OmegaDPW

You know how they say that everything old becomes new again? I fished stuff that looked pretty similar to this back 30 years ago on a float and fly rig for bluegill. 🙂

Yes. I mainly fish two small ponds. I know for a fact that I caught the biggest one a couple of weeks ago out of the main pond. I've also caught a 3lb crappie out of the same pond. I don't know enough about the crappie/bluegill population in this pond, so that's what I'm going to focus on now and let the bass get even bigger.

I'm still using the same rods and reels that I bought 25 years ago when I upgraded from the stuff that I had. If it ain't broke don't fix it. I have other hobbies that I occasionally spend money on, but with two kids, car insurance on 3 vehicles, mortgage, property tax, you name it- I don't spend money at all if I don't need it. This year I bought jigheads, a few spools of line, a Shakespeare reel to stick on a rod that didn't have one, some soft plastics, some Beetle Spins, stuff like that. The type of stuff that I can throw in the basket when buying groceries that doesn't add up too much. I'll never use up my soft plastic collection that I have now and rarely throw hard baits, so my spending is pretty sparse.

Have you ever been to the spot at Lake Montgomery? I went a couple of years ago. I cast a few times with nothing, but it looks like a great crappie fishing hole. From what I saw, "Lake" is a stretch, but from the bank it was hard to tell. It's also WAY off the main road down dirt roads that probably weren't there in the 30's. I don't doubt it was caught there back then. Probably hard to access and not pressured. Think a farm pond 5 miles in the woods.

My Father-in-law recently passed away and I inherited a few old Zebco's and rods. Most were catfishing stuff, but he had a 33 on a 6'0 rod. Of course, I enjoyed cleaning the dust off and re-spooling it with some new 4lb mono- even though I figured I'd never use it. Today, my wife and daughter (16) wanted to go fishing at our local spot. I carried the Zebco to give it a shot with another UL spinning reel/rod and figured that I'd look for panfish after putting my daughter on where the bass usually hang out. The spincast rod and reel easily beat the spinning set-up (8lb braid- slightly shorter 5'6 rod) in casting distance. I was using Creme Spoiler Shads 1/16oz in weight on both. Maybe it's not much, but I'd say on average the spincast would go at least 2-3 feet further than what I could get the spinning set-up to do with the same light bait. That just really surprised me. Turned out to be a good day overall. I set up my kid with a weightless green pumpkin stick bait and told her to cast out, wait, reel in a bit and pop it a couple times and let it rest again. 4th cast she got a nice 2 pound bass or so. I wound up with a couple of crappies on the Zebco. I also had a nice large bass inhale one of those Creme shads and fought him to shore before he threw one more big head roll and the lure popped out. It's on me, though. I never set the hook because I was afraid the drag was too tight and I'd pop the line. The drag on the Zebco reel is iffy at best. One click it's too loose and one click the other way doesn't let any line out. 😁 Anybody know what I need to do about that? I think I'll keep using it for a bit. One more option in the panfish stable that casts extremely well. Happy 4th of July, everyone!

I fish a lot of stick baits. Usually not Senkos because they come off the hook too easily, but the Creme stick baits are always on sale at Wal Mart for $1 a pack of 5 and they work great. The funny thing with stickbaits is that I never catch anything with them on a weighted TX rig. I hook them weedless (usually a 3/0 EWG) and just cast them out. Green Pumpkin is the choice of color for my ponds.

Same for me. All my waters are chocolate milk colored. Gotta go with Black or a dark Green Pumpkin for just about everything. Sometimes red works but nothing on any lighter greens like this or Baby Bass colored.

I'm terrible at guessing weight. I could get out the measuring tape and estimate on the rod, I guess. I'm thinking my son caught the same fish last November. His was right under 9lbs. Same pond, same spot, different lure. One of these days, I'll have to break down and buy my own scale for the tackle bag. I told him it was 10lbs just to "one up" him a little. 😄

You and I are exactly alike. I have two MH 6'6 Ugly Stiks that take up 95% of my fishing. One is for weightless stickbaits, trick worms, or lizards. The other is rigged with a 1/8oz bullet weight, bead, and a #1 EWG to pitch the finesse worms or curly tail rigs. I love the rods.

Got the big one today. My PB. Of course, the wife had the scale and she wasn't with me. So, the pic is pretty bad. 12lb braid broke at the hook when I tried to bring him onto the bank but he was stunned/tired after a good fight and I had to wade in and get him. Took a quick pic and released with no problem. Caught on a weightless black lizard. The pole for scale is a MH 6'6 Ugly Stick with the biggest reel I own. The rest of the day wasn't so hot. Reel problems on other rods. Missed fish. Wound up with one more LMB about 2.5lbs and a small crappie.

Be prepared to spend some money. I got into the hobby when you could find seconds of good cigars for around a buck a piece. Those days are long gone. I'll second Macanudo for mild. One of my favorites. If you liked the sweet cigar, Baccarat is old school sweet and extremely well made. My personal favorite is La Gloria Cubana. It's fairly strong, though. Monte Cristo, Cohiba and H. Upmann are also good old brands. I wouldn't really know anything about the newer brands. The cigar boom hit awhile back and everyone and their brother wanted to start a cigar company or at least get their name on a stick. I lost interest in them at that time.

I have a bag of garlic scented finesse worms I got at Bass pro. They're probably the Chompers listed above. I have to keep them in 2 or 3 ziplock bags because they're awful. Hadn't caught a bass with them but have caught large redear on a #4 EWG hook. Even after a full day of fishing, the scent doesn't come off and if I don't take it off and throw it away, you'll smell it in the car and the house afterwards for days. I give them credit- they put a lot of thought into how to make the scent durable.

