heavyduty

Sleds look great!

Prototype Lures buzzbait. Has a stainless steel rivet and man does that make the blade squeak! Also has a planer style head that helps keep it up on slower retrieves, and you can bend the blade wire so that the blade can hit the head for more noise/thump.

Good job, easy to navigate!

KastKing Cutthroat 7” Fishing Pliers, 420 Stainless Steel.

It's my favorite way to catch smallmouth so it's the first thing I throw every time I go whether burning, stop & go, or slow rolling bumping the bottom. If no takers, then I'll throw other things. 38 degrees and up. Slow rolling in cold water with a lot of pauses will surprise you! Almost like fishing a jig...

I enjoy them all but for my favorite, when they absolutely.... crush..... a spinnerbait!

Interesting....What size do you think to float a 2.75 tube?

Their stone catties, chillie willies, and river darters have all produced well for me fishing for smallmouth. As said above, they took over the business from Al Winco and do have a good following. Check out Reel River Adventures, Chris Gorsuch. He's one of if not the best smallmouth guide on the Susquehanna and Delaware Rivers and uses their plastics quite a bit. He's got many pics of their lures and smallmouth pics on his facebook guide page, instagram also.

Smallies love them! I usually break them in 1/2. I've fished them on a 1/0 EWG with a split shot up about 3" before I learned of the ned. Fish them both ways now.

1648 minimum for stability, casting room with two people, gear, cooler. I started with a 1236 as a teenager, 1442 till 40yrs old, now at 57 I want something stable and roomy. Also want the stability now to take the grandkids out.

Watkins is slack water backed up by Bosher's Dam. Watkins down to the dam you'll be fine. Watkins up about 1/2 mile you will see a couple islands and ripples/rocks (end of slack water created by Bosher's Dam). You can get thru in a kayak or canoe, a jet maybe on plane but will have to be very careful.

sent you a couple messages

L.E. Rhodes runs Hatchmaker Guide Service out of Scottsville, VA. He guides on the James and Shenandoah.

Do your hands sweat in the nitrile gloves? Is there a thin cotton glove to put on first, then the nitrile over that to prevent sweating?

River Rock 20% off summer sale. Auto applied, no code needed. No affiliation but if you haven't tried them, these are a go-to brand for me for smallies.

Next ramp above Watkins is Maidens Landing on Rt 522. You can run your jet there. If you are experienced, you can run Watkins to Maidens. Going upriver from Watkins you have the following ramps: Maidens West View Cartersville Columbia Bremo Bluff Hardware Scottsville Howardsville Midway Wingina James River State Park Bent Creek Lynchburg Hardware is boulder strewn and very tricky Scottsville to Howardsville is difficult, almost impossible to not hit rocks at normal levels Howardsville ramp is better suited for canoes and kayaks Wingina ramp is short and can be difficult to launch a jet Smallie fishing has been off this year so far. Not sure if due to all the high water or if RR spill in Lynchburg did have an effect on the fish. 2-3' on the Cartersville gauge, you can pretty much get anywhere with the jet. Bent Creek needs to be 3.5' or above to get around safely up that way.

Makes perfect sense, thanks for the explanation!

Munkin, can you share some more info on blade spacing on spinnerbaits please.

Same here

Thanks for the reply. I follow your explanation so no need for pic unless you want to. Thanks again!

Dye the tail with a little chartreuse.....for your benefit! ?

A-Jay, the bags look promising. A few questions if you don't mind: 1. Can you unzip a bag just to show how you have the bait packages aligned? Or if this makes sense; do you have several short rows across the bag or a long row the length of the bag? If length of the bag, will a standard size bag fit easily, say the size of a zoom pack of super flukes? 2. If stacked on top of each other 2-3 tall, are they sturdy enough to hold their form and not "squish" the bait bags inside? 3. Roughly how many bags will the large size hold? I currently use the plastic sterile lite containers and they do fine but if these bags are sturdy, I think they will pack/store a little better than the plastic containers. Thanks for your time!

I carry a net on my boat always. Have a Frabill that I use on my jon boat and a new Ego2 Slider for my river jet. I don't carry a net on my kayak since I can easily lip them right in the water being so close to the water. Fish grips on my yak for the toothy ones.

Here's a curve ball.....

Interesting to hear Gary say he invented the senko as a sluggo replacement, fishing it like a jerkbait. That's how I fish it 95% of the time. Throw it out, let it wiggle down as the wake settles, twitch it a few times like you would a fluke, let it wiggle down, twitch, twitch. It's definitely a confidence bait for me for river smallies! Enjoyed the interview, appears to be a humble man, thanks for sharing.