iceintheveins

I'm a pro barb angler, and I don't fish barbless because most studies conducted on barbless versus barbed hooks show no statistically significant different in post release mortality. I believe barbless only regs are thus biologically wrong.

I have some leg material to replace the worn out legs on a hollow bodied frog of mine. I removed the old material. How do I put in the new material?

Another good tip is to set the parts out in order, by number, and label them. That's how I got to be decent at cleaning reels.

d**n liberal water utility managers. They need to lose their rule by decree power over our waters. Jerks.

One thing is for sure, these salad mats in 1 to 4 feet of water sure held a lot of bass that were smashing frogs a couple weeks ago. Weather was 97 degrees, but they were there and would smash a wobbletron frog. Wouldn't hardly touch a live target frog though, a couple missed blow ups on that. So the answer, is yes, they will hold under thick salad even when it's real shallow.

Honestly mono is still the most versatile line out there. Fluoro is great for deep cranks, hard jerks the size of a pointer 100 or bigger, rippin' lipless cranks through grass, and many pitchin/flippin applications. I only use braid for frogging, punching, and for smaller soft jerks. Mono does the rest for me, and does it with great effectiveness.

I would imagine it does well with some KVD Line and Lure.

Tatsu is very good, but it doesn't stand up to jagged rocks when you're grinding deep cranks over it. I'm going to try Gamma next. IMO, Tatsu isn't worth the price, even though it's very good (though the abrasion resistance is meh).

For senkos I like mono because you get a slower fall than with fluoro. I use 8 pound mono for the 4" senko, and up to 15 pound test for the 5" senko.

A 7.2:1 Curado I and a 7'6" Veritas Frog rod. I use a BPS Pro Qualifier for my frog reel and it still works great, especially since most frogs are heavier. I've heard good things about Fred's Frog Rod from I - Rod as well.

The Veritas series is great for a hundred bucks.

Rapala Skitter prop, Rapala X - Rap Pop, and the Devil's Horse. The Cotton Cordell Boy Howdy is another really good one. The one I really miss is the Cotton Cordell Crazy Shad, which is shorter, with bigger double props.

I never have a problem with it.

These regulations should never be passed and are pure garbage. Those who pass them should be kicked out of office. This is the problem with giving state wildlife agencies so much power. In most cases un - elected bureaucrats that are the ones passing "laws", and there is no accountability. They can almost rule by decree. It's sick.

The Live Target frog is very durable IMO. The pad crasher is softer and less durable than many others. I like both however, the pad crasher has a slightly better hookup ratio than the live target and walks the dog easier.

Spooks just flat out work. No sense NOT trying another lure though.

Yeah, there is no basis for a quarantine. "Invasive species" is another reason we are losing access to our waters.

Definitely. I never use line less than 10 lb diameter on a baitcast reel. Besides, 50 pound is the minimum braid for frogging.

Fifty pound braid is the minimum. When you're in truly thick cover and there are lots of bass over 4 pounds, 65 pound braid is the way to go. I like a MH 7' rod, a MH seems to walk a frog better than a heavy and provides a little shock absorbing action on the hookset. A 7 to 1 ratio reel is the way to go. A 7' MH microguide veritas and a 7.3:1 Curado would be an ideal frog setup, spooled with 65 pound power pro.

You're welcome.

I use a weightless texas rig more often with a senko, but wacky style is great when you want a really slow fall. The O ring is a must to avoid quickly tearing up the bait.

Braid is a must for a frog. If you use a leader, make sure you tie a good knot, I broke one off at the knot on a strike the other day and lost my frog, and it was only a 1.5 pounder.

X2

Learn to pitch and flip to targets if you haven't already. Pitch to the target (weedline, dock, rocky shoreline, wood ect), and let it fall on a semi slack line. Hop it off the bottom once or twice to let it fall again, then reel in for another pitch. Sometimes it takes several to draw a strike. Swimjigs I fish just like a spinnerbait, pretty much anywhere. I do go a bit slower with a swimjig and will pause and let it fall more often. Football jigs, there are two presentations I use. The first is just a plain dragging retrieve where I maintain bottom contact. Football jigs work best either in rock cover, or on structure (humps, points, creek channels, ledges ect). The other presentation is "stroking" the football jig. You sharply jerk the rodtip up and let it fall on semi slack line back to the bottom. When you jerk the rod up, smack the bottom of the rod near your reel and this will make it dart a long ways off the bottom, giving the jig more time to fall.

One of the weed beds is on the edge of a drop off that goes down to 9 feet, and I catch a lot on the edge. There are spots you can flip the holes, and spots it goes almost to the bottom. I guess my main question wasn't whether to punch or flip them, but if they are worth fishing at all at that depth. I have caught them in these weeds on frogs and weedless topwaters before. So I figure they would be in there, despite the shallow depth, since it's thick, this lake has limited cover, and it's so hot out.