Hyrule Bass

i think fishing can be as simple or as complicated as you want it to be. For myself I mostly just try to keep things simple, basically just cast and retrieve whatever lure i want to use or think might work. Have to admit at times i do find myself over complicating things. Before I joined this site, I didnt realize people actually worried about things like barometric pressure for example. some of this stuff has changed how i fished and has helped me to get better. other stuff, i just havent learned how to apply it, or when and where. and some i figure doesnt apply to me at all. honestly some of the stuff here ive read has absolutely blown my mind and i'm like "really?" In many ways, this site could make things much more difficult for a beginning fisherperson, taking in so much info at once can be overwhelming as opposed to focusing a couple things at a time...and thats no shot at this site, its a compliment to the wealth of knowledge here. not many can take in and process a bunch of input at the rate of Johnny 5 also, id say get out there and use some of that old tackle sitting around for years. you bought it, use it. i bet it still catches fish. just because some things are the latest and greatest dont mean they outfish the old fallbacks. you have plenty of tackle and you dont really need any more it seems. and dont give me that bait monkey crap, you control him, not the other way around.

i dont know why they just dont air it live like the did on lay lake several years ago...

this house had baseboard at first, we installed a heat pump and ripped out the baseboard heat...we also have a wood stove we can use as a backup if need be...

assuming you have a rod and reel already, i would start off with 2-3 bags of plastics, hooks, sinkers, a lipless crank, a top water, and a spinnerbait or two.

this pretty much says it all. the guy is working on the assumption he is going to even catch that same fish again. thing could go belly up an hour after he initially releases it for all anyone knows.

the fish is coming out of the lake if i catch a record fish. put it back for someone else to enjoy may sound like a novel idea to some of you, but it could also be the same fish that breaks your newly set record a couple months and a feeding frenzy down the road. i understand wanting to preserve fisheries, but those fish aint gonna live forever either. chances are you could release it right after catching it and it turn belly up a few hours later. you just never know. im just wondering when people got so soft about keeping a fish. i bet some of you would cry if you saw me keep a fish or two...

i just try to be really careful with trebles. if youre going to lip them, better put the death grip on them because they will flop around if you dont...

do you have a planned route youre driving? then you should stick to places close to the planned route. since you plan to be camping, then maybe even consider a river or two and not shy away from smallmouth either. Are you flying back home? gonna cost you to ship or fly with those rods too...

cant believe no one has mentioned Gaston, its a great fishery...

one more thing, some lakes also have blueback herring which are very similar to alewives...

i wouldnt say youre really doing anything wrong, alewives just arent like regular minnows. they will die over night on you even if aerated in cool water. you have to have a top notch bait tank system to keep them alive and kicking for any long amount of time. so yeah, i guess they are pretty much the weaklings of bait fish...

while alewives can be hard to keep alive, of course theyre brittle if you cast them 5-10 times. mostly a bait and wait scenario with them. if youre casting them out and reeling them in that much youre most likely drowning them

i tend to disagree with this. you think bass used to smaller meals are going to pass up a chance for a bigger meal when they do get that chance? i dont, bass are opportunistic feeders. i think bass dont care where their meal came from if it looks like food to them. you can use baits and things for baits that dont swim in any water anywhere, yet bass(and other fish) will eat them. so i doubt theyll pass on a larger meal just because most or all of the forage in their water provides a smaller meal. also, ive seen smaller ponds like a half an acre produce decent fish, multiple bass over 5lbs and large bluegill big as my hand. im not saying smaller baits wont work, all i am saying is just because a body of water is small doesnt mean everything in it is small, from the fish to their forage... as for the OP, the earlier the spring i would throw jerkbaits and slow roll shallow cranks like manns 1 minus. as it warms up id switch to plastic creature baits such as lizards and craws. somewhere in between try throwing a red eye sexy shad. later in spring, most any soft plastic...

i dont like the idea of using drones. its not easy to fly them for one. i think it could create safety problems on the lake. aside from probably being a general disturbance to other lake goers, i can see drones crashing into boats, swimmers, other drones, and the likes. i dont want one delivering my pizza, nor do i want one buzzing around my head while im trying to fish...

do exactly what others say, get out there with a camera and map. mark things on the map and take pictures of the structure and cover that you can now see that you couldnt before.

i dont know about there, but i fish Smith Mountain Lake in VA several times a year and its loaded with Alewives. they come in the coves at night and spawn. We have a light on the dock we plug in and shine in the water at night, from spring through summer there are usually alewives that build up under the light. they seem to disappear come fall. we use the cast net and catch them for bait sometimes for striper fishing out on the boat but i use some night fishing on the dock too. i only seem to catch catfish on them though. i know striper and bass eat them too. an older friend of mine caught a 7lb smallie out of the lake about 4 years ago on an alewive. there are also shad in the lake but i never catch any in the net under the light. its always alewives in this cove. i suspect theyre at their heaviest in there in april, because mid-april is the only time i catch striper off the dock....

one of my biggest downfalls is tying on a few baits i want to use, then being too lazy to switch them out when they arent working...changing the type or color of a plastic is one thing, but having to choose which new baits to use and then tying them on is where i get lazy...

i had a terrible case of the flu last year, kept me home from work for a week, and i wasnt truely better until about 3 weeks later. i went back to work that 2nd week and it was rough making it through the day. for most of the first week i laid in my bed sleeping balled up in the corner of it looking like a postage stamp lol. rather than having no taste, everything tasted absolutely horrible, plus i didnt really have an appetite anyways. wasnt very congested, but had a cough, and had coughed so much my ribs hurt. i had never been that sick in my life though, and i made the whole house sick. it took tamiflu to start feeling better though...

12lb mono. sufix siege or trilene xl

if you cant feel worth a d**n then whats it matter? you could use a telephone pole or a cb antenna and not tell a difference

you can use any type of hook for a drop shot. i like to drop shot live bait a lot. the smallest thin wire hook ive drop shotted with is probably a 1/0 eagle claw abeerdeen hook...

honestly, if fishing is the only thing you have for fun then i feel bad for you....

sensitivity is more so in your hands than in the rod.

first off, a 7ft medium ugly stick will be just fine for a variety of multispecies fishing(excluding the muskie). i have a 7ft medium ugly stick paired with an abu garcia cardinal spinning reel. ive caught plenty of bass, bluegill, white perch, yellow perch and catfish on it. those saying its no good for bass are just wrong. there may be better options for bass, but the ugly stik works fine for bass too. the rod will be good for live and artificial baits. and its certainly durable. a pflueger is a fine reel too, i dont own the president but its probably the most versatile. i do own a trion and supreme both of which i love. i also would recommend the abu garcia cardinal rod and reel combos for what youre looking for. and theyre only around $30 bucks total, i got one at walmart. the price is cheap, but the gear is solid. to be honest often your cheaper priced gear is gonna be your best gear for multispecies. the higher end stuff usually tends to be more technique specific. i would just say dont let the cheaper priced gear fool you because of the low price, you can get a solid combo that can last you for years. also i have to acknowledge, some of the cheap stuff is just that and is utter junk. the $30 cardinal combo is a good deal and a quality setup for the price, its probably one of the best values around. my ugly stik and cardinal combo cost around $70 but i bought them separate. my 6'6M ugly stik and supreme combo cost me around $130, also bought separate...

the fish is potentially injured more by falling off the scales hook when/if it decides to flop around while hanging. as for the slime coating, the effect is probably minimal. its not going to lose all its slime flopping on the ground or boat carpet or whatever for a few seconds.