iabass8

I've never researched why but on the Mississippi in many pools in IA, I've noticed a lot of crawfish during the spring and summer with red on their shell and their claws. Others have had nits of blue or straight green/dark green during the same time of year. Red cranks are a very productive bait throughout a lot of the spring.

I had one. Actually I've had two. I had to take back my original because it felt extremely geary and not quite what I had wanted. The second one, while it was nice and smooth, the AR kept failing. Fixed the spring issue myself but it still wasn't up to what I usually use (stradics). The reel had a great drag and initially felt nice reeling but I ultimately took it back and just got a stradic.

What he said.

great stuff!

ha. Beat me to it.

is the drag tightened down? is the spool locked in to the (i'm terrible with part names) gear on the handle side? When you drop the spool and shaft back into the reel , the spool shaft has a cross that locks into place in the gears under the handle side so the spool will mesh with the handle. If you can close the side place this is probably not the problem. the reel won't engage if the drag is too loose.

That would cast fine on just about any reel. That isn't really what I would personally be using for vertically DS in clear water. If you are casting a DS, then that set up would be fine. I would even go down in braid size. I use either 6/2 or 10/3 832 /w a 7# fluoro leader or straight fluoro for casting a DS with no issues at all. I'd probably just use a 20# braid as it would be a better universal diameter to use a 6-8# fluoro leader. As for the casting rod, I would probably be looking at the (I don't know your budget) 802/852 glx/nrx. The 853 may be "too much" rod but I could be wrong. I use the 854 for heavier jigs.

It isn't so much the weight that is the issue. That's the easy part. The chronarch/curado 50 has no issues casting smaller DS weights. I wouldn't be using a 200 size reel for casting a DS or vertical DS. It is manageable to put 6-7# fluoro on a 50 size shimano or a diawa sol but can take a little getting used to having such smaller line on a casting reel. Spinning reels are just easier to manage in small # line. As for the rod, I've never used the casting version but I've used(don't own) the 822s nrx. It's a nice rod.

I hope it's soon. I'm excited to see what you come up with. I have to do some altercations to the skirts I buy for my football heads color wise by either adding more blue or more green pumpkin.

BfishN tackle and hutch's blade baits are all i use.i use mine for walleye more than anything but have hammered small mouth on em.

Magic Craw, blue craw, molting craw are all variations of each other that would go well with that color beaver bait. I'm a HUGE fan of blue craw skirt color.

I only used dressed feathers on a few different type of topwaters and jerkbaits. The hair pulsates in the water when the bait is at rest. I don't care for it on moving baits.

I throw lipless baits more often than spinner baits but it's more of a confidence thing. I throw swim jigs more often than spinner baits though.

I did the same thing with a patriarch i used to have. they sent me the part free of charge. just e-mail them.

bats fly left when they leave a cave

Shakey head. Great bait

Zoom fluke or SK caffeine shad

quantums acs braking system can be very touchy. It isn't like shimanos "set it and forget it". I have one quantum reel with the new ACS braking and it took me a few minutes of solid casting of different baits to get it dialed in properly. I've had the same experience you are having. I've thrown 5/16 oz swim jigs + trailer for 10 minutes or so then all of a sudden there would be an unexplained backlash using the same lure. I set the brakes on the side to one setting tighter than I normally would and just let the lure almost free fall off the spool with just a touch of tension instead of the conventional "lure just being able to stop when it hits the ground". This seemed to do the trick for me. I've read the smoke can be very touchy with brakes at first but after you get the hang of it it supposedly is a great casting reel. There are comments about lots of people just tightening the brake knob a little tighter than usual to fix the issue as well. good luck.

St. Croix Legend Xtreme 69mlxf Stradic 1000fj 6# suffix 832/7# fluoro leader or later in the year straight 7# fluoro 1/8-3/16 secret lures wide gap or SK football heads most of the time zoom finesse/trick worms, robo worms, rage baby craws

not at all. sometimes they want it crawled just above the bottom. if you referring to a depth of something like 2 ft then just use a 3/16 oz swim jig and it will make your life easier with the retrieve. i use 1/4-5/16 almost always and 3/16 in very shallow flooded backwaters. 5in single tail grub is my favorite trailer.

That's pretty neat. How did you go about attaching the blade?

The Legend Tournament, legend elite, legend xtreme to keep it in the st. croix family. Dobyns Champion Extreme, G loomis glx/nrx. List can go on and on from a personal standpoint. "Better" is a very relative term. Some are just fine with avids, as they should be. they are good rods.

By the looks of it, unless he custom paints each individual reel according to the wright and mcgill victory reel, he uses his reel. I wouldn't be surprised though if he still uses his skeet reese revo which looks identical in paint schemes to his newer one.

You are probably not the only one but definitely the minority.

Fyi gander mountain has a really good rebate going on for st croix rods thst will get you it cheaper than tw right now. The 7'mh avid would be perfect for what you need.