Brian_Reeves

In 3-6 ft of water with a mucky bottem, the chances of a bass having enough time to get to the jig before it is eaten by slop is slim. If it were deeper...like 12-20ft, then I'd say keep trying it. I'm with avid and roadwarrior. Senkos and Ikas are probably your best bet to get bass off of a shallow area with a bottem like that. Don't overlook spinnerbaits though.

I just modified this entire post. Deleted the old one and started from scratch. Keep on fishing like you do and keep experimenting like us bass'ers are famous for. If you are catching fish, then who cares if roses are red and violets are blue?

Thanks man. I think my best chances for sponsorship right now (well after this Iraq tour) will come from a small non-endimic company or hopefully a small hand-poured company on a local tournament trail. I had 2 sponsors, but both of them fell through before they fulfilled their end of the bargain. Needless to say I don't use their products OR wear their hat anymore >

This is more of a project to see how I can sell myself to potential sponsors in the future. Seeing as how I am still in the middle of a tour to Iraq, immediate sponsorship isn't my concern. I would, however, like to wear someone's hat for a reason in the future. So here goes nothin... My name is Brian Reeves, age 24 from Gonzales, LA. I've spent most of my fishing life probing the Gulf Coast marshes for redfish and specks and the bayou backwaters for largemouth bass. At 19, I joined the US Army for 6 years, serving as an Infantryman stationed out of Ft. Hood, TX. There, I began learning and fishing the clear water reservoirs that makes Texas famous. While at Ft. Hood, I began refining my approach to the finer sciences and techniques of bass fishing. I learned how to apply off-the-water research to my on-the-water trips and become successful and consistant on the day to day basis when fishing. I've picked up some minor open tournament wins and top 5 finishes along the way, bringing in a small amount of winnings against local anglers. Beating locals on their own lake is becomming an infactuation and obsession of mine because it proves my growing skills. My time in the Army has developed important attributes in my personality. I have learned how to deal with people from both our country as well as abroad, which enables me to be candid and comfortable with strangers. I've worked hard at developing a can-do attitude with an open mind for creativity and out of the box thinking and I welcome challenges, on and off of the water. During high school, I took classes such as Creative Writing, Debate, Speech, and NJROTC which all helped me gain skills in public speaking, article writing, and leadership. All of these skills would be beneficial to any company that would allow me to represent them. What do I expect from a sponsor? In the world of professional fishing, I'm one of the very little fish in a very big pond. Because of my status as a little fish, I expect little. I'm hoping to sign on with a small company that produces baits, terminal tackle, or anything else that is related to the sport. I want to grow with a business as opposed to trying to get with one of the titans and be forced into somewhere that I am not comfortable. What can I do for a sponsor? With my colorful personality, ability to interact with people, and passion for the sport, I can be a positive representation of a company's products, work ethic, and quality of their product line. I would use my on-the-water knowledge and experience to help to try to develop and improve the products in the best interests of the company, consumer, and sport. That's a 1'st draft and I need to re-order the paragraphs and probably run it through a spell check. But there it is

Well we have something in common. I'm in the process of buying my first bassboat too. An 18ft Nitro with a 150 Merc on it. Can't find the brakes or clutch on this one either. ;D

Yeah a cooler rigged up like a fish aquarium wouldn't be too pricey or heavy. Next on the "hook up da boat list" will be a trailer though. Followed by a 50hp merc with a jackplate, hot foot accelerator, hydrolic steering, side imaging sonar, and airbrushed glitter paint job. You think the bait monkey is expensive....try having the boat monkey on your back. He's more like a 2ton silverback gorilla.

