smalljaw67

I got a 7' ML-XF for a Christmas present a few years ago and while I normally use a little more expensive gear, I have to say that the rod was pretty good for what I use it for. I was going to send it back as the person who got it for me doesn't anything about fishing but to my surprise it actually works well for an "all purpose" type finesse rod. I use it on shaky heads and tubes and finesse jigs but I really like it for flukes. Sensitivity isn't great but it isn't horrible either, actually a little better than I would have thought on a rod at that price point but I think the extra fast action helps. If you like fishing hard and soft plastic jerkbaits with a spinning rod this will be a great rod as it is very good with those baits but it has enough feel for bottom contact baits like tubes, shaky heads, light T-rigs and finesse jigs and you can also drop shot with it but to me it would be for things like a 5/16oz to 3/8oz drop shot weight, it is a little too stiff for smaller drop shots, and it isn't that it can't handle the smaller baits as I normally throw 1/8oz stuff on my rod but drop shot fishing is better with a rod with a soft tip which the Procyon doesn't have. All in all if you're looking for a good all around finesse rod on a budget, this is pretty good and with a 5 year warranty it makes it a steal. I hope I answered your questions.

Go to make lure * and check out the videos on making molds and then look at the Alumalite products, they have the resin you need to mold a plastic bait. A few things about making the plastic jerkbait you want is fisrst, you have to make a wood model that you can get to work right and it will be trial and error until you get the weights right. Once you have that you can use the wood mater to make a mold but you'll have to make 2 molds, one for each side because you are going to have make a hollow bait with 2 sides that will be glues together so you can put weights and/or rattles in it. There is a lot of making a plastic jerkbait from scratch but if you are serious and have the time, money and ability, you can do it but I'll say it is going to take a good bit of time, good luck.

I use epoxy on jigs I make for friends, on my own I use Loctite super glue Gel Control, it is important that it is Loctite brand. Regular super glue will wick up the weed guard and then when it dries you will get a white film or residue that forms, if you use gel it don't happen. The reason I say to use the Loctite brand is because it you get too much and it oozes out a little, it dries clear so you don't get any bad spots but more importantly it doesn't break down in water like some cheaper super glue gels have been known to do.

My favorite is discontinued, it is the Xcalibur Xt3-D, it is the perfect size and the depth is very controllable with line size. 8' with 10# line, 9.5' with 8# line and with 6# line we can get close to 12', I'm sure if I used fluorocarbon I can get it down a little futher still but 12' is about the deepest you need to go in our waters.

50lb braid is only as thick as 12# mono in most cases, 50lb mono is what we like to call "goat rope" and I couldn't even imagine trying to cast with it or even spool it on a reel. As far as that knot, I was under the impression that the knot in that video can only be done on heavy mono as the smaller 10# and 12# line needs to use a knot that both lines have to wrapped otherwise it will slip. I'm not sure as it was quite some time ago and after using braid and then trying leaders and all that stuff I just quit doing it and now when I use braid I tie direct.

Most guys use bench vises but a good jig-fly vise will work depending on what you want to do with the lures. Fly and jig tying vises are precision tools, they will hold on to a small area and keep it from slipping under normal pressures but it isn't going to take any type of banging or hammering and even using a dremel is something I would not do on my jig tying vise. What you would probably want is what is called a hobby vise or sometimes called a jewelers vise. http://www.ebay.com/itm/3-Tabletop-Swivel-Base-Vise-Jewelers-Hobby-Bench-Vice-Tool-360-Tilts-Rotates-/380950553081?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item58b26c21f9

I use some from a small manufacturer called River Rock Baits, they make one called a P.C. Ringer, it is a small 3" stick worm that is just a killer during the summer and then again in cold water, I never leave home with out a bag or two in my box. Black neon and black with a gold tip just light the fish up, awesome little bait.

You're going to get a ton of suggestions as there are two sides to this , one is the shorter medium power, fast action guys and the other is the longer, medium and medium heavy with moderate action guys. I'm somewhere in the middle, I use to be a solid shorter, fast action guy but I have become accustomed to using a 6'10" MH-MF rod as well as a 6'6" ML-M casting rod and with that I can try to give you a little insight. I love the moderate action now but I only like it for certain baits, baits that are suspending and in that 1/4oz to 3/8oz range. I love Pointer 78s, Twitch stick and X-Rap 8s and Super Rogue Jr.s on the moderate action rod and larger 7/16oz and up baits I like a fast action rod but it has to have somewhat of a soft tip to it, most medium power rods are perfect. There are pros and cons to each, shorter faster rods are great for working the bait aggressively during warmer periods with more active fish and they offer more control in general but you also give up some fish fighting ability with limited flex, while moderate action rods offer great fish fighting ability and generally longer casts but you give up a little control on your lure, it ends up coming down to what works for you. I have tried both but watching a friend use a moderate rod I found I was too aggressive with it when I first tried it but now I have the hang of it but it still doesn't give me total control but in cold water with long pauses it isn't necessary. The rod you are looking at, the Lews 6'8" ML-F topwater rod is going to be good for jerkbaits and it isn't going to be too light, the reason it goes to 1/2oz is due to the tip and that rating tells me the tip is going to be right and it will be close to a moderate fast as they have it rated for a topwater rod, same deal with jerkbaits, small treble hooks that requires a certain degree of finesse to avoid pulling them out yet a certain degree of backbone to avoid the fish having control during a fight. I think you'll bb fine with that rod even with 1/2oz jerkbatis or even 5/8oz, good luck.

