James Yalem

Yes, I still use 5' 6" pistol grip rods in heavy or medium-heavy action. I can't stand in a boat due to bad balance. So I find it hard to use rods over 6' and prefer 5' 6". Most of my rods are old, but I do have one source that sells this type of rod for about $120. I have been using this type of rod my whole life since the old Heddon Pal Wormer. I can't pitch or flip, but my casting is very accurate. I can pitch with a spinning rod, but I hate flipping or pitching. With a spinning rod, I can skip cast fairly well. One good thing about these rods is that I have never broken any using braid lines.

I grew up in Ladue and currently live near Creve Couer in unincorporated St. Louis County. I fished the White River lakes, Stockton and LOZ in the 1970'. Then in 1981, I built a vacation home on Truman. It was good fishing for 20 years, but not the last 10. Now that I am retired, I have put my home on Truman for sale and plan to buy a condo on LOZ when I sell my home. I used to be confined to weekend fishing, but now I can fish on any weekday. So boat traffic is much less of a concern to me.

That is my theory too. Since 2000, it seems that Corp of Engineers drops the lake level much faster then it used to when it gets high; sometimes only a few feet high. In recent years it has happened quite often in the spring. So not only does it mess with the spawn, but it scatters the bass.

I built a house on Truman Lake in 1981. For the first twenty years after I built the house, I would say that bass fishing on Truman Lake was as good as any in Missouri. However, since about 2001, IMO the bass fishing on Truman Lake has really declined. I fish from Osage Bluff Marina. First, I have experienced many more days of high wind and Truman is difficult to fish in high wind. Also, the lake level seems to always be dropping or rising much faster than in the past. I have finally put my house up for sale and after I sell it, I'm going to buy a condo on LOZ. Another reason is that I no longer am confined to fishing on the weekends and can now fish weekdays so boat traffic is not the concern that it used to be for me. But I have really struggled to catch bass on Truman in areas like the upper Pomme De Terre arm that used to produce so many bass. Do you agree with me?

All of you do realize that these bass fishing shows are not real. The bass are caught before the show and put on the hook by divers who film the fight. The last real TV fishing show that I can remember was "Gadabout Caddis" who flew an small airplane to various fishing lakes and rivers and fished for most North American freshwater species. Lots of shows depicted him casting without results. The show was in the late 1960's and early 1970's. But even Virgil Ward pre-caught the bass that he "caught" on TV. The shows all have a disclaimer that some scenes are depictions of fishing.

I am considering purchasing 30 lb test Momoi Diamond Braid line for my general bass fishing. Has anyone tried this line? Does anyone know its listed diameter in MM? How does it compare with Spider Wire Camo?