Avalonjohn44

It's hard to beat the $5 Gander MT hats. Got one on now.

Zoom Horny Toad or Stanley Ribbit Weightless 5/0 Trokar Flipping Hook

The Winchester VA Gander is great. Huge fishing section, and always a ton of bargain bins to sift through. I practically live there. Love it.

I grabbed a bunch out of the clearance bin at Gander... I love them, a different profile than the bass are used to. I catch a lot just swimming them slowly.

I bought one on ebay a couple of years ago sure that it would give me an edge... That was two years ago, never got that edge... Haven't caught anything on it. It looks like a work of art, but it's nothing spectacular on the water. I had one blowup on it this summer, but didn't land the fish. By comparison my black back/white belly Rapala floater caught two or three dozen fish. Buy a rapala or a bagley bang-o lure and save yourself about 10 or 15 bucks.

When used traditionally, I use the same Arkie's that Basshunter1961 does and they work great. I have played around with flukes on a 3/16 shakey head this year and was surprised how many fish this produces both in rivers and the ponds.

I'm a big fan of Koppers. Lost count of how many bass I caught this summer. Fished them almost exclusively in Orlando area a few weeks ago and was doing great with them.

Looks like a dead ringer to the Cultiva Rip N minnow to me, color #13:

Looks like a Cultiva Rippin' Minnow. LINK

Yep, rod is from Gander, it came with the scaling.

I was fishing it traditional Tx Rig style, slow, on the bottom, but sometimes gave it quick swimming bursts. I tried it weightless thinking I'd keep it near the top where dragonflies would be but they didn't want it that way.

I always wondered why the color Tequila Sunrise was a good producer, or for anything colored pink for that matter. On a trip to FL I found a pond with hundreds of pink dragonflies. As luck would have it I brought some Tequila Sunrise Powerworms and was able to precisely 'match the hatch'. Pretty much a perfect match. I caught a half dozen bass in about thirty minutes before the rain started, and used that color worm for the rest of the trip, it killed!

I just fished with a guide in FL who swore by Trokars. We frog fished all morning using Trokar Flippin' hooks in a Zoom frog. I had more hookups than ever before on frogs, and will be getting some of those next trip to BPS. I Loved them. Maybe not a conventional use of the flipping hook, but I'm sold after trying them that way. They seemed to penetrate deeper and allowed for better hookups. I was impressed.

Dick's Sporting Goods already has them in stock. They look identical to the baits just before Bagley closed up - same body styles, same colors/patterns. To be honest I was a little disheartened with the paint job. There were bubbles in the finish and the colors looked somewhat washed out, not as vibrant. They do have different packaging and cost 6.99-9.99 depending on size/popularity of bait... Because of the paint issue on many of the baits on display I didn't pick any up yet. That may change, just lost a couple last week on a snag...

^^^THIS. Seven pages and nothing as elegantly put. Could not agree more.

Lunker City Salad Spoon needs more love around here... Great sleeper bait that I always carry with me. I never see anyone using them.

Either Megabass or River2Sea. Can't tell from the size.

Got some free 5/0EWG hooks today and a cool sticker for my car. WOOHOO! What a cool Company.

I haven't caught a fish on one yet, but my LC1.5s keep on catching...

Crap-pee here. Also heard them called specs too. I like the name Strawberry Bass will start calling them that and see if it sticks...

Cool idea. I can't imagine their durability is great, but I would try them.

KVD1.5

They look nice and have some nice looking colors and models. But I've have never heard of them or seen one of their lures and I've been around a while. Curious though...

I only have a few SK cranks other than the KVD1.5 and 2.5 of which I own many. The normal SK cranks are generally sub par, craftmanship is poor and inconsistant, the hooks stink, the paint jobs are sometimes brittle and flake off. I am not a fan. However, the KVD 1.5s, for me, catch fish almost as well as my Lucky Craft RC1.5s. They are fairly durable and all of mine have run true so far. The hooks aren't great, and a lot of people change them out. I haven't yet because I am lazy. So far it hasn't come back to bite me... They are fairly inexpensive and are becoming my go to crank.

My walmart had the skip gap gammys for a buck fifty, bought em all. Grabbed some Spiderwire mono on the cheap too. A couple of months ago I found some Yum Money Minnows and Money Craws in the $2 Yum box, grabbed all of those too.