jb_adams

Thanks for the post Lane. So is garlic scent sprays & baits bad for fish? If garlic is bad for fish, why do they sell so many garlic scented baits and attractants? I personally have seen a bass go bananas when some garlic over-spray fell on the water surface. It either drove him nutts or it turned him off to the scent.

What are the signs to look for? From what I understand, they go into shallow water and around boat docks and the bass follow. This is usually post bass spawn in the spring. Is that correct? When else do the shad spawn?

Thanks guys. I've had the same feeling about where there are gar, bass are close by. It's frustrating because you here a boil on the water or see a fish jump and you think it's a bass but it's only a gar. They can be pretty aggressive early in the morning. I had one jump at a topwater bait just before it landed while it was still in the air. There are quite a few gar in the 3-4ft range in a large cove I fish. I figured they were eating small bass, baitfish, etc. The lake is under a huge algae bloom right now so that should help the shad population which i hope will help the bass population and size.

28,000 acres....she aint small ;D

I'm headed to S. Florida next week. (Cape Coral) Know of any good bass charters there?

I've seen a lot of gar this summer on my home lake (Beaver Lake, AR). Is that bad for bass? This lake is by far not a trophy bass lake. It's doing good to have bass of legal size. It's also full of striper too which I think eat the smaller bass when they can. I've seen gar consistently blowing up on shad and I have not caught bass when they were around. According to wikipedia, they are not aggressive predators towards fish of reasonable size.

Well, compulsive bait buying makes me happy....not catching bass doesn't make me happy because I just spent a lot of money on baits. Catching fish makes me happy and then I go buy more of the baits that were catching fish that day especially if I lost a few of the baits. It's a vicious cycle that cannot be measured. Well, not until the baitmonkey moves out of my spare bedroom anyway. He snores loud too....keeps me up at night thinking of new ways to improve my fishing.

Is that a flats boat? Only time I've ever seen a stand on a boat was for fishing salt water flats.

Here is a largemouth White bass Spotted bass Courtesy of the Arkansas Game & Fish... Spotted Largemouth Smallmouth

They are feeding on larger baitfish I believe but it depends on location. Some feed on threadfin in coves and some feed on baitfish in the deeper main lake waters. I think my DD22 was getting down to around 18ft or so. It was hard to tell but I was in 22ft of water and I don't think I ever touched the silt bottom on the shelf were were on. They would swim up to get the 6" Rapala but they would only chase the DD22. Which led me to believe the larger size and erratic action is what was triggering strikes. Does that sound logical? My buddy tried a DD14 in a shad color and one in a craw color. Both good baits but no bites. How do you fish your Storm swimbaits? I like fishing them like a jigging spoon....up and down like an injured shad. I also swim it like a jerkbait too but the action has to be pretty quick to keep the little tail moving right.

Just wanted to update the thread. Since the weather has cooled off a bit more, we had much greater luck this weekend. We found that the upper end of the lake was clear and less stained due to the algae bloom. Those fish in clear water were much more active. I actually had one on a crankbait and could see him coming up to the boat over 12-15ft down. That's clear water! On the other side of the lake which is not too far away, there is a long cove about 1-2 miles log with small cuts off of the main cove. That water gets up to 20-30ft in the cuts and 60-80 in the main cove. That water is more stained because it has less underwater current, less wind exposure, etc. than the main lake and the algae bloom is pretty heavy. The water is only clear up to 5-6ft there right now. With the algae being so heavily present in coves off the main lake, the shad are in these shallow coves by the thousands. Not many bass though once you get in water less than 20ft. Matter of fact, I have not seen any bass or large fish on the fish finder or on laydowns in 12ft or less. The only time I've seen fish in shallow water is when it's off a larger body and close to deeper water. I think the oxygen content is richer in the deeper water and the thermocline is about 25-30ft right now. They just don't seem to like being in really shallow water even though the shad are feeding on the huge supply of algae. So, I pulled some bass off cedar trees with a War Eagle spinnerbait in 10mins or less. They were suspended in 20-23ft water and they were very aggressive. Also had luck with Rapala jerkbaits, crankbaits, and jigs in 30ft on large flats. We tried points at night but no bites. The fish were in really deep water but suspended shallow and they wouldn't touch a plastic, jig, or big spinnerbaits. I can't remember if we tried a crankbait or not. I'm pretty sure I did. We'll keep at it though and find something that works.

