RoLo

I have a hunch that you'll have a broad selection among the noiseless PMs that you receive. Roger

I have a hunch that you'll have a broad selection among the noiseless PMs that you receive. Roger

That pretty much sums it up I too am guilty of reiterating the accepted rhetoric: "Locate bass with a search lure then mop them up with soft-plastics". It's nice to think of that way, but ask yourself honestly, what percentage of time does it actually work out that way? If soft-plastics are putting bass in the boat, we're probably going to stick with soft-plastics. If lipless plugs are putting bass in the boat, we're probably going to stick with lipless plugs. Switching from crankbaits to soft-plastics can make the switch from catching bass to marking time. -------------------------------------------- As for plastic worms during the pre-spawn, I don't know of any time of year when the provocative worm profile doesn't appeal to bass Roger

John, I'd be remiss if I didn't thank you for this website, which is my idea of sharing. Lake charts without depth lines are like dinner plates without food, but the Angling Technologies Mapper is a full plate. In a word, "incredible"! I'm currently using both Garmin and Navionics cartography on every lake I fish, but frankly both are fraught with inaccuracies. I live just minutes from Lake Kissimmee (four turns from my community), so I'm intimately familiar with many of the chart inaccuracies. The Angling Technologies Mapping tool is remarkably accurate, and I can see several areas where it's more accurate than expensive GPS cartography from Navionics and Garmin. I never thought I'd be saying that, but it happens to be a fact. In addition, I was able to import my Garmin waypoints under their GPS button. I choose the Garmin.gdb format and it imported my waypoints in their saved DD.ddddd syntax (slightly greater precision than "DD.MM.mmm" syntax) Thanx again Roger

John, I'd be remiss if I didn't thank you for this website, which is my idea of sharing. Lake charts without depth lines are like dinner plates without food, but the Angling Technologies Mapper is a full plate. In a word, "incredible"! I'm currently using both Garmin and Navionics cartography on every lake I fish, but frankly both are fraught with inaccuracies. I live just minutes from Lake Kissimmee (four turns from my community), so I'm intimately familiar with many of the chart inaccuracies. The Angling Technologies Mapping tool is remarkably accurate, and I can see several areas where it's more accurate than expensive GPS cartography from Navionics and Garmin. I never thought I'd be saying that, but it happens to be a fact. In addition, I was able to import my Garmin waypoints under their GPS button. I choose the Garmin.gdb format and it imported my waypoints in their saved DD.ddddd syntax (slightly greater precision than "DD.MM.mmm" syntax) Thanx again Roger

John, I'd be remiss if I didn't thank you for this website, which is my idea of sharing. Lake charts without depth lines are like dinner plates without food, but the Angling Technologies Mapper is a full plate. In a word, "incredible"! I'm currently using both Garmin and Navionics cartography on every lake I fish, but frankly both are fraught with inaccuracies. I live just minutes from Lake Kissimmee (four turns from my community), so I'm intimately familiar with many of the chart inaccuracies. The Angling Technologies Mapping tool is remarkably accurate, and I can see several areas where it's more accurate than expensive GPS cartography from Navionics and Garmin. I never thought I'd be saying that, but it happens to be a fact. In addition, I was able to import my Garmin waypoints under their GPS button. I choose the Garmin.gdb format and it imported my waypoints in their saved DD.ddddd syntax (slightly greater precision than "DD.MM.mmm" syntax) Thanx again Roger

Those are some fantastic walleyes! Eighty waypoints? You must know that big bay like your own living room. (at first glance, I thought your companion was Fish Chris) Roger

> I'd also have to parrot 'Side-Imaging' > Minn Kota's 'Spot-Lock' electric anchor (aborts the need for the ugly and expensive Power Pole, and functions in deep water) Roger

> I'd also have to parrot 'Side-Imaging' > Minn Kota's 'Spot-Lock' electric anchor (aborts the need for the ugly and expensive Power Pole, and functions in deep water) Roger

> I'd also have to parrot 'Side-Imaging' > Minn Kota's 'Spot-Lock' electric anchor (aborts the need for the ugly and expensive Power Pole, and functions in deep water) Roger

