Hyrule Bass

if you decide on VA/NC i would definately try lake gaston on the VA/NC border. if you want amazing scenery try smith mountain lake in VA. but Gaston is one of the better lakes i ever fished at, seems like its severely overlooked by many people, but there is some excellent fishing there.

i imagine its a pretty huge pond if its got channels, blues, and flatheads in it. whats the size of the bluegill and population of them like? but anyways, this time of year(winter) i have never had much luck with soft plastics, but if you fish them, be sure to fish them really really slow. i would try a suspending jerkbait or a shallow diving crank bait, both have worked well for me in cold water in ponds. if i were you i would be trying to catch some of them catfish too, theyre a blast as well.

ive been through this discussion before here, speaking strictly for me, sensitivity in rods is so minimal to me that its not worth spending an extra $100-$200 for. i've "test driven" some other rods to know this(granted not all rods), so im not just making a blind statement. i figure if my ugly stik does just as well or outfishes some of my buddies who have expensive rods then i have/see no need to upgrade at such prices. now dont get me wrong, there are a lot of excellent rods out there, im sure they may be better than an ugly stik too, but for the cost and my view that theyre only marginally better if that, i cant justify paying that price. for those that can and will pay that price, more power to you. but im convinced no one truely needs rods that expensive to have great success fishing and i doubt my mind can be changed. id rather spend on the reel. i'll be honest, while cheaply priced, i do have an affinity for shakespeare rods. i have no qualms putting a $100 reel on a $20 rod. like i said, the sensitivity thing, to me, is minimal enough not to matter to me. and i have never broken a shakespeare rod, but have read plenty of stories of people breaking their more pricey rods. but since i started dropshotting with a 7'M ugly stik, my hook up ratio is near flawless compared to other rods ive tried it on...

i disagree with this based on the fact i have no problem turning a reel with my left hand, whether it be spinning or baitcasting. but i do have issues working the rod and setting the hook with my left hand, whether it be spinning or baitcasting. while in theory, your post may in fact be correct in its original basis. but ultimately it comes down to personal preference and what makes you feel comfortable...

to actually answer your question, it would not be a problem to cast a left handed reel with your right hand. its actually a benefit if you ask me. i got my first two baitcasters last year(2011), both of them i made sure to get a left handed retrieve and im a right handed person. for me its natural to hold the rod in my right/power hand and turn the reel handle with my left hand. i cast right handed. you dont have to turn the reel upside down or anything odd like that, and i dont have to switch hands after i cast. with that said, you could actually cast it left handed too if you wanted, just depends on what youre comfortable with. the only difference from a spinning reel that you reel with your left hand and a baitcaster that you reel with your left hand is the spinning reel is gonna be face down and the baitcaster is gonna face up...

$160 for a drop shot rod? crazy, i do just awesome drop shotting with a $35 ugly stik

i primarily fish mono and stren has been pretty good to me when ive used it in the larger sizes. right now i got a couple spools of stren in 10lb and 20lb. otherwise i mostly use big game which ive never broke off a fish with. the stren 10lb mono makes me nervous, doesnt appear to be as strong as it should be. ive broken off 2 fish with it, and only have it on one reel now. also my bro-in-law needed some line to put on his spincaster and all i had with me was that line, every cast would break off on him...

didnt really get much in the way of fishing. my mom and her husband got me an abu garcia ambassadeur 6601 C4 baitcaster, the left handed model =) and my little sister got me a pack of storm sunfish swim baits.

hilarious

excellent point. ive broken the drag on a reel trying to free a snag as described above. ever since then i find something to wrap the line around and pull with, that way i put no stress on the reel or rod...

i agree with this. i have an uncle with a small shallow farm pond. i fished it heavily for the last couple years and only caught one fish in the 20 inch range. this year i caught that same fish a couple times in the late winter/early spring. near summer this year i was fishing it during an on and off rainy day and caught two fish in the 20 inch range in the same day. one had a "flesh wound" is how i distinguished the two fish. havent caught either of those fish since either, they bite a lot less frequently than the smaller bass in that pond, unless i put on a small blue gill for bait. the good thing about the pond, is i watched the bass grow in size and in population this last couple years, this year seems to have really taken off. this is basically without any pond management. the two differences this year i think is weve had a substantial amount of big rains that lasted days, the remnants of hurricanes and such. i believe the drain pipe that controls the depth got clogged up and the pond was a foot or two deeper than normal, it flooded over top some of the grass beds the bass like to hide under. also there is also a slow running spring that feeds the pond, last winter when it wasnt grown over i cleaned up some tree limbs and old fence posts that were kind of restricting the springs flow into the pond, not sure if that helped anything, but i felt better about it anyways...

