aunt's Creek. Caught fish about everywhere we stopped and were able to duplicate the small pockets where the channel swung in, again with the underspin. Didn't catch quite the quality, but Coty had another high 3 range fish along with several solid 2.5-2 3/4 pound fish. Towards the end of the day we ran back near the ramp and found fish busting. Fish everywhere on the graph and they were pounding the underspin. All barely short of just barely keepers, but still a lot of fun. Saturday, we started around KC, but the torrential downpours seemed to shutoff our underspin bite. We managed to get a small limit before running to Aunt's. I started throwing a jerkbait and about the time the wind started blowing, they started really eating it. I ended up catching our 2 biggest fish of the day, a 3.68 largemouth and 2.90 spot that looked like it was about to explode. The fish had stuck to the channel swings or close to steep drops, but seemed to have moved to gravel or sand banks or points. We ended the day with 13 3/4 pounds, less than half a pound from second. Sunday, We decided to stick it out in KC because it seemed the better quality bite was there. Started out the morning hot and heavy, but mostly smaller smallmouth. They really wanted the jerkbait, so I kept feeding it to them. It was dead calm, and the bigger ones didn't seem to want to move for it. Finally got a little ripple on the water, and I quickly boated 3 keepers before we made a short move to a point I'd wanted to fish if the wind started moving towards it. It was a good call as our biggest of the weekend literally tried to swallow my jerkbait. It had been a tougher day, so we were feeling pretty good, but really wanted another quality bite to feel like we had a shot. Then the sun came out, wind died, and so did the bite. We went a couple hours only culling up a little with a 2.5lb smallmouth on the jerkbait, but still had a 2 pounder to get rid of. Decided to try to the little pockets again to see if there was any magic left. Very first one, Coty got slack lined on his underspin and put the one we needed in the net. We ended up with 14 3/4 on the day, which gave us the win by almost 2 pounds and big bass for the weekend with my 4.14lb fish. I've fished The Rock for a long time, never seen her show off like that before, it was a blast.

Some highlights from our weekend at Table Rock. I also fished Wolf Creek Thursday in the beautiful weather. True to form, Wolf fish love the nasty weather. Dozens of largemouth and smallmouth, some whites, some drum including an 11.5 pound monster, and 1 catfish all came to the boat before we got blown off around noon. We tried Melvern for a few, but it was high and muddy again with trash floating everywhere. My biggest bass of the day slammed a Savage Gear Shine Glide and went 4.30 pounds.

Love the Rage craws. Wish they were more durable, but I can live with some torn baits for such a productive bait.

It's the Menace for me. Hoping there's a bigger version on the horizon.

Rage Menace Havoc Pit Boss and Changeup Zoom brush hog and baby brush hog Zman Boar Hogz and Palmetto Bugz SK Rodent YUM Woolly Bug BBB Yo Momma I love creature baits

Man, over $1 a jighead for a Ned rig head is highway robbery. It's not hard to lose 5-10 a trip thanks to the zebra mussels. Makes me really glad I'm not paying for them

FWIW, Fireline is a fused line, not a braided line. Doesn't handle as well on casting gear for me, and a little stiffer on spinning gear, but it's still fine line, exceptional if you can find it for $3 a spool.

I personally use a 7' 3' H/F and love it.

The Presidents are great and the Trions are pretty dang good too. I hate the trigger and double paddle handle on the Spirex, so I've never used one much. The binding issues on Shimano spinning reels turned me off to them completely. Now, all but one of my spinning reels are either Pflueger, or Okuma.

Small topwaters, jerkbaits, and spinnerbaits.

I've had very good luck with the Okuma baitfeeders. I have 3 different models and 4 different sizes, all have served me well. A 50 or 65 size would be a good option for the fish you're targeting.

7' MH/M St. Croix Pro Glass, no longer in production.