No matter what the commodity may be, manufacturers and dealers are focused on profits rather than feelings. Manns Bait does not have the power to set product prices without the support and consent of the angling community. The law of supply-&-demand automagically sets prices at the limit of what traffic will bear. Rising prices are a clear message of corporate strength. Naturally, consumers seek the lowest prices, but understand that the lowest prices are always found at the most stressed manufacturer or dealer, where imbalances are the greatest. Stockholders dump stocks when the underlying company 'lowers' their prices, while accumulating stocks able to raise their prices, especially in an anemic economy. Realistically, unless your letter offers a business model for expanding profit margins, it's not likely to raise many eyebrows Roger

Any idea what the heaviest male smallmouth or spot might be? Interesting question. I've never encountered data regarding maximal weights of male smallies or spots. On balance though, smallmouth bass weigh about 60% of largemouth bass. If it were proportioinal, male bronzebacks probably ceiling around 3½ lbs. Roger

Male bass rarely exceed 3 pounds, which is a major reason why 3-lbs represents such a stubborn weight-plateau. One of the heaviest males on record weighed 6 lbs. Trophy game fish of all species are the result of several factors, but being the offspring of supernatural parents is not one of them. To be sure, it's very elating to release a double-digit bass, but I have yet to entertain the notion that it will produce other double-digit bass. The odds are low that a very old fish will even make it to the next spawning season. But even if it does, fish of advanced age are past their reproductive prime, which wanes with every passing year. Mother Nature never relaxes her responsibility to ensure "survival of the fittest", and the oldest is never the fittest. Consequently, old specimens are slowly phased out of competition. For example, old buck deer eventually fail to grow antlers (nicknamed baldies). Despite their age and experience, Mother Nature does not want old bucks to reproduce. In similar manner, fish of advanced age are ultimately unable to spawn, not unlike an 80-year old **** sapiens. Within the genome, trophy potential hinges on two primary criteria: A) Subspecies Gender Differently put, if you're dealing with a female Florida-strain bass there's probably nothing 'innately' special about your 12-lb bass. Beside the two inherent factors however, there are two environmental variables that contribute enormously to trophy potential: A) Growth Rate Old-Age Potential (hinging on climate and fishing pressure) Roger

Autumn is a very complex season, and depending on whether it's early fall, mid-fall or late fall, bass location pretty much runs the gamut. Even lakes that do not turnover will undergo a complete water density overhaul. Fall is a time-of-year when game fish will find similar water temperatures and similar dissolved oxygen in all water depths. Bar none, the most overworked phrase applying to fall fishing is "Find the bait and you've found the bass", but think about that for a moment. Prey fish are at the bottom of the food chain, the widest part of the pyramid. The biomass of forage is exponentially greater than the biomass of predators. In healthy ecosystems, baitfish will be marking nearly every time you stop the boat. It's not physically possible for bass to be located everywhere that prey fish are located. In my opinion, that ole saw would be a lot more accurate if it were reversed. "Find the bass and you've found the bait", but who's looking for bait? ;D Roger

Berkley 10 Power Worm Gambler 10 Ribbon Tail Worm Why? > Low-speed tail activation > Tail ratio less than 50% > Plump rather than spindly body > Realistic length (advertised lengths are often fictitious) Roger

As their names imply, a crankbait is activated with the reel, while a jerkbait is activated with the rod. A crankbait may be a diving plug, known as a lipped crank, or it may be a non-diving plug, known as a lipless crank. Crankbaits and Jerkbaits are both available in three buoyancies: > Floating (lighter than water) > Suspending (neutral buoyancy) > Sinking (heavier than water) (BTW: There are hard jerkbaits & soft jerkbaits) Roger