ive never seen one like that, but i have seen people with trucks that have racks on the front that fit a cooler with PVC pipes around the rack holding fishing rods. not sure i like the idea either way. buy 2 piece rods for when you take the kids, that way you can just break them down and put them in the trunk when traveling to and from the water...

i like rebels lures that i have used. im a big fan of the crickhopper and the tad fry. if the fishing is slow for bass i tie one of those on and go for panfish and might pick up the occasional bass too...

i bout a couple packs of trigger x frogs on clearance a couple years ago, couldnt get a bite on top with them. but when i let them sink and fished them like a worm i started catching fish on them...

caught my personal best of 20 inches 4 1/2 pounds in September of this year on a drop shot with a night crawler at Smith Mountain Lake. I was night fishing off a dock. Just out of reach of casting distance from the dock is a creek channel. then to the right there is a point running out towards the creek channel and several tree stumps. The water was kind of low that weekend, i caught her in maybe 3 feet of water out towards the point and tree stumps. My personal best on artificial is 4lbs 20 inches from a pond. caught her on a weightless baby rage craw, swimming it across the top of the water with the two pincers creating a wake from their flapping. that was also this year in the summer. also caught the same fish in February on a husky jerk and didnt take a weight.

i havent fished in your area, but something that has worked well for me in cold water are suspending jerk baits, mainly the rapala husky jerk. you may want to try them or x-raps or any other brand of hard jerk baits. i just fished them slow with a slight jerk and pause method...

you could also direct him to join bassresource.com, but after christmas so he doesnt see your plans in this thread lol

put a bunch of rage tail products under the tree for him and he will forget all about senkos for awhile, i may have thrown a senko maybe 3 times all year after i got into rage tails...

that game was horribly officiated all the way around. lots of bad calls and missed calls...

how much lighter? i have no problems handling my ugly stik/abu garcia cardinal 104 combo all day. minimal amount of weight differences is not a factor at all for me. balance? no problems here, feels fine to me. sensitivity? my ugly stik is plenty sensitive, of course i already explained that. explained the subtlety too. i feel bites just fine, even the soft ones. as i said earlier, im not saying ugly stiks are the best, im sure there are better rods. but i love the versatility of them, the price of them, and they do the same if not more than a high dollar rod. i can comfortably and just as effectively do with an ugly stick what many people have 5 separate rods for... well said yourself. and for the record, my 7ft M ugly stik has been an excellent for me when i drop shot with it

ok look, its like this. im not trying to put down or insult anyone who spends hundreds on a rod. im not saying ugly stiks are the best rods out there either. i dont want there to be any confusion there. but ugly stiks arent complete garbage as some would have you believe without directly saying so. i can do the same things and maybe more with my ugly stick that people do with a high dollar rod. i just cant justify it to myself to put out that kind of money for a rod. i was looking for rods in the $100 range before, just couldnt pull the trigger in the end. id much rather put that money into a nice spinning reel or a round baitcaster or lures. i can detect subtle bites with all my shakespeare rods and feel the bottom contour too, i myself have no need to spend significantly more on rods just for sensitivity or because it may be lighter in weight or made from a certain material. some of you say the ugly stik hasnt really changed in many years and is outdated, i say its stood the test of time...

i do just fine bass fishing with them.

ive used higher priced rods of some friends, ive held them in stores, ive read about them online...for me its just not worth it to buy a high dollar rod. my ugly stiks and other shakespeare rods have served me well for all applications. i dont need an over-priced rod to feel good about my fishing. some of you can say im wrong, but my opinion is simply how i feel. you cannot convince me theres such major differences in rods that one is worth hundreds of dollars more than another. and there are very few things that i buy that i'll just be paying for the name on the side of it...

here is something i happened to come across about channel cats in specific... channels have an average of 175,000 taste buds. there gills have about 50 per square mm followed by the barbel (whisker) that has about 25 per sq mm mouth has about 10 per sq mm body has 5 per sq mm they also take in smells in the water through nostrils called nares. they can smell oil and blood in as little as 1 part per billion in water.

the kick wouldve been off in time and good had garrett let it be. its a classic example of a coach outsmarting himself.