I have to bring my wife with me to help me find certain colors. I know what shades of colors that I want and can tell that better than my fishing buddies, but I'll get brown insead of green, or blue instead of brown. I have to keep soft plastics in bags and work off of memory and notes instead of the colors themselves. A bad April's fools trick to play on me would be switching all my baits around in their bags. >

You would think since I grew up in Louisiana and spend my time in Texas, I would know...but I don't. I don't have a clue. That's because I am colorblind (no joke)

Dog is dead on. I'd like to have the price tag of a smaller boat, but I fish huge texas reservoirs and other large fisheries so I had to find at least an 18footer. But if you fish small water, then it should be good for ya.

http://***/cgi-bin/order/SB35 That swimbait. Anyone tried it in freshwater yet and anyone have any recommended jigheads/presentations for them? They look good to me and I have some on order...just trying to see what the bait monkey convinced me to buy. Know anythign about them or anything similar?

I like brass or tungsten when I'm fishing a C-Rig. The main difference there is the amount and type of noise made. Lead isn't nearly as loud as brass or tungsten. Using a bead, plastic or glass, changes the noise as well. I typically like glass beads with a brass sinker. Using a swivel is safer than a split shot. While I use split shots for finesse applications (minature, soundless c-rigs on light line with light tackle) I always worry about it weakening the line. It does with mono or flouro line. Braided is tough enough to withstand it. I think that would be the biggest difference. That and you don't have to worry about a swivel getting caught up in grass like a split shot would. Really, I guess your C-Rig is proper as far as 'proper' goes in fishing. If it works, don't worry about proper I never fish a proper jig.

I treat docks like holy sanctuaries. There are too many ways to catch fish on them. I try to work the outside with collision/reaction baits like a swimming jig, spinnerbait, or crankbait first, casting past or behind the dock to be sure I dont' spook anything. After that, I'll pick up a fat ika or a jig and work underneath, depending on the mood of the fish I've been catching earlier throughout the day.

I am bored and curious as to what everyone's go to baits are for tough times or good days of fishing. What are your best producers? I'm gonna put a lot down in no particular order for my favorite baits for the entire year 1. Double Tail Hula Grub on jighead (spider jig) 2. Single Willow bladed (small blade) spinner bait 3. Split shot tube 4. Carolina Rigged Senko 5. Fat Ika 6. Rebel Pop-R 7. X-Rap 8. Zoom finesse worm shakey head (may be replaced by the meathead) 9. Hart Buzz bait 10. T-rigged berkly power worm

Anyone know of a place (online or otherwise) where I can get components to remodel my 97 Nitro? I need new carpet, seats, driverside windshield, and livewell parts. Thanks in advance

Longer fishing season for you northern guys and more lunkers. For us southerners...more 15lb+bass. I'm about to go crank my truck and let it run ;D

I really just started fishing again in 06. I did some in 05, but not much at all. Before that, I didn't have the money or equipment to get into it. Last year was probably my first year of fishing freshwater. I used to be a saltie until I moved into Central Texas. In 06, I learned to fish one of the most complicated/versatile baits in the tacklebox. The jig. Not only did I start catching fish on it for the first time in my life, I broke 2 fish over 8 lbs on it and many over 5 using them. I also exanded my knowledge and skills with them in the tuning/tinkering arts. I also learned how to apply saltwater powerfishing tactics to bass, which has paid off tremendously, especially in the topwater department. All in all, I'd say it was a great year for me. This year is a fishing waste because of Iraq, but I'll make up for it in 08 when I start fishing club tournaments.

You should try to get into a local BASS sponsored Club. You could search the BASS website or yahoo or something for BASS clubs near your hometown. Having a boat that is competitive is your next step. A 50hp 2 stroker isn't going to hang with Merc 200+ ya know. The next step is Federation and Regional Circuits. After that, after a few wins and whatnot, you might be able to either fish the Classic or sign on with BASS. A good way to research it is Mike Iaconelli's book Fishing on the Edge. It outlines everything. He also sells CDs and tapes about advancing through the levels. They are good too.

