Hamby

Definitely want some quality marine carpeting that won't catch hooks. The real advantage i've found is keeping the carpeted area cool. My 14ft with wooden seats can fry an egg in the summer.

I don't fish tournaments, but i know they don't give you a reason to be an ****. Don't jump in front of guys.

Hair is cheap enough...i wouldn't deal with it. Got these from sites linked in an earlier thread regarding jig and fly tying supplies. Barlows Tackle search: hair Bears Den search: Hair

I fish out of a 14' deep v with a 40hp. It lacks stability when standing in the boat with more than one person, the wind blows it all over the place because it's light, and i get very wet when there's large waves. I fish a 2500 acre lake and i've been out during the windiest of days. I have to go slow on those days and runs across the lake usually take 3-5 times as long at least. I've never felt threatened, but wind is usually a day killer for me. I'd go with at least a 16ft with an appropriately sized engine. You'll be happy with something small at first, but if you're gonna put work into it you'll be happy you spent the time on something a little larger than a 12-14ft. I can't tell you how much it absolutely sucks to have a few hours in a while to fish and there's 25mph winds forecasted for several days. At least with something larger you can still make the run quickly across the lake to that protected shoreline.

How can you say that for sure? Many others like to say to go big in cold water because bass look for large, easy meals.

There's always that biggest fish competition, but i never pay attention to numbers. Actually, i think i fish harder by myself. I love being carted around in the back of the boat...catching them or not.

Why always downsize? In cold water, sometimes i like bulky jigs that fall slowly and make a bunch of commotion on the bottom. I like them to get stuck everywhere rather than move through it all with ease. I may trim the jig and put a shorter trailer on, but the trailer will be wide to slow the fall. Sure there's times where a small, compact jig works...but i wouldn't do it "as much as possible."

When it comes to actual jig trailers, I like the rage tails and the sk perfect plastic chunk. The sk chunk tends to stand up and have a very subtle wiggle to it. Good for sitting the jig in one spot and barely twitching your rod tip. Those tails really dance around easily. When i want something very subtle, i like to just use a trimmed senko. Try that. It causes the jig to fall nose first and land with the tail up, and can hop off the bottom without travelling very far. I also use whatever i have sitting around that can be trimmed down and fit on a jig.

I haven't fished with many mass produced jigs that you'd find in a store. I find that hand-tied by guys like gman and northstar are often far superior in quality and consistency. But i will mention that i bought a handful of the premier denny brauer ones on clearance and they are absolute crap. No idea how you can recommend those. Skirts were cheap, hooks rusted within a day and dulled easily...overall crap for me. Just wanted to add my 2 cents on that jig since you mentioned it. Wanna know the best part about guys like gman and northstar? The exact question in the original post could be emailed to them and they would likely answer it quickly and recommend a jig. On topic: I like a bullet style grass jig or anything sold as a swim jig is excellent also.

My issue with it is more about them falling off the hook and whacking the side of the boat or bouncing around the bottom. I haven't caught anything over the 5lb range, so the weight of the fish is probably a lot less than the type of weight i put on it in hooksets on a fish... or very large snag Now if i'm fishing for dinner, i don't care where they land as long as it's in the boat. But for catch and release, i like to take those easy precautions to ensure a healthy release. No reason to take the chance if i can easily lip or net them.

Man..i cannot even tell you for sure when the last time i fished illinois water was. Probably early 2010.

Little guys that are hooked well i do. If they get over 3 lbs, or look like they could fall off the hook into the boat, then i'll lip them. I don't usually fish with very heavy tackle though. MH at the very most.

If i have it on a tripod, what i often do is point the camera at something equal in distance to what i'll be from the camera. The only problem with this is lighting, so i have to make sure i'm pointing it at something in the same direction i'll be standing relative to the sun. The best way i've found to accomplish this is to simply point it at the nose of the boat when i hit the button, then point the camera up and stand at the nose of the boat. If you're shore fishing, set it up to focus on a tree, then stand in front of that tree.

During low light conditions you can use the flash to darken out the background. Even on cloudy days, you can sometimes use the flash to darken out identifying features in the background. For example, my avatar. It wasn't that dark...but the flash made it look dark.

Thrashing pike, big lure. End of story basically lol. Stuck the tail end of a big jointed minnow right into the side of my middle finger near the base of the finger. After thrashing around, the fish finally unhooked itself before ripping my finger open. After yanking my hand all over the place, i still had to push it the rest of the way. Surprisingly, i felt no pain at all. Very fatty area of the finger. I should've stuck a nice little piercing in there, the hole was plenty large. Other than that, no major problems with hooks in my flesh. My brother's caught me a few times, but those never went past the barb.