Scott F

The Wisconsin is where I plan to spend a great deal of my time this summer, depending on what stretch you fish pressure is pretty light especially compared to lakes. Your shot at a big smallmouth is pretty good there.

I think their hooks are great. Very sharp. What do you think is wrong with them?

RoLo is spot on about buoyancy. Many think that braid will have some big effect on getting lures to sink. With the lighter braids that I use, a small bare hook will cause the line to sink. Braid has no effect on my suspending baits. It doesn't cause the nose or any other part of the lure to rise. It also isn't buoyant enough to keep any diving bait from reaching its maximum depth. If you don't try and match the line diameter to mono, and use the lightest line you can, your lures will run as deep as possible.

Before the days of digital editing, I used to tape my fly in fishing trips. I'd make videos for the guys who were on the trip combining stills and videos. It made a nice souvenir to remember the trip. The downside of recording hours of fishing videos is the editing. Having to rewatch all those hours of footage for just to get a few minutes of action that you will never look at again quickly gets tiring. Unless you have something unique and interesting, no one else will want to watch it either. Most who try to shoot a lot of videos soon find it's a big waste of time.

I would think that not having to purchase any third party maps chips would be a benefit. Why would you need Navionics when the built in maps and ability to make your own high def maps are already in the unit? What am I missing?

Smallmouth migrations vary depending on the river system. If the oxygen levels and food supply stay healthy, they may not move at all. Rivers that have dams will restrict their ability to migrate. Late summer, as the days get shorter and water temps start to drop can start the move toward their wintering area. In the spring, as the days get longer and the water warms, they will move to toward their spawning sites. they often spawn in creeks where the water levels will not fluctuate as much after the spring rains.

I learned how to walk the dog with a Zara Spook fishing for pike. Be warned, little pike tend to miss the bait sometimes. As RoLo said above, they'll come flying out of the water chasing your bait. I've had some miss the bait so badly, they cut my line above the steel leader I was using. When a big pike hits your topwater, they seldom miss. It can look like a bowling ball landed they make such a huge splash.

The pattern when the water is high is very simple. Fish the calm eddies very, very tight to the bank.

That's UPPER 40s. Get off that bridge and get into the water, once it warms up. Get a pair of waders or if you don't mind a little E-coli in the water, wet wade. To find smallies consistently in rivers, you may have to do some walking. If they are sometimes by your bridge, during the times they aren't, they may not be far away. Learn more access points, then get in and wade upstream and down. Eventually, you'll learn where they hang out.

Even if the air warms into the 60s, it will take the water much longer to warm up. Activity really gets going when the water temps are in the upper 40s.

The "hatch" refers to insect hatches that fly fishermen try to mimic when fly fishing for trout.

I just looked up a 36 volt, Lithium Ion battery kit. The cost, $3,900. It is 3, 12volt 100AH batteries in a kit. It includes a 3 bank charger. I found a complete 36 volt unit which was 12- 3.2volt batteries in series for $6,300

Why do you say that bass spawn on the full moon? Several studies have shown that moon phases have no connection to bass spawning.

It's too late now but for your sake I hope you upgraded the trailer. My friend got the same boat which has been fine but the trailer has been horrible. The tires did not last one season. It didn't even come with a spare tire. He did not realize that until after the boat was delivered. The rear guides broke off I the first month. If your trailer breaks down, you won't get to your tournament or get home.

I have never weighed a bass and when my picture is taken holding a fish, I don't "long arm" the fish to make it look bigger than it really is. Shameful I know. They'll probably take away my fishing license for admitting this.

Assuming your property could handle a boat ramp, you'd probably have to check with local authorities because you are on a river and not a lake. Does the deed to your property include the river bottom? It shouldn't. Rivers in the US are supposed to be held in public domain and you may not have the right to improve the shoreline below the high water line.

Aside from Lake Michigan, there are few places you can take your boat within an hour of Griffith. Cedar Lake isn't far. On the weekends, the lake is so churned up, you can't fish it past 10. There is Bass Lake and Maxinkukee which are south of Southbend. In central and Southern Indiana, you get to the reservoirs but they are a few hours farther. If you head into Illinois, there is Heideke Lake that has bass, stripers, walleyes, and catfish. It was a cooling plant lake but they don't generate there anymore so the water temps are normal for the area. It, like the other cooling lakes, doesn't open until April. That's probably the best lake that is closest to you. One half hour farther west is LaSalle Lake, a cooling plant lake with a lot of species present. Once you get into early summer, the water gets pretty warm and fishing slows down

I'm doing it. Here's the way I did it. I worked 36 years for the same company and built up my 401k. I wore my back out to the point I can no longer do the job I did for all these years. I retired, I'm collecting long term disability and a pension. You need to get hurt bad enough that you can't work, but not so bad you can't fish. Good luck!

Distance becomes important in other situations. The northern lakes I fish have very large, weedy, flats that have largemouth or pike scattered over many acres. The normal way we fish it is to drift with the wind over the flat fan casting the open water with a variety of baits. Long casts allow you to cover more water and keep your bait in front of more fish. Another situation is when fishing very clear water. You must keep the boat as far from your target as possible. If you get too close to the fish, they spook and you see them turn away. A third time when I need long casts is when I'm wading rivers. Without a boat, getting close to your target can be difficult. Again, stealth is critical. Long casts let you reach your target from farther back reducing the chance of spooking fish. Getting good hooksets on the end of a long cast can be tough so I always use no stretch braid.

Comparing the distance you can cast to what someone else says they can cast isn't very useful. If you want to cast farther, you need to fine tune your gear, and improve your technique. Decreasing line diameter, lengthening your rod, using enough weight to load the rod properly, adjusting the spool tension, and picking the proper release point during the cast will all effect your casting distance. Play around with what you have and figure out what you can do to maximize the distance you can achieve. Your goal should be to increase your casting distance over what you are getting now, not to what someone else says they can do.

The "flying" carp that are in all the videos are enticed to jump by running a boat in about 2 feet of water. They have no place to go but up. When you run the boat in deeper water, they seldom jump. One piece of ironic information. Because of another invasive specie in the Great Lakes, the zebra muscle, that filters a lot of the same thing that the carp eat, there may not be enough plankton in the Great Lakes to feed a large amount of the Asian carp. No one knows for sure, but no one wants to find out.

Many anglers, including myself, that fish for smallmouth in the northern sections of the country use mostly spinning gear. Even when I switch gears and go for largemouth, I stay with spin tackle. I also fish for pike and muskies on occasion but I use baitcasters for chasing them. Any time I'm using heavier baits, I go for baitcasting gear. But for smallies, in lakes and rivers, spinning rods with light line do everything I need them to do. Your own fishing style will determine if you should add a baitcaster to your gear. As long as spinning tackle does everything you need it to do, stay with it. If you find your spinning rod can't handle larger spinner baits or big swim baits with ease, that's when you start looking for other gear that can handle the job.

Every lure ever made with a hook is easily made barbless with a pair of pliers to pinch down the barb.

Don't most states have a law that says it's not legal to keep any fish not hooked in the mouth? It makes it illegal to intentionally snag fish

Make sure your volt meter is set to DC voltage not AC.