McAlpine

I have the ardent set and love it.

Brilliant. I want stock in that company. Fishermen would be suckers for a box of baits that shows up every month with new stuff to try out, especially if it ends up quality stuff.

1/4 oz Shad color Terminator T-1. I can catch fish on this anywhere. There is always one tied on a rod on the deck.

Since I have been really interested in getting one of these rods and just ordered the 6'9" ML/F - Pfluger Supreme Combo for a smokin price above.... I'll thank you now. Thanks! ;-)

Someone gave me one so I thought I would try it out starting early last year. First season it worked great and was on my squarebill rod, it cast very smooth, drag worked well also very smooth. This season it is already showing some wear and tear by the grittiness of the feel of the gears. I care for my reels so this is definitly wear but I also fish tournaments once a month on top of regular trips so this thing got some use over the last year and a half on one of my primary rods. I brought in (2) 5lb class fish and several 4lb class fish on this reel with no issues last year and early this year. I would say you get what you pay for. It's a $50 reel. For that price range it will work very well if you dont fish often. If you do, then I would look for something that will last longer.

The trip to the store would have been a pretty long one since I was out of town when I bought it. Customer service should have taken care of me but did not. I ended up mailing it to the store for a refund I'm sure they just sent it back to Shimano for a replacement which is exactly what Shimano should have done with me to start with.

I bought a Calcutta 200B and the drag did not work right. Just can't lock it down. I called up and they suggested replacing drag disks but the parts were on back order until January. This was last fall. Come Februrary I still had not heard anything. Called them up and they said they had the parts but I would have to pay for them. I bought the parts just to get my reel working. Parts arrived, replaced what I had....drag still does not tighten up correctly. Then a week later another set of parts shows up, which they also billed me for. I gave up. I don't buy Shimano's any more.

Just saw the ad on the main page here, that 1/2 off looks like a good deal but I have never heard of these before. Been thinking about picking up a new 4 wt recently anyway. Anyone have any experience with them?

After breaking off on a couple big fish with $10 live target frogs (just bad luck) I started using the Booyah frogs. One thing I have noticed is 1.) I'm saving some $$ 2.) They dont take on water. Great frog for about $6 and I've caught a couple 4lb-ders this year already in tournaments in the morning on these. Been a good bait for me to put some good anchor fish in the boat early in the day.

Got qty (7) 1/0 EWG. Tickeled about the free hooks, I have really wanted to try these but the cost has kept me from doing so. The big pack from the other sign up has not shown up, hope it does that would be awesome. Thanks for the heads up on this.

An A rig is an umbrella rig with 5 baits on it and should be illegal in every state that I know of. The DNR of most states not making a decision these is ridiculous. Why not just put 200 baits on there? Doesn't seem to make a difference to the law.

So, I just went out with Hotmaps premium for the first time. Before I went out I updated everything, checked out the lake I was going to fish with their PC App, set waypoints, saved the waypoints on a seperate card so I wouldn't write to the map card, super careful with everything, ready to go...right? Nope. I swear that card was working at home in my 898 but I must have been looking at the contourXD Map. When I got on the lake, the unit could see that there was a map card and I could select to load the map from whatever slot I put it in. The unit would say..."Loading Map", then when it was done there would be nothing. When I zoomed in it said "no map". So when I got home I put the mmc card in the Navionics provided card reader, plugged it in. There was an update avaialble, downloaded that. Ran the PC app, the lake I was on is right there, there are my way points, no problems. Ugh!!!! I have a Humminbird 898cHDSI and 788ciHDDI units. Did the same thing in both. I'm pretty bummed. I assume Navionics wont be in the office till tomorrow but anyone have any ideas? Is there a trick to this? Thanks for any help. I have my first tournament of the year next Sunday and I'm pretty frustrated with this. I was looking forward to using it.

They are terrible, stay away from them. At least until after 9:30am after I get my 3 max they allow and get out the door.... For $69 this is a smokin deal.

yeah, work the x-rap faster than a normal jerkbait. I use them after the water warms up but I still want a jerk bait. Only pause as long as it takes to reel up the slack. Great bait.

heck, if your in e-town, just go to Nolin. oh, and try to dodge the houses in the middle of the road. What a mess this was today.

I'll completely agree with a couple of the earlier posts. The toughest thing for most fishermen to learn is that what worked for you before might not be what you should be doing today. We are creatures of habit unfortunatly. We would all be much better fishermen if we could forget everything we did every time we left the lake.

my grandfather used to have a small lure that looked like a mini budweiser bottle. I bet him I could catch a bass on it and he told me I was nuts. Took it out on the pier and Bam...caught one. I'd be the first to admit I am a sucker for the marketing and have too many lures, but Bass dont eat lures, they eat a moving shape because it's the right size. Put anything in the right column of water with the correct general shape and move it right and you will catch bass. It's fishermen that worry about color, brand, etc. not fish.

That was awesome! Thanks for posting it.

Get a Lund and you will never be sorry. I really wanted a bas boat but needed something for the wife and son too. I went with the 1810 predator which is a great combo between a bass boat and a semi-deep v. Regardless of the model you choose, trust me get a lund.

10lb Flouro. Whatever brand you want.

I grew up fishing clear to lightly stained northern lakes so I always use a leader with braid. Just a confidence thing I guess but it also depends upon where you are fishing. However; I don't use any heavier than 10lb Flouro on any rod and consider this to be heavy line. The guys that are used to fishing the big reservoirs which tend to be more stained/muddy are not dealing with the same issues as someone that fishes natural lakes which tend to be more clear. Just have to judge this against what your water is like if you feel you need a leader or not. On the flipside though I have always been amazed at the aparant need for 20,30,50 lb line. I dont get it. I cant even remember the last break off I had and I generally boat several 4-5 and maybe a 6 lb bass every year with 8 and 10lb line. Last trip I made to canada I boated a 12 lb lake trout on 6lb mono and a 20lb Pike on 10 lb mono with a wire leader.

I have not used these but I have a couple TFO fly rods and they are awesome for the money. Plus, lifetime warranty! Also, the Technical rods are designed by Gary Loomis. Something which G.Loomis rods can not say any more. I have really been interested in picking up one of the TFO bass rods, if you get one please make sure to let us know how you like it.

I have the 80lb minn Kota with I-pilot and a 788 di on the front of my boat. The built in transducer in the motor can't do the di frequency so you have to put a puck on the bottom of the tm. You get some noise from the tm motor at times but the newest code for the 788 is supposed to help. Just upgraded this week so don't know yet. You have to run your transducer cable loose down the side of the tm shaft. Kind of a pain but the I-pilot is flat money. It's well worth dealing with the slack in the ducer cable to get the gps heading static set and the anchor feature alone. Good luck.

Small 1/8oz spinnerbaits, jerk baits, small crank baits, Johnson silver minnow with white grub trailer.

Chigger craws are money. I prefer the natural colors.