Jolly Green

This is a good point. Dougie's probably got a basement in Illinois (likely not the case in Florida, eh?) but even so, if that tank goes you can kiss all the finishes good-bye, not to mention possibly furniture or other personal property. I'd check with my insurance agent to see if such an event were even covered under a normal policy; even if it were, coughing up my $500 or $1000 deductible over a pet bass would really burn. Yeah, buy new.

Braid. I don't know what advantage you would gain from switching to fluoro, unless you need your bait to ride lower for some reason. Can't comment on co-poly.

In such a small community, I would probably want to be darn sure that he was doing something illegal before I even called the authorities, and the only thing that you yourself could possibly witness would be bagging more than the daily limit of a species or keeping fish that are obviously outside of size limits. (Assuming he's not fishing with a crossbow or something completely asinine like that.) If he were my neighbor, he could legally have 60+ assorted fish in his freezer. Maybe he's giving them away, I know guys that do that. I hope he's not single-handedly draining your local resource but I kind of doubt it? Maybe your community as a whole would be interested in funding some professional management strategies, and maybe this guy could turn out to be helpful after all. I understand your frustration and concern, but don't be too quick to crap where you fish, so to speak.

Live and learn, right? Whatever reel you settle on, plan on learning the habit of closing the bail by hand instead of letting the reel's mechanism do it. Also FYI, a clean spinning reel doesn't cast any farther than a dirty spinning reel. The spool is fixed and the line flows freely off of the end of it, as opposed to a baitcaster where the spool rotates during the cast. Probably the most neglected part of a spinning reel is the line roller; whether it's a bearing or a bushing you want to make sure it is clean and lubricated properly so your line can be laid on the spool or payed out by the drag as smoothly and with as little friction as possible.

Interesting concept, thanks for explaining.

I just looked up spiral wrapped rods, as I had never heard of such a thing. As an average fisherman, let me just say yup, those look really weird, to the point of gimmicky. I think I understand the concept, and I don't doubt that it works in practice, just shockingly odd to my eye. And I feel like there must be some wicked torque on the first two guides from the reel; are they more susceptible to deformation or breaking loose, etc.?

R bends are the simplest (cheapest) to manufacture, one bending operation vs. multiple twists/turns for twisted eyes, coiled eyes, or even U bends. And as has been mentioned, less problem with the line fouling and/or possibly breaking off in the V on a less than perfect cast. Buzzbaits in general are made with wire that is a little heavier than is ideal for twisting into a closed eye. I'm paraphrasing a few paragraphs of "Luremaking" by A.D. Livingston, a great read for any angler, not just tackle makers.

Perhaps they've all moved off out of reach and you're feeling bluegill messing with your bait?

Where I would begin is holding a round reel on a rod in my hands to see how it feels; many people find them bulky and not as comfortable as low profile baitcasters. Either way, there are probably better reels out there for only a few more dollars. The one you are looking at is part of Abu's revamp of the Ambassadeur line, and while I've never used it, I am a little suspicious of the quality. Some tried and true low profile models have already been suggested here, but if a round reel suits you then I suggest the Ambassadeur C3 4600. The new generation retails for $120, older used ones could be had for much less.

Glenn "pegging" a weight to the line with a strand of skirt instead of a toothpick in order to avoid damaging the line. Brilliant.

I don't know if the bass care or not; I've caught them using wire leaders (the type with a swivel on one end and a snap on the other) but I've only used wire leaders on baits they wouldn't get a good look at anyway, such as spinnerbaits, buzzbaits, or lipless cranks. For anything else I mitigate the risk by using heavy fluoro leaders, which aren't pike-proof but they are resistant to being bitten off, certainly more so than braid or mono. You could use Cortland Toothy Critter or some other tie-able wire for a less visible wire leader that doesn't mess with your bait's action as much as the snap/swivel types. Personally I don't bother with it because I don't throw anything I can't bear to lose, and I've lost waaay more lures to rocks than to pike; 20lb. fluoro is fine for my needs. I wouldn't enjoy fishing more defensively than that, if that makes sense. Good luck!