No matter if you are buying premade skirts or plain skirt tabs, if they smell and are sticky you simple need to separate them and leave them air out for 2 days and they should be fine.

So what inexpensive lures do you use that maybe look and/or perform better than you originally thought they would or that the price point indicated? I have a couple, but the first one that sticks with me and I have the same reaction every time I use it, the Storm Twitch Stick. This jerkbait is fast becoming a favorite, but it was only $5 bucks, so I got one because I liked the look of it online but when I got it I was really impressed with how nice it was for the price, it even has decent hooks which is almost unheard of at that price point. I have to say that after my first one I now have 6 of them, four in the size 10 and two in the size 8, the size 8 takes a single suspend dot to make it suspend but the larger size 10 has been good, in high water temps at or near 50 degrees it needs 1/2 of a suspend dot to make it suspend but even without it rises very slowly. I can add the Rouges to this list at only $1 dollar more or $2 dollars more for the upgraded models like the Cabela's G-Finish rogues and my last one is the Bomber Square A, that little square bill bangs off rocks and comes through cover with the best of them and like every bait I talked about, it just flat out catches fish. Because they are inexpensive I wasn't expecting a lot when I got my first one and it was given to me as a gift and years later it is a staple in my box, and even though I throw a lot of different square bills, the square A is only one I have every time I'm out.

I separate them almost every time but my buddy doesn't separate the claws on his smallie beaves, well the ones he uses for jig trailers he pulls those apart but if he is T-rigging them he leaves them together, he said it makes them glide better and slip through cover but I'm not sure I buy it but he does catch fish like that so I guess it doesn't hurt.

I'm one of those "don't knock it until you try it" types , I do have some expensive baits and I like them a lot. That said, most premium baits are premium due to components and detail but a few are innovative. There are two baits that I pay more for because they work, the Lucky Craft Pointer, and the Xcalibur Zell Pop, it isn't that others don't work but it is due to these working at the times when others in the same category don't. A Lucky Craft Pointer 100 and a 78 have a remarkable suspending quality but there is something with them that when other jerkbaits aren't getting bit, the Pointer seems to work. The Zell Pop. I hold it in the same regard as the Rico, Splash-it, and Yellow Magic, it is that good and I'm very satisfied with my regular Pop'Rs as well as my Super Pop'Rs but the Zell Pop, like the other high priced poppers, has a unique action, it spits more than pops, the spitting sound these poppers makes causes fish to hit them at times other poppers, or topwaters in general, fail to draw strikes. One really good jerkbait I don't pay top dollar for anymore is the Vision 110, and the reason is because the RC STX looks almost identical, and has an almost identical action that I feel I don't need the original. If I had a lot of disposable income then I'd probably use the original but saving money is something I must do and I pay for baits that I can't get unless I buy them, but the RC STX works for me and has proven to be a good bait. I'd be buying the Xcalibur XT3 instead of Pointers if they were still around because those were just as good and had the same type of suspending ability that makes the Pointer so good. I agree that some baits are higher in price than what you actually get but there are a few that you get more than what you paid for.

The spinnerbait is my favorite bait but it is also the one that bass get conditioned to first, at least it seems that way. During the mid fall there are places that the fish will group up as they make their way to wintering holes, I'd catch 3 on a spinnerbait and then make a dozen casts without a as much as a follow, then put a crankbait on and catch another 5 or 6 and go back to the spinnerbait only to find they won't take it but you can still catch them on a good crank. I'm also going to say rattling cranks, the same scenario is why I fell in love with the DT series, it seems balsa cranks are the last of the hard baits that the fish get accustomed to.

It all depends on how soft the tip is. Medium, extra fast rods are great for any kind of lure you have to use the rod to give it action but it has to have the right amount of limberness in order to do it. A good medium power, extra fast rod for jerkbaits will have a tip that flexes pretty deep, think what the handle on a cane looks like, but a medium power, extra fast jig rod will only flex a little, that rod wouldn't be good for the topwaters you want to use. I do like the length for those type of topwaters, it makes them very easy to work so if that rod doesn't pan out, a medium power, fast action will work for you most of the time.

The regular taper on your Tatula is more for reaction type baits than it is for jigs, so I'm guessing the Powell will be a lot better just because of the taper.

