run23

a pretty popular suggestion for an anchor trolly is to rig one up and use it a couple/few times without drilling. i took this suggestion and i'm glad i did. i just made a functional (and ugly) trolly with pieces from depot and rigged it up on the right side of my kayak. liked it. moved it to the left side...liked it more. now i have the yakattak leverloc sitting on my desk and will be installing it on the left later today.

take a look at the Vibe Seaghost 130. if you can find a 2016 model, they are under your budget, comes with a paddle (pretty stock aluminum paddle, but more than capable of getting you around), scupper plugs and a toe control rudder. it has a weight capacity of over 500 lbs and a real comfy chair. a couple features i enjoy in mine are the paddle park and the two tackle box holders on both sides of your chair that fits plano boxes (3600). i'm 6' 215lbs and have no problems standing. here's a pic of mine in case it helps to see one in the wild.

Same. Always just figured a deet scent can't help.

i've had a lot of success using a Berkley Beat Shad or Keitech rigged on a 2/o jika rig i made with little bell weights. you can swim it, drag it, bounce it, pitch it...etc. it's my confidence bait and what i always start with. also got me my PB so there's that. i throw it on a 6'6 M action rod with 10 lb fluoro.

so many pointers....hrm. the two that have produced the most for me: 1) how to fish a fluke and 2) grabbing the tips of your senko and pulling them apart a bit to break it in. i do this with all new plastics i put on my hook now. maybe just a mental thing, but at least it gives me more confidence with the presentation.

easy to make as well. i made some smaller jikas using smaller hooks and weight. used it last time out with a 4" havoc beat shad and caught a few including a 5lber. nothing was working so i figured i'd try something different with a swim bait. glad i did! most of the fish came off a point slow dragging and bouncing into to deeper water. the female was sitting in about a foot of water and took it after the first twitch. quite versatile and part of my lineup for sure now. don't give up yet!

reading this forum got me interested in breaking away from my comfort zone of tossing soft plastics into the tules. i watched Gene's videos on fishing the fluke and had moderate success the first time out. last weekend i was in my float tube and a school of stripers started breaking the surface literally 10 feet from me. i went 6 for 6 in those few minutes of madness. i was so pumped up on adrenaline my hands didn't stop shaking for 15 minutes. after the school moved on i threw one last time towards the shoreline and hooked into a 4lb large mouth kicker. 7 for 7. are you kidding me? without the motivation to try the fluke, i don't think i would have been in the right spot and with the right bait to take advantage of that situation. thanks BR! could you imagine if i had a double fluke rig tied on? haha. maybe next time...

i started with one 6'6 M baitcaster with 10lb fluoro. T-rigged and weightless plastics. that was it. caught plenty of fish. if i had to go out with only one rod though, i would take my 7'1 MH with 12 lb fluoro. i can use this for any piece of plastic i have in my bag and also throw a decently heavy jig as well. maybe a separate discussion, but i feel that starting off with T-rigged plastics made the jump to jig fishing pretty seamless for me. there's really not a whole lot of a difference in the way i fish the two right now except i'll maybe throw the jig in a little deeper. that's just where i'm at with my game. just a few years in. i really enjoy learning new things every time i'm out whether it's bass behavior or a different way to present a bait.

over the weekend i decided i was going to learn the ins and outs of jig fishing. i threw those things probably 80% of the time. at the end of the weekend while my fish count was a little lower, the average size of the fish was much higher. i'm a newb as well and just recently got a second pole...7' MH. my other pole is a 6'6 M which i learned on, (and continue to learn on). Trigged plastics and weightless senkos almost exclusively. i honestly couldn't tell you the benefits of one over the other and which one is better for any given presentation, but my observation was that with a heavier jig, i felt much more confident with the longer heavier pole. my goal was to throw that jig as deep as i could and learn how to fish it. with my Trigged plastics i just don't have the confidence to throw it in as deep. i use a 1/o hook combined with the smallest bullet weight i can get away with. that doesn't get me down through the thick stuff like a jig could. once a fish takes the bait i also like the heavier backbone to set the hook and drag her out. the 6'6 just seems a little too 'noodley' to get a good hook set with a big hook if that makes any sense. anyway, just my observations from a weekend of trying new techniques.

sometimes i'll thread the senko down a little deeper on the hook just to change it up. always weightless though for me. also, something i always do when i grab a new senko out of the bag: just grab the head and tail and gently tug them apart. you're basically stretching it. it will noticeably feel different. grab a new one and compare if you have to. this might just be a mental thing for me, but i swear it gives the senko much more waggle on the drop.

