smalljaw67

What did you expect?? What you do is see where the length you need is on the tail and cut some hair off it, DO NOT CUT THE TIPS OFF!!!!!!! Cut from the base and tie to your jig and any excess gets cut off from the head of the jig. I had a guy ask me why his hair jigs had no action and when I saw how he butchered up the tail it answered the question. I suggest you look on youtube for a video or have someone show you how to work with natural bucktail, it isn't rocket science but if you cut the tips off the hair your jigs will be garbage, the tip of the hair is hollow, the base isn't and it is hard for me to find the right words to describe what to do.

I make them for myself so that is my favorite and I use 1/4oz to 1/2oz, and I've used 4" super flukes, 4" River Rock Jointed jerkbaits, and the Yum Boogee tail, all work great and produce a lot of action.

As everything else in fishing there is really no rule but for me spinnerbaits are special so I'll tell you how I select blades. First off you are right, sunny=silver or nickel, cloudy= gold or brass and it works well but that is based on clear water so for clear water with periods of sun and clouds I'd go with gold since the sun doesn't hamper the gold as much as clouds dull the flash of silver blades. If I'm fishing water that is stained but still has 3' of visibility I'll go with gold indiana blade unless there are smallmouth and then is when I like to have a painted blade, either a chartreuse or white blade. The reason I like the painted blades in stained water only if smallies are present is that they seem to react more to color than a largemouth does, it isn't to say I never caught a largemouth on painted blades because I have but I up the odds at catching smallies on the painted blades. I stay away from those painted blades pretty much in clear water but there is an exception and that is low light days, most of the time I use the gold or brass blade for that kind of day but sometimes I will use metallic colored blades, a metallic chartreuse with a metallic blue or metallic red, these put out flash on low light days just good as the brass or gold and I only do that just to change it up and see if it affects the bite at all and for the most part they hit the gold blades just as much as the metallic blades so either blade choice is fine.

Which mold??

I like grubs on a small jig head, and you can either bottom hop it or swim it but I use them around rocks since using them like this makes them prone to snags as the hook is exposed. A good shaky head worm isn't supposed to have a lot of action on the fall, the idea is to have a subtle presentation with just the tail quivering on the bottom to get finicky fish to hit. I have a new favorite that I found last year, it doesn't float straight up but instead floats at a 45 degree angle and the tail is almost impossible to get it to stop moving. It is the River Rock Baits 5" drop shot worm, and while it does work on a drop shot it excells on a shaky head. Another one to use is the Big bite squirrel tail worm and the Power bait shaky worm, both of these stand out as only the tail floats so they too have that 45 degree float off the bottom which seems to work better than the worm standing stright up, at least for me it does. Grubs are either River Rock Baits 3" grub for swimming and the Manns Stingray grub for bottom hopping.

I forgot about that hook!!! Yep that too is a good one, I like the 5304 better as the deep throat holds really well but either hook should be fine.

I found a swimbait bite on a river but the hoolow body swimbaits don't work well unless you use a 3/8oz jighead as the current really grabs them but I found that a Storm 4" wild eye swim shad is great for slow swimming in current. The neat thing on the swimbait bite when it comes to smallies is the attention, unlike a spinnerbait that gets mudered the swimbait makes the smallies follow but sometimes they fully commit and just bash it and other times they leave it alone but they do show themselves.

Try the Owner 5304 deep throat jig hook, it usually fits molds that take the mustad 32786. The Owner hook has the 2X strong shank, both the Mustad 32786 and the Owner 5304 are good strong hooks but the deep throat design of the Owner may help but give it a shot, I never had a complaint with that hook.

There isn't a right or wrong way, it is just a matter of preference. For 5" senkos weightless texas rigged I like both baitcasting and spinning but casting is what I prefer to use most of the time. Not throwing 3" sticks whether weightless or on a jighead I use a spinning and for the 4" slender type of sticks I will go with spinning.

I agree, with that amount of cash you are not going to get a great rod but the LR is ok, it will do the job.

X2 !!

