Swamp Girl

I also threw black Jitterbugs in my youth and like you, I love farm pond fishing. I think the Loon Whopper Plopper would entice many Indiana farm pond bass. Wading is the best, isn't it? It's literally immersive. You're in their world. Sad about the effect that spraying has on bass.

@alonerankin2: I use the black one (Loon color) in low light conditions, i.e, mornings, dusk, and pre-storm skies. The brighter it gets, the lighter my color, so I'll progress up to bone and white. I like the chrome one a lot and have success with it both in bright light and low light. Size-wise, I go small in the spring and fall and big in the summer, from 3" to 4 3/8". I use a slow, steady retrieve. YouTube anglers suggest you vary the retrieve and I have, but slow and steady works best for me. Can you reach the Everglades, Skippy? At night? @Zcoker thrives in that gatory blackness. According to several who fish the Everglades, you don't even need a boat to catch big ones. If you live in Indiana, I'd go west and fish the Mississippi, which is a fish factory, or north and fish the Great Lakes. I've had many 100-bass days even farther north, in northwestern Ontario. In Ontario, there aren't bass as big as @A-Jay catches, but there are four and five-pounders. I used to fish the U.P. and had some great days there. One day, I caught a 7-pound walleye, a 20-pound pike, and several 5-pound smallies, in addition to dozens of other bass, pike, and walleye. Lake Michigan, like the Mississippi, is a fish factory.

YIKES!!!

I know this experience. Not to the same extent as a 50" musky, but sometimes I'll target big bass and fail and fail and then take a break and fish for quantity and land quality. The challenge all musky anglers face is staying alert when nothing has happened for eight hours or five days. I used to imagine muskies hitting on every cast to stay awake.

Well, my wrist feels better and the wrist brace is on the way, so I'm going fishing again this evening. I'll be fishing my quantity pond again (I'll fish two quality waters, a pond and bog, next week.), but I'm not going to use my Rapala Crush City swimbaits with the Owner underspins nor a Whopper Plopper. I'm going to T-Rig a lizard and finesse worm and also use a popper for a change of pace. I expect I'll do just as well, but we'll see!

@Bluebasser86: That is one sad story. You saved his motor. You rescued his boat. A South Bend combo? That must have set him back about $20.

@king fisher: So, you rouse them with a buzzbait and then finesse them with a Senko?

@Bird: Largemouth are such brutes. I think landing a big one on a fly rod would be like trying to lasso a bull with some kite string.

@WRB: If I'd been there at the right time and right place and I'd hooked a 16-pound bass, she would have pulled me around Castiac for a couple hours and then she and I would have become tangled in my fishing line and she would have gone deep. It would have looked a little like this: Tim, to reach that lake (There were no portage trails.), I had to drag my canoe up through three sets of rapids. You should have been there. We both would have loved it!

You have a detective's eye and mindset. Even if I knew where it was, Montana is soooooooo far away. Too far.

@Fishlegs: I do love a busy boat! Again and again, you don't just talk this talk. You walk it: Think about good things. (Phil. 4:8) Do good things. (Gal. 6:9) What you wrote about @WRB is flat-out amazing. Thousands of us here at BR and Tom's in-the-teens count likely surpasses everyone else's together. Now, I can surpass Tom's count if duct tape is permitted when weighing.

@AlabamaSpothunter: I've always caught a lot of fish by going when and where others aren't willing to go, whether it was Lakes Superior and Michigan in my measly 14' Lund and its puny 10 HP motor, wilderness lakes in northwest Ontario, or the Mississippi River when the howling wind bit. I've observed you fishing through the winter and through the night and thought, again and again, "Brother." ^This^ is why I quit musky fishing. I'm sure Tim (@T-Billy) knows the toll that casting over-sized baits takes. As far as my hands, I'm wearing full-fingered gloves most of the time, so they look fine. My arms are another story. I don't know how @bp_fowler acquired it, but that photo of my arm was taken just yesterday. 😉 For a while, I was writing for bicycling magazines and I will never forget what one pro told me: "The person who wins is the person willing to endure the most pain." Whereas that's always true in professional cycling, it's only sometimes true in bass fishing. Sure, we have times when it hurts, but we also all have moments were deer are bounding on the shoreline or owls are hooting in the woods or the sky and water harmonize in grades of gray: My all-time two favorite moments in fishing and one didn't even involve fish, although when I did launch, I caught some big smallies: 1. I was solo fishing in northwestern Ontario, camped on the edge of a cliff. I awoke to wolves and their pups howling. Geese flew overhead so low I could hear their wings pounding the air. A kingfisher flitted back and forth. Bass were rising below me, but even then, I just sat and realized that no amount of money can buy a moment like that. Sure, you could hire a guide to half-carry you there, but you wouldn't be alone with the wolves and bass and kingfisher and geese. And you wouldn't have earned it. 2. I was wading a point on the north shore of Lake Michigan, looking for a particular rock mentioned in a 1969 Field and Stream article. I'd fished for two days and caught nothing. Then I finally saw it and proceeded to cast to smallies who hit about 95% of the time. It was deep, so I was up to my armpits in water and bass. When they jumped, they were higher than my head. My prior failure made that success even sweeter. When I came to shore, my waders were full of water and I must have weighed 300 pounds!

Thank you, @Fishlegs. You embody your tagline: Think about good things. (Phil. 4:8) Do good things. (Gal. 6:9) @Jmurphy87: A kayak is too heavy for me, which is why I fish from a Bell Rockstar at 32 lbs. Even that is almost too heavy for me. When I can, I strap wheels to it, but I can't always do that or the distance to the water is too short to take the time to strap the wheels to my boat. I sure understand why you quit using your kayak. Through the apartment? Down the stairs? Brutal. @Fishlegs: Regarding the number of bass I catch, I am fishing less-fished water, which I've shared many times. The average age of Mainers is the oldest in the nation. Plus, there are only 1.4 million of us. We are also more forested (90% trees) than the rest of America. That adds up to a lot of old Mainers who don't want to carry/drag/pull a canoe or kayak through the woods to reach water.

Yeah, it does a little.

If you caught a DD, you'd look like the Cheshire cat:

So well put.

Yeah, I took too outfits and my little waterproof tacklebox. I also took a net and two paddles. So, I didn't take a lot, but it felt crowded because I'm used to a canoe.

@bp_fowler: Whoa, BP! Upgrading both quantity and quality!!! Well done, fellow Buckeye! Look at the your smiles in the three biggest bass. Each is bigger than the last. See how each of your smiles is bigger than the last too?

I'll do exactly this as soon as the brace arrives.

Just two kids having a good time. I don't actually own the pond. All ponds over 10 acres are owned by the citizens of Maine.

I have all ^that,^ but so do many Mainers, so it's no big deal up here.

@ThatZX14Fella: I'm sure you have water in Alabama that is fished less. To reach two of my ponds, I have to cross private land and I'm developed relationships with the landowners. I'll bake cookies or leave cashews with a "thank you" note. Alex (@AlabamaSpothunter) did chores and even Christmas lawn decorations for the landowner at the lake where he caught so many 4, 5, 6, 7, and 8-pounders. I'd use Google Earth to find some water down the less-traveled roads. Then knock on some doors, and barter, such as labor for access. I do understand that it's easier for me to develop relationships as I'm an old woman and no one is afraid of an old woman.

It's not just fishing. I've been gardening and walking too. I figure I'll rest when I'm dead. However, I also understand your point. It's a good one.