i'll bite. 1. sometimes i'll hold the line with my index finger of my free hand, but generally speaking i'm much more of a line watcher. IMO the line will give you more feedback anyway...at least in this context. 2. i don't own a boat so if i'm on board, i'm on the back getting sloppy seconds.

instead of a full kit, i would create more of a 'car kit' that had some essentials and a variety of plastics. that way, if they melt...meh. no big deal. a planned fishing trip is just that. you know you're going fishing so you can plan accordingly.

i think it's just more of an instinct thing. like what most others have mentioned, if i feel something 'different' i'll just stop. watch the line, slowly pull back to see if there is weight etc. it's pretty awesome to see your line swimming off. that's my favorite pre hook thing to see. sometimes it's much more subtle like a tap or a slack line. sometimes you feel it, sometimes you see it. sometimes both. i obviously fish mostly plastics though.

haha. this. i figure the fish must just be staring at the plastic and as soon as i'm sorted and reel up all the slack...bang. you'd figure i'd learn something from that, but i still fish too fast. it takes a lot of patience to let something sit there for a minute or two. heck, 30 seconds seems like an eternity.

New member and loving all the information on this site. relatively new to bass fishing as well. grew up fishing ocean, trout....and now my new obsession: BASS! first bass i ever caught was out of calero reservoir in san jose in 2000. found a cheap float tube waders and fins, bought a cheap BC combo, some line, a popper and a spinner bait. that's it. first time out i found a quiet shallow little cove that had all sorts of submerged cover. the tips of the branches and trunks were above the water line and it just looked, to my newb self...perfect. too many stumps for boats, and with no foot or boat access to the far side it just HAD to hold fish right? access was sketchy and i slipped and fell in the water. d**n. had to strip the waders, dump the water and start all over. not exactly how i pictured it going. finally made it out and got skunked. but, through all that, i fell in love with the freedom and tranquility of being so close to the water in a small cove all by myself. the next day i went back, made it in safe and started throwing the popper. about an hour in and right next to a large stump poking out of the water it happened...WHAM. the water exploded and i almost shat myself. a few seconds later and i had a 3lb LMB in my hand. whoa. i went on to catch one more on the spinner bait and that was that. sadly things changed, life went a different direction and i never really fished for bass until a few years ago. back in so cal now and river season is upon us. i still float tube the backwaters and carried that popper with me for good luck until a couple years ago where i got wrapped up and lost her forever. cya around!

Hey Darren, thanks for the reply. i have some wacky rigs that are weedless, but can only pitch those right along the tule line. i have caught fish with it, but i tend to hang up a lot. they're basically weighted hooks with a single wire weed guard. fun to fish, but the hang up to fish ratio makes it difficult to use. i have most of my success throwing TX rigged plastics right up against the tules and letting it sink. i get my jigs in a little deeper where i can. i just learned about pegging weights on my TX rig. i know that there are numerous instances where the weight drops and the bait gets hung. just a lot of dead line in the water and i'm sure i've missed my fair share. face palm. i picked up something called a Zeka Rig from BPS which is basically a weight and a hook attached to a ring. so they're independent from each other and just connected via the ring. pretty excited about trying it out on my upcoming trip. i like the idea of it...guess we'll see if it produces though. after looking at it, seems like something that could easily be customized or created on your own though. at $5 for a pair, i think i'll be making my own if they work out for me.

Hey Everyone, First post for me. been reading tons of great information from this board. i'm pretty new to bass fishing. maybe three seasons in now. i say 'seasons' because i do all my bass fishing in and around Ferguson when it's cool enough to camp out there, (lower colorado, outside of Yuma and just up river from Fisher's Landing). i float tube almost exclusively in and around the backwaters. my friends that i camp/fish with have been fishing that area as well as martinez for 30 something years and are quite knowledgable and have given me lots of great advice on how and what to fish. outside of that small circle though, i'm just curious if any of you guys fish that area and what your go to is. since i'm in a tube and i'm not going anywhere fast, i'm almost always throwing T-rigged plastics and fishing it slow in the tules. weightless and texas rigged senkos almost always produce fish, as well as creature baits like craws and lizards. i caught a monster on a jig with a craw trailer last season so i'm eagerly anticipating my trip to get that back in the water. that's the only kind of fishing i know. i have no clue if i should fish the open water or just stick to the tules. just wondering if any of you guys have fished this area, and how you do it. i usually take a spinner bait and a couple crank baits, but they hardly ever get used. this season i will have a second pole so i figure i'll be more open to messing around with those things since i won't have to re tie every time i want to change it up. if it helps, i have a 6'6" medium action and a 7'1" heavy (just got it in the mail today!) both bait casters. fishing 10-12 lb fluoro. thanks guys.