2 different techniques for different purposes. Texas rig for me is shallow water in and around cover, the shaky head is a deeper water, 6'+ in light cover and more open areas, more of a finesse technique but it doesn't have to be like that but that is the general way I use them. I sometimes fish a finesse texas rig using a light weight and small worm and I also have a power shaky head with a big head and 10" worm, that is the contrast as both can be used in different ways but I wouldn't let species population dictate what I'm going to use. I would opt for finding fish and then base my presentation on location and match the size of the bait to the fish. In a lake with a lot of spots and they are biting in 8' of water around docks floating docks I'll use a shaky head but if they are wood or metal docks that are permantly in place with posts I may opt to use a finesse texas rig. On a lake with more largemouth you may find them relating to stumps in 3' of water or maybe they are laying in 5' deep holes in a large weedbed, in those situations I'm using a texas rig but maybe the stumps are isolated in 6' of water with little to no cover around them well I might use a shaky head in that situation.

I use the Mustad triple grips, not the 2X short shank but the regular shank because of weight issues. Suspending jerkbaits are tough to change hooks on when they don't tell you what hooks they use because the bait was balanced using that specific hook but I like the holding power of the triple grip plus the regular shank model doesn't seem to upset the action or suspending ability of the baits, I've used them on suspending rogues, Pointers and Xt3 twitch baits and all worked and more importantly suspended just as they did with the stock hooks. Owner hooks are stronger hooks so unless you can downsize the hooks I stay away from them, I tend to like those for regular crankbaits.

When I tie a hair jig it very seldom has silicone in it but I have done it for some people and the only way is to tie with thread, wire will not hold the hair very well. I've seen a mostly silicne skirt with just a little hair added to it and I've seen hair jigs with just a few strands of silicone added to it.

What you experienced doesn't happen often but it does happen. What I believe was going on is you had a bait that was the right color and size with just enough action to make them bite but the trailer probably made too big of a profile. The fish probably would have followed but not hit smaller lures with a lot of action, they were in a mood were just the pulsing of the skirt was enough to make them hit, easy meal. I had something similar happen one time in over 30 years of bass fishing, I was fishing a jig in cold water, early March, a warm front came through and I was able to be on the water the last warm day. Anyway the water temp had gone from 44 degrees to 47 degrees and as a result the fish were moving but still lethargic. I had a Zoom super chunk jr. on my jig and I wasn't getting any bites for an hour or so and then my jig got hung up in some limbs and when I finally got it free it rended up tearing off my trailer well I put the rod down and left the jig in the water while I went to get another trailer out of my bag and when I picked up the rod I felt a slight tap so I set the hook and caught a nice 2 pound fish. I threw it back out without the trailer and let it sit on the bottom for a second and then gave it a short hop and felt the same slight tap and another fish. I caught 7 fish that day all on a jig with no trailer so it does happen but not often.

I like regular soft jerkbaits weightless, but the swimmin variety is awesome on a scrounger or a chatter style bait.

All BPS and Cabelas retail store keep inventory geared to the local demographic. If the store is close to the coast you find more saltwater stuff than what you would find in the mid west. My local Cabelas has a way of helping you out when you go to the store for an item in their catalog and the local doesn't stock it, they will ship you the item for free but you have to pay for it right then.

This is confusing but I'll try to explain. A lot of cranking rods that have a combination of graphite and fiberglass are a fast action but a fast action fiber glass blank is not the same as a fast action graphite blank. Lews makes a Tounament SL rod that is a graphite/composite mix listed as fast action but these rods have parabolic actions, they are a little faster than an all glass rod but still flex a lot for using cranks.

All of your questions are matters of personal prefrence but I'll add my 2 cents. I don't use a trailer very much, it causes a lot of short strikes and I hate using trailer hooks because I'm throwing spinnerbaits and buzzbaits in and around cover. I use mono for both spinnerbaits and buzzbaits as I like to use a fast action rod which is stiff. The reason for the rod is simple, I'm target casting to areas with cover, and a lot of times I'm ripping the bait free from grass and it is tough to do with a moderate action rod with a lot of flex or give. The mono is my shock absorber since the rod is stiff I rely on the little bit of stretch mono gives to take some of the shock off the rod, if you ever set the hook on a big smallies using a fast action rod with braid, well it is a bone jarring experience. I will add that I make my own spinnerbaits and the hooks I use have an extra long shank so it helps but if you fish a lot of cover with them trailers and trailer hooks just seem to get in the way but everyone fishes them differently so they choose different methods.