I've only got one real shot to fish good weather and that will be April while I'm on leave. Post spawn for Louisiana. I'll only be able to get one ONE day, two max in a row-boat with my usual 6'6 Quantum TE rod and baitcaster reel. I only have one tacklebox available...the one with my jigs and hula grubs. The lake is huge with tons of cover with no outstanding features in Louisiana. sounds bad? I got a feeling this is the one trip where I'm going to hang my 10lber. Gotta go against the odds and always root for the underdog. Everything is against me with the exception I have my favorite rod and reel and favorite baits. I've gotta make it a big trip since this is going to be the only good one this year. Good news is if y'all are doing Fork next year, I'll have my 18ft Xpress with that Yamaha 150 Vmax. Thank god for combat pay

Your best all around choice (fiberguard) or no that will have better results in a wider variety of areas would probably be a ball head around a 3/8oz size. I've used that setup for years for skirted jigs and soft plastics alike. I still use them to this day except with smaller sizes for finesse applications.

I rarely get to check the forums out now that I'm in Iraq, but imagine my surprise when I do sign on and see a ton of posts asking questions about jigs. My personal favorite. I figure it would be easier for jig novices to be able to get all of their questions answered at once than to have to piece the tremendous puzzle together by themselves. So I'll run through everything that you should need when fishing jigs. First off, lets define a jig. A jig is typically understood as a rubber or silicone skirt on a jig head, often with a fiberguard. While this is true, it's only the tip of the iceberg. A jig is more correctly described as a lure where a type of lure is fixed onto a jighead. This could be anything from plastic worms, rubber skirts, creature baits, craws, or just about anything else that can fit onto a jig's hook. Regardless of what type of lure you use on your jighead, the presentations remain the same. You can flip, pitch, skip, swim, pop, crash, hop, bounce, flutter, deflect, rip, or burn them. Basically you can use a 'jig' in any application in the water, from open water structure fishing to heavy cover flipping, the versatility is amazing. This is why every angler should not only learn how to use a jig, but master it. Most professional and experienced bass fishermen will agree that it is the one lure that they couldn't live without. Jigs can be appropriately used for power or finesse fishing. I personally do not define these as presentations as much as I do by lure size and weight. Smaller, lighter jigs will fall into finesse fishing while heavier and larger jigs will be categorized by power fishing. All of what I am about to explain is for LARGEMOUTH BASS. I am not a smallie angler because they are sparse or non-existant in the waters that I fish. Finesse Jigging- Usually, when the bite is tough due to weather conditions, pressure, sunlight, water clarity, or whatever other reason, I'll tie on a smaller jig and target cover in depths less than 10ft. I prefer 3/16 to 1/4 on spinning tackle with 8-10lb test. Normally, I'll abandon traditional skirted jigs and use a GYCB Hula Grub (3-5in") Fin-Tech lures Title Shot jighead. I'll pitch these near laydowns, docks, vegetation, rip-rap, and timber, hoping to generate subtle reaction strikes on the fall. When forced to use finesse tactics, I will almost always prefer a slow, hopping retrieve near the bottem. When fishing such conditions, natural colors are almost always the key. I'll get into color selection later. Power Jigging- Powerfishing is the polar opposite of finesse fishing. When powerfishing, I'm trying to use big and heavy baits to triggre violent reaction strikes and cover water quickly. Most pros powerfish their way to victories all the time on the pro tour, but finesse tactics still have their place and are sometimes more effective. My preferred tactic is to use a 3/8 to 3/4oz jig. Depending on depth and clarity, I'll flip flop between skirted jigs and creature baits (most times going with the same Hula Grub as mentioned before). I'll always, always, always use the Title Shot jighead when using soft plastics. This is just my preference, but I'd recommend it to anyone. Anyway, when powerfishing a jig, I'm flipping and pitching into heavy cover, often bounding or swimming the bait back after the inital fall. The goal is to put the bait in the water near cover and structure, let it fall (which generates tons of reaction strikes so PAY ATTENTION TO YOUR LINE!!!), then get it to cover water quickly back to the boat. I choose weight based on depth. In 10ft or less, I'll use a 3/8. 