I'm with you guys. The bite right now in my favorite pond is just about dead. I went both days this weekend from 0600-0930 and that was enough. Total of 5 fish over those two days. The pond is super low (and it's a very shallow pond to begin with). Right now, June is my least favorite month to catch fish.

I stick with the same things and still collect stuff, also. I don't fish hard baits 99.9% of the time so I hadn't collected anything there, but let me see a finesse worm or stickbait in a different color than before and I'm buying numerous bags without even trying them out first. Over the years, my absolute go-to bait to catch a fish (any kind) has been a Beetle Spin. It has to be the smaller black grub without a split tail. I will probably always have one tied on to a rod. I've actually caught all of my biggest bass on panfish lures, so there's that.

Correct. 5 different colors 10 each. No way to tell the brand. Temu style soft plastics. I'll throw one in a cup of water when I get home though. I'd almost bet it doesn't float by the feel of it. Thanks for the tips so far- That looks perfect. Wonder how it works with a non floating bait? Thanks a bunch. I have never heard of this rig.

My daughter picked me up some Ned Rig style baits. She knew I fished stick baits and saw these on Temu or Ali Express and didn't pay attention to the sizes. They're 2.5 inches I guess. Finesse fishing is nothing new to me- most of my rods are lined with 6-8lb test, but I've never fished a Ned Rig. My pond wrecks havoc on an open jighead. Way too many stumps and logs and weeds, etc. So, I'm thinking of trying these baits on a split shot rig or conventional TX rig (bead and weight). If they cast far enough, I may do weightless. I've got some #4 EWG but they may be too small to leave enough room for the hook-up. I also have some 2/0 EWG but nothing really feasible in-between those two sizes. I'd have to check when I get home. No smallmouth around here, so if they work, they'll be for LMB. Any tips on how to fish these baits with the way I described above?

Everytime I want some bluegill or crappie for a fish dinner, freaking bass is all I catch. 😂

5 packs of Beetle Spins in various colors and sizes and a big ol DQ blizzard. Couldn't ask for anything better!

Mine are gone from the bank already (one hour North of the Florida line). It got up to 98 today and was 78 when I got to the pond at 0700. I stayed for 4 hours and only targeted panfish. Only caught one fish- a 5+lb LMB on a 2 inch black curly tail grub and 6lb line on my ultra-light BPS noodle rod. Can't complain- it was fun reeling him in on that set up.

Happy I stumbled on this thread. For work, I spend quite a bit of the day outside in the GA heat. A couple of weekends ago, on a Saturday morning around 0900, I was out fishing at my local spot and for some reason stated feeling terrible. The Friday before, I was out fixing a water line in the sun all day- drinking the little bit of water I had with me but it apparently wasn't enough. Until today, I had not heard of "hydrate yesterday" like others have talked about here. Anyway, I felt like I had a terrible hangover even though I hadn't drank in years. Called my wife, who was in town, and asked her to please bring me some water. I'm planning ahead better now... my birthday was a few of days ago and I got a nice 1 gallon Igloo water jug to fill up everyday for work. The ice doesn't last all day, but the water does stay cold. Not bad for $11 at Wal Mart. I went back and bought 4 more for the guys on my team. Two of the younger guys are using Pure Kick water packets. They taste pretty good and can be found at places like Dollar General pretty cheap. They have two types- one with caffeine called Energy and one with extra electrolytes called Hydrate- in numerous flavors. Me and the older guys just load up the jugs with ice and water from the shop everyday. Everyone likes the jugs and none of ours leak. Figured I'd post this to let others know of a nice, easy to carry, inexpensive option to bottled water and all the extra plastic. Thank you for this. I'll try it when I get back to work. I wonder if just adding plain ol lemon juice with the water will cover up the salt taste enough? I'll give it a shot and see.

Georgia has already been dealing with it and this weekend will be 99 and 98 Saturday and Sunday. I normally fish early on the weekends (0630 or so) so it doesn't affect me too much. Last weekend the bite did die down pretty quickly, though. Not just bass, but the crappie and bluegill weren't biting, either.

It's what I grew up with and still use if I'm not fishing weightless. A large curly tail lizard is one of my favorite baits to throw on it. I don't fool with weights on stickbaits too much, and that's about the only two bass baits that I throw often. 😉

I swapped over to full braid on all of my rigs a few or more months ago. I used mono for 40 years prior. Bass, where I fish, couldn't care less about line- and the water is consistently muddy so I don't have to worry about clear lakes and line shy. I did find out that I didn't like braid on my panfish set-ups, so switched back to mono. The light braid would get tangled like crazy around the floats that I used and was impossible to untangle. 4lb mono also cast further without the tangles. I rarely get hung up using a float so the extra strength with the braid was rarely needed.

I guess I see this more in hooks geared towards panfish and other species- and I'm talking about the hooks that have the hook point bent off to the side of the shank and not EWG/round bend style hooks. What's the reasoning behind this hook bend? I have never noticed any difference in hook up compared to a straight shank hook (like on a typical jighead). Just curious and thanks!

I gotcha. I use a fixed bobber most of the time. I know I should be using a slip bobber, but I have a ton of fixed bobbers to use up. My kids usually give me those for Christmas or birthday presents. 🙂 I also use a snap swivel on many lures. So many people look down on them, but I'm all about the KISS principle. Especially for panfish.