Only until ice-out. Bass opener isn't until the first weekend in May but I'm happy to pester the panfish and white bass until then.

It is nice that they stand behind their product. I've heard some companies won't warrant line guide issues like that because it might be cheaper to pay someone to replace it than to incur warranty expenses. Maybe, but that still seems pretty bush to me. Glad it worked out!

I made my share of spoons over last winter and found my local thrift store to be cheapest source; they sell individual pieces of flatware for a dime each and there's usually a wide variety of shapes and sizes to pick from.

My "truck rod" is the kind of thing no serious angler has used for decades, short steel rod with a Bronson levelwind reel, but the Oldcaster is a fun challenge and I occasionally even catch something with it. The bass are finally coming back shallow where I can reach them (I'm bank-bound) and I caught a nice one under a rail bridge this morning on a cheap bucktail jig that I was hoping would resemble the scads of puny white bass around the area. It worked! She put up an admirable fight but the Oldcaster emerged victorious, bringing in its biggest fish to date at 3lb. 9oz. I didn't have the heart to tell her I use Vanish for my leaders. Shhhhhh. That stuff is crap...

How to pour and/or dress my own jigs. Been doing OK with small bucktails lately and thinking, "I could make these..."

I worked at tying the Trilene and Pitzen knots with only an inch of tag because I'm cheap like that. But I will cut and retie in a heartbeat if I don't turn out a good clean knot because I'm obsessive like that. I'd rather lose a few inches of line than a nice fish.

I'm curious about something that isn't the main point: what do you mean by "fraying"? I think of fraying as something that happens to braid, unraveling into its separate strands, but I've never had a mono or fluoro line do that.

Different folks have different ideas of personal space, same for personal fishing space. There's a small dam/lock near me where there's probably 30' total fishable bank to either side, plus rail around the lock. There are usually a half-dozen entire families plus any number of single anglers fishing for anything that'll bite, and none of them seem to mind the crowd at all. If I had happened upon you, fishing along 20' of bank, I would have kept on walking, but that's just me.

Somebody whacked it.

Illuminati and meteors... tied for Most Original Theory. Thanks for making me smile, fellas! I thought of toothy critters too, but there was no other movement, nothing burst through the surface, the pad didn't move one bit up, down, sideways... I feel like a pike or muskie would have made much more of a ruckus. Seems to me that ANY sort of topwater strike from any sizable fish would have made some kind of boil in the area, but this hole just seemed to appear in an instant without the slightest extra ripple. Is the bait monkey amphibious?

So I was fishing a lizard through some pretty thick lily pads today, wiggling it across the tops and letting it drop into holes, when something... the best I can describe is that something blew the lid off the pad my bait had just been on a split second before. There was a pop like a champagne cork that accompanied it, and no other real movement or commotion in the area. The pad suddenly had a big hole in the center of it but with the center piece still barely attached, like the lid of an empty soup can sticking up. It was about thirty feet away so I couldn't really get a picture of it, but it's one of the weirdest things I've ever heard or seen on the water, like a bluegill popping if it were some mythical 20 lb. 'gill. Of course, I continued casting at the spot, but nothing came of it. Did something try to inhale my bait through the pad and pop a hole in it with the suction? Any ideas?

I never throw tubes, but I don't see why you couldn't Texas rig them. I have T-rigged 5" grubs before but I found that with a light weight or no weight I had to use a swivel 12" up from the hook to keep the line twist in check, and a swivel grabs plenty of weeds too... hmmmm... at this point, I'm personally reaching for my bag of flukes.

The L in between the C and the 3 denotes a particular retailer. (CK3 models come from K-Mart, for example.) I believe it is otherwise identical to any other C3 reel of its generation. Comparable reels retail for $90 - $100 new. You may be able to find more specific information with searches that include the number stamped on the underside of the foot, but my guess is that it's worth around $50 give or take. If you happen to come across the 5600WS that used to be in that box, I would put roughly the same value on it. Good luck!

Skip rocks elsewhere. (My youngest doesn't fish more than ten minutes at a time; too boring, Dad!)