Whether it is for Christmas or your birthday or some other occasion, most of us recieved a lure from someone who is clueless about fishing and if you haven't then you probably ended up with a cheap lure when first getting into the sport. Besides how we end up with cheap lures the point is we all have or had at least one but I was wondering if there was one of those lures that actually caught fish? I got 2 poppers from a friend than knew I fished a lot, he picked them up at a local show his church had sposored and of course I thinked my friend and made a big deal over these lures when in actuallity they were just cheap lures probably made for a beginner kit or something similar but I put them in my box anyway. Well out on the river a few weeks after getting those I saw fish busting the surface and since I was in the jon boat on a float trip I only had a small assortment of lures with those cheap poppers as the only topwater baits, well I tied one on, it was all black with a red mouth about 1/4oz and the fish were killing it until the hooks broke but I still caught a lot of fish on it, probably the fact that the fish were just hitting anything on top. Well I decided to keep those lures after that trip so I put some new triple grip hooks on it and the next trip to a local lake made me realize there was something with this lure, we were on the water for 2 hours without a strike and so I put the black popper on again and the first cast got me a small keeper size fish and then a few casts later another and then another after that. I ended up catch 15 fish all on that popper, my friend with me got 1, I even tried the second popper I got with the first one and not a single fish, and ever since it has been an incredible bait, I have touched upp the paint and replaced the hokks a few time but I still have it. The triple grip hooks I put on the bait were the first year mustad came out with them so that tells you how long I have it and it still gets bit.

Try using the popper in low light conditions like overcast days, early morning or early evening. Also, anything more than a slight ripple on the surface isn't great for poppers, so what you want to do is try using it when the coditions are good for it, that way you'll be able to hone your skills with it.

I agree with gobig, I don't like glass as they just have to much weight for me but when it comes to lipless cranks I like a fast action rod, I know I'll lose some fish but the way I use them doesn't allow me to use a rod with a parabolic action. Most of my lipless cranks are getting pulled over weeds and when the bait snags the weeds I rip it free, and it works just like you hear pros say, when the bait pops free that is when a lot of stikes occur, ripping a lipless crank through weeds with a soft rod is incredibly tough at times, that is why I use the fast action rod, I compensate for the action by using a medium powered rod in a lot of cases.

I have always liked cork and I thought I'd never use EVA but this isn't your fathers EVA, it has improved. Traditionalists will scoff at EVA grips, but for me, either is ok as long as it is the correct thickness. I don't have any experience with the new one but I had the older Bionic blade and if you haven't got used to that handle then you shouldn't have a problem, if you had one previously then you might not like it but as long as you don't prejudge before getting it in your hand you should be ok.

If you find a deal they are fantastic, I have that rod but they retail over 100 dollars. I also point out they are rated for 3/8 to 1oz and I would say it is spot on, a 1/4oz bait on that rod seems over matched but 3/8oz cranks and the rod loads up great and the feel is there. I would also point out this doesn't have a deep parabolic action either, instead to rod flexes equally along the length so you it still keeps a relatively fast tip, this is great for big cranks and deep cranks as the action and resistance of the bait doesn't make the rod overly flex when working them. I really like it for throwing Vision 110 and Rapala X-Rap XR10 jerkbaits on it.

I guess I shouldn't have been over reaching because I use a lot of the jig hooks that appear on you jig in your avatar, an Owner 5304 Deep Throat jig hook is one of if not the best jig hook around, so yes, I will admit I'm wrong. I should have been specifit, the Owner 5326 cross eyed hook I use for shaky heads is one I do not like and it is due to the cutting point, it makes a big hole for a lite wire hook. The Gamakatsu 614 does a similar thing, I guess I should say the lite wire hooks from Owner and Gamakatsu aren't great but the flipping jig hooks are a different story. I don't like the spinnerbait hooks as I said, the cutting points do cause that problem and it isn't so much with largemouth as it is with smallies, the smallies tend to jump far out of the water and twist while doing it and the cutting point tends to really open up a hole. I should have made it clear as it did sound like they were all bad and they are far from it. My personal experience has been great except for a few model, primarily the lite wire jig hooks and the spinnerbait hooks and if they would make the gap on the spinnerbait hook just a tad smaller and add a little bit of length to the shank it would cure the problem.