For me it is normally 12# but like Bluebasser86 I use line in the 10# to 15# range and my rod also changes depending on what I'm fishing. I use a 6'6" ML-M rod with 10# for the smaller 1/4oz and 3/8oz square bills when I'm banging rock with no wood or weeds, the smaller rod allows me to make pin point cast to targets which is critical when fishing this type of water. If I'm fishing rock with some sparse weeds and brush with 3/8oz and larger square bills, well then I'm using a 6'10" MH-MF rod with 12# line and when I'm using 3/8oz or larger square bills around a lot of brush or rip rap, then I'm using a 7'2"M-MF rod with 15# line, this gives me more power to rip the bait off of brush but more importantly the heavier line keeps the bait a little higher and that is important for me when I'm in rip rap. The bait will dive to 3' but on 15# it may only go a little over 2', not much of a difference but enough that my bait isn't crashing into the gaps in between the rocks, it still hits the gaps, you can't avoid it but that little change in buoyancy makes a world of difference, so keep depth in mind when choosing line and I too am in the North east.

I did a review on their XTS , not XPS crankbaits during late summer. I can tell you that they are cheap in price and they look cheap but something about them that make fish want to eat them, I'm not sure if it is the size or action or a combination of the two but we did really well with them. We did well on big smallmouth with a few over the 5lb mark with 2 colors, blue chartreuse and glimmer shad, I think they stopped making the blue chartreuse as it isn't listed anymore. I was with my friend fishing, he was using one and I had on a KVD 1.5 and we both were catching fish but his fish were larger and they were taking it deep every time while mine had the rear treble a good bit of the time. I ended up buying some and it wasn't a one time thing, we got into some fish and I was catching smallmouth just like my buddy was, and it is a cheap bait but it held up and is still in my box. I did change the hooks out, I won't lie, the hooks aren't great on the BPS cranks but for the price I think they are ok.

The prespawn period is funny as a cold front can ruin a good crankbait bite, that said I'll give you my list. Early prespawn - Rapala Shad Rap, Rapala DT-6, Flat side cranks in the 4' to 8' depth range, lipless crank baits and suspending jerkbaits. Late prespawn - Same as above with the addition of square bill cranks Spawn - Same as the above. Post Spawn - All of the above plus medium to deep diving baits. Summer - All of the above plus deep diving baits and floating jerkbaits. Fall and winter - Same as early prespawn. EDIT: If you notice, I only was specific with 2 baits, the Rapala Shad Rap and the Rapala DT-6, the reason for this is I don't believe there is any better cold water bait than a shad rap and I'm learning that the DT-6 is very effective in cold water too by fishing it early last season with success.

It has to be a tie between the Super Pop'R and the Rattlin' Chug Bug, both have really been fish catchers in my arsenal. I think the Chug Bug wins in number simply because I've been using them since they came out and while the Super Pop'R has been around for quite some time, it has been as long as the Chug Bug. The Super Pop"R , also called a Premium Pop'R is 3 and 1/8" long and slightly thinner so it only weighs 5/16oz, and it has different finishes but because of the profile it has a different sound and I'm convinced it gets bit more because of it. The Chug Bug is a popper and a walker combined, it is the easiest popper to make walk and what makes it so deadly is you can make it "pop" like most poppers but this one you make spit, and that is the very thing that makes a yellow magic, Zell Pop, and the Rico so popular, that spitting sound gets even neutral fish to bite, and add in the fact you can walk it and it is a no brainer that it is one of the best topwater baits for producing numbers of fish.

As Will Wetline has already mentioned, Bio-Silk is a great alternative to living rubber. I have been using it since it came out and I'll continue to use it. It acts and feels like living rubber but it doesn't melt or clump up like rubber because it is silicone. The only problem is the material is exclusive to Lure Parts Online but I normally order other stuff there so it isn't a big deal. A simple way for you to start is by picking base colors and accent colors, base colors will be Black, brown, watermelon, green pumpkin, and pumpkin, while accent ciolors will be natures edge colors, living image colors, glitter scale colors or basically any color that has a pattern on it like barb wire or tiger tracs. Just put together what ever looks good to you and think will catch fish, good luck.

Great post Allen!!

The Senko has been my go-to bait since it came out, it literally saved a lot of days when you couldn't buy a strike on a jig or anything else, even T-rigged ribbon worms with and without weight didn't work but a T-rigged weightless Senko always seems to get bit. The same thing when I'm fishing river smallmouth, a 3" Senko rigged on a 1/16oz or 3/32oz jig head drifted in to a pool and dead sticked will draw strikes for fish that could care less about anything else.

That was done by someone of immense talent!!!! I really like it!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

The Silverhawk is a Cabelas exclusive, it is a 30 ton graphite and I'm guessing it is probably the same or similar to the Vendetta blank but it has Alconite guides with really good build quality but not many models to choose from. I think if there is a Veritas in a model you like then that is what you go with but the Silverhawk seems to be a decent rod so you will make out no matter which you choose.

For myself, I like a little shorter rod to pitch with, I can't pitch at all with a flipping stick but my 7'2" MH-XF is awesome. The rods you are looking at are nice and a MH will serve you well unless you are pitching in really heavy stuff, I tend to pitch to moderate cover that is pretty heavy but nothing like what I flip in. I think it depends on the type of baits you are going to pitch with as well, a MH is great in my case because I often will pitch a 5/16oz finesse jig and a heavy rod seems to overpower the smaller jig. I think the 7'3" MH-F would work well for you