10ft-15ft I'll be throwing a 1/2 oz. Greater than 15ft, I'll use the 3/4. I rarely like to fish deeper than 30ft, but any deeper than that and you might want to use a full ounce jighead. With the larger jigs, I am able to use heavy baitcasting gear with 10-17lb test for clear water. In muddy water, I'll be using spider wire with the diameter of rope. Color Selection- Most anglers fish in stained to gin clear water. There are some places where muddy is the best you can get, but you only need two colors for muddy water. Chartruse/Black and solid black. I prefer chartruse/black 9 times out of 10, but use whichever the fish prefer. For clear water, there are a million options. I'll go with green pumpkin, green pumpkin with orange, brown, brown with orange, white, cinnamon/purple, or white and grey (or blue). For stained water, I prefer blue/black or brown/chartruse. Color Representations- Bluegill, perch- Green pumpkin/Orange or Brown/Orange Crawfish- Green Pumpkin, Brown, Cinnamon Purple Shad- Whites and greys *In muddy or stained water, I'm not trying to "Match the Hatch" so much as I am trying to make the bait stand out. I will not use rattles for Ultra clear water but rarely fish without them for stained or muddy water. Always experiment with the rattles, sometimes there will be a preference from the fish. When to use What- As far as colors go, you have to figure out what the bass are eating and what they prefer. This will vary a lot in each lake, as areas provide better habitat for one type of forage or another, so you will have to play with it some. Things that will clue you in are if you see baitfish near the top of the water or on your depthfinder, shad colors will be a good bet. If you see a bluegill school near cover, go with bluegill colors. If you are fishing rip-rap or vegitation, crawfish colors will be a good bet. Seasonal Jigging- This is probably one of the most misunderstood aspects of jig fishing. Sure, you can flip and pitch them all year round and have moderate success, but there are better applications for different times of the year. I'll break them up several sections and elaborate on each. Winter- Bass will go deep to find warmer water and will be lethargic. They will rarely leave their depths to feed, but find it hard to resist an easy meal. If you find an area with steep dropoffs then you've probably found the fish. Use about a 1/4-3/8oz hair jig with a pork trailer in natural colors. Let it fall on semi-slack line and watch it carefully. If it ticks, moves, jumps, or pulses, set the hook. If it makes it to the bottem, barely hop it back to the boat, ensuring that you have contact with the bottem. This is my least favorite time to use a jig. I'm cold, the water is cold, the fish are cold...no one is happy. Pre-Spawn-Bass will start leaving their winter haunts and move to primary lake points and drop-offs next to spawning flats. Look for cover along the points or dropoffs. I will almost always imitate a crawfish coming out of hybernation, so I'll use a hula-grub/title shot jig in natural colors and hop it along the bottem. Crawfish are more active now and will move around a lot, and so should your jig. Use the depth of the water to determine your jighead size. Spawn- Bass will move to shallow flats with hard bottems (if able) to lay eggs. The females will move off the nests once they complete their egg-drop and males will move in to defend the nest and fertalize the eggs. Males will RARELY feed, therefore you have to play a different card. They are very tempermental and do not like things intruding on their nest and messing with their eggs. Forage that is notorious for this is crawfish and bluegill. Set your jigs up to look like a crawdad or bluegill and dead stick them into visable nesting areas. If none are visable, Hop, shake, pause, and repeat. Multiple casts to the same area are the key. This will cause VIOLENT strikes. Post-Spawn- Remember where the fish were in prespawn? Go back there and look for reaction strikes with heavier jigs (unless they are being picky) Bass are looking for an easy meal because spawning takes a lot out of them. The warmer water will have them semi-active, but they will not have a whole lot of energy to chase down fast moving baits. Heavier jigs will allow you to penetrate further into heavy cover while lighter jigs will entice them with a slower fall rate. Play with it based off of what type of area you are fishing. Summer- Deeper water and shade is the key. Bass will stay shallow in the summertime if there is shade and something to eat. Especially in the mornings, bass will leave deeper water and cruise nearby shallows looking for a quick meal before the mid-day heat boils the water. Target these morning cruisers by swimming a jig like you would a spinnerbait or crankbait. Booyah makes an excellent jig for this application. Later in the day, some fish will remain shallow, you can pick these off by getting far under docks, laydowns, lillypads, or thick cover. Once again, choose your jig weight based off of what type of area you are fishing. Continued on next post...