It might be good to start by answering the question: What Is A Jighead? To my mind, a jighead is not a lure per se, but describes a Weighting System. Instead of using a loose hook and a sliding sinker, the jighead is a glorified weighted hook that provides a fixed union between the two. Pegging the slip sinker with a toothpick merely simulates the behavior of a jighead. During the descent of an unpegged T-rigged trailer, the bullet sinker always beats the trailer to the bottom, which leaves a loose loop of line above the lure. Normally this is no big deal, but sometimes that loose loop can be a problem in dense pondweed, hydrilla or tapegrass. More importantly, the T-rigged trailer may not reach the bottom during a slack line descent. Unbeknown to the angler, the lure may be suspended in weeds above the bottom during his long pauses. This isn't possible with a jighead, because wherever the jighead goes, so goes the trailer. Although a T-rigged plastic may land gingerly on a tussock of milfoil above the bottom, the trailer on a jighead will crash thru the vegees as it's dragged to the bottom. Just food for thought Roger

I like that

Never. I don't understand why anglers feel so obligated to the marriage between a bullet sinker and loose hook. Almost always, I rig plastic worms and plastic craws on a bullet-head jig sporting an Owner hook. If there's any disadvantage to this practice, I've been living in the dark for many years. After the soft-plastic lure has been rigged on the jig, you would be visually challenged to know whether it's a T-rigged worm or a jig-worm. Roger

No question about it. It costs money to stock fish, which is normally done to waters with anemic self-regeneration. I'd much rather read that they're 'taking' fish from my lake to boost the population of less vigorous waters.

With respect to 'location', lunker pike are deepest during the summertime, but are not particularly deep in winter. Although hammer-handles can be found on the weedy flats in summer, trophy pike migrate into very deep water beyond the outer weed-line where they're can't relate to vegetation. Large pike have a higher demand for dissolved oxygen than small pke and even muskies, in fact lunker pike are borderline coldwater fish (not far behind a lake trout). Spring holes are dynamite in the summer, but lose their appeal during coldwater periods when oxygen is not an issue. If your timing is right in fall, adult pike may be on a whitefish pattern. Whitefish spawn in temps around 45 deg in water around 5 to 10 ft deep. However, even before the ice is out, the gators will already be in knee-deep water. Pike are free-spawners that build no nest, instead they broadcast their eggs in backwater sloughs (marshlands). They look for last year's dead annual plants, like sedge, cattails, reeds, etc. Though a creek is always a bonus it is not a necessity (creek mouths are red-hot during the spring sucker run). Roger

I agree with all 3 of your lure choices: Spoons, Spinnerbaits & Jerkbaits. My favorite pike spoon by far is the "Johnson Silver Minnow" (1-1/8 oz x 3-3/4" - Gold) The J-Spoon has a reliable back-&-forth rocking action (35 degrees) but equally important is the fact that it's remarkably "Weedless". I always add a plastic trailer to the spoon, a 5.0" Kalin grub or 5.0" Reaper Tail. Another lure that can be cast or trolled is the "Buchertail Original Bucktail Spinner" (1¼ oz x 7.0) If you're going in early spring or late fall, an "LC Pointer" would be real tough to beat. Many anglers believe that northerns will knock the paint off any lure in the box. That might apply to the snot-rockets in skinny water, but I wouldn't hang that description on gator pike. Of course, once the "When" & "Where" are nailed down, the "How" becomes much easier. Roger

Provided you don't damage the hook chamber, the Ish Phat Frog will float till the cows come home. That said, I need to come clean. Hollow-frogs have virtually been phased out of my bass arsenal. Sounds blasphemous I know, but I have an ongoing love affair with "solid toads". By the way, there are four solid toads that are constructed of buoyant plastic, which float like a hollow frog. However, "Floater" must be specified, otherwise you'll technically be fishing a 'subsurface' lure Roger

Mother Nature is the best steward of planet Earth. Bass populations tend to balance themselves, in fact, man has typically been the biggest offender, where no management is often the best management. Bottom Line: If anglers were causing any harm to this lake, the lake would not be giving up buckets of bass. Conversely, when bass become difficult to catch, the anglers will melt away. Roger

Congratulations...that was no easy win buddy! Sunday morning I walked outside (lake wales, FL) and was greeted by cold gusty winds that bent the scaffolds on our largest trees. I told Lois that we're going to concede to the pier on Lake Walk-In-Water (a private pier on the sheltered north shore). I spent a couple hours experimenting with different lures & deliveries. Happily, I was only interrupted once by a sub-legal bass that came unbuttoned 8-) Roger