Not sure if the what the water temp is, but if it's over 50, I'd try to get some reaction strikes with spinnerbaits. 1/2-3/4 with small willow blades should do the trick is most areas. It's a bait for burning through the water. if the temp is below 50 or so, then jigs, colorado bladed spinnerbaits, jerkbaits, and senkos should do the trick. In cold water, the bass don't need to eat as often, so 'feeding strikes' (IE REEAALL SLOW) fishing may or may not work. Don't forget to try to get them to nail a bait (colorado bladed spinnerbait) based on their reaction strike behavior. It's worth a shot.

I'm a tourney guy. I rarely bring a camera or a scale. The marina bought those so I wouldn't have to Actually I don't have a good throw-away digital camera yet, though I'm going to buy one while I'm in Iraq. Cheap electronics over here lol. I always, always, always have a scale. How else are you gonna know what to cull?

Well...I'm "back." Thanks for all the good lucks and best wishes. means a lot Right now we're staging in Kuwait to move north. I'll post more about the location and whatnot when I get there. I think it's still one of those hush hush type of things as far as the internet is concerned. I'll post an address if y'all wanna mail me a subscription card to bassin magazine or whatever. I'll get the subscription from them. I'd feel bad people spending money on me lol. Thanks for everything guys.

This is my last post from the US. Not sure if I'm going to have access to the internet over there in Iraq for awhile, but I'll try to keep in touch as best as I can via PMs and posts whenever possible. I can't put an exact deployment date or location for obvious reasons until I'm over there, but I'm losing the internet and my cable TV today Anyway, til I get to talk to y'all again, good luck on the water and enjoy fall fishing for me Later. Brian

I guess the 'big bass mindset' is really for a different breed of angler than I am. Yeah, I'd like to catch the World Record Bass but not nearly as much as I would like to be the World Champion by winning the Classic. In tournaments, unless someone has a stringer full of decent fish, most professionals look for a big quantity of decent quality as opposed to one huge kicker fish first. Once they get 10 or 15lbs, then they MIGHT start switching to big bass tactics. Big bassin' definitely has its place both in tournaments and in the recreational areas of the sport, but a good tournament stringer (20lbs) is a lot easier to catch than two 10lb fish. I guess for practicality, you really need to know how to do both for tournaments to either learn a pattern and load up on 4, 5, and 6lb fish, or to try to find that kicker fish to give you a prayer at some winnings. Like Matt said, swimbaits...even his as spectacular looking and performing that they are...are not silver bullets or magical baits. I can fully understand why bigger fish would hit the swimbaits more often as opposed to other lures. I don't think anyone is saying, "Thou shalt not fish anything other than thy swimbait." I think that instead, people like Matt are trying to raise awareness on the big fish potential of that style of bait. You still have to know how to fish worms, jigs, spinners, and crankbaits to be a well rounded and successful angler. I am excited about fishing some swimbaits, especially Matt's, when I get back from the desert. But even if I catch a 17lb bass on one, jigs and soft plastics will always be the main weapon for me in tournaments unless I'm looking for a kicker fish or I see a pattern forming on that particular day. And if I am looking for a kicker fish, I will be throwing big swimmers, big spinners, and jigs accordingly because one bait can, and never will, do it all. Learning to blend powerfishing, flipping and pitching, and finesse fishing into one deadly style is almost like learning a martial art. Swimbaits, just like topwaters, jigs, spinnerbaits, crankbaits, and soft plastics, are just another tool. On some days it may be a haymaker punch...but like a haymaker, sometimes it misses and leaves you in the open. That's my shot at philosophy today and I think I blew it but it was fun trying lol