Anybody got an explanation for this? :question

I didn't try a lipless crank because it has a tight wobble. I wanted something that darts like a jerkbait with an erratic action but swims deeper than 8ft. The bass were following the DD22 crankbait but they wouldn't strike it. A lipless crank has less action but........it would be a good chaser bait for fast speeds. Thus the name "Speed Trap". I'm affraid that the bass on my lake are used to the rattles in lipless crankbaits. I can't get them to hit one no matter what I try. I may try removing the bb's to tone it down a bit. In two years, I've caught one bass on a rat-l-trap. He hit it as soon as it splashed the water too. I know Lucky Craft makes some jointed jerkbaits, I want something about like that but goes deeper than 8ft. Anyone know of anything? I'm not finding anything but some of the Rapala trolling cranks. Those might work for what I'm looking for.

I have a "stupid question" about scents and gel scents in particular. I think it was "kickin bass" or something like that my buddy has laying in his boat. I put it on a jig & when I took the jig off later (after many casts), the gel stayed on the lure and had a gummy feeling and it caused the skirt to look like I put hair gel on the skirt (lack of better description). I had to wash the jig with soapy water to get the gel off later so the skirt would flare like it's supposed to. Is that a common trait with gel scents? It's the only one I've ever used.

Well I found some Rapala Deep Divers. They might work pretty well too. I guess what I am looking for is something that puts out a lot of vibration, fast, erratic action and can be fished pretty fast. The feather tail on that Rapala is what makes it so great. That think just looks too cool compared to a normal crankbait like a Norman or DT10. If I changed out my DD22 with a feather tailed hook, that might would have helped me this morning.

I've got several soft swimbaits but there are some issues with that type of bait vs. what I am looking for. I have some Lake Fork shad swimbaits, Storm swimbaits, etc. but they all have a single hook, much less action, and I can't regulate the depth as easy as a crankbait. The Rapala X-Rap "Extreme Action Splashbait" (what I used) is almost perfect for what I want but if I can can get a more erratic & realistic swiming motion and it will be the pefect bait for multiple locations on my lake because you can fish it like a crankbait or jerkbait. I could make it go down to about 6ft but that's with me retrieving it pretty quickly on a 6ft. spinning rod with erratic jerks. When they hit it, there was no doubt they were on it. The faster I would retrieve it, the more they wanted to chase it. Soft swimbaits would be hard to fish like this because you don't get as much action. Only the tail moves. The X-Rap darts, swims, vibrates more, etc. If there was a jointed crankbait that could get down to 15ft, that would be good enough. Again, I watched several good bass follow my DD22 right up to the boat and then turn away. Probably 10 from the same area. I just couldn't retrieve it fast enough or make it more erratic. Well, not without working me to death anyway. The color was "Rootbeer". I've had good luck with that color in clear water. It just looks like a reel baitfish. So I know the color was OK. Just wasn't fast enough and erratic enough to produce a strike. I just found the Rapala X-Rap "Deep 10" lures. They are supposed to go down a little deeper than the other series that I am using. They are also supposed to hold their depth when paused. I'm affraid the "Rapala Baitmonkey Rep" just arrived in my tackle bag......not a good thing either considering these puppies are $7-8 a pop. Any suggestions or thoughts?

I personally had great luck using DD22 cranks early this morning but it seemed like I couldn't reel the bait fast enough. I saw 4-5 different fish follow the crank all the way up to the boat. One or two of them would have gone 3lbs which is what we were looking for. Tournament sized keepers. I tried really fast retrieves, slow, jerk-pause, fast retrieve with jerks, etc. They just wouldn't bite it. I did catch one on a slow steady retreive later. At the same spot, I switched to a Rapala X-Rap that has a feather tail and I was catching fish then because I could work it faster and retreive it faster with erratic jerks like a jerkbait. They would come up from deep water to chase this one. The water I was finding bass in was 25ft. -30ft and the water is clear down about 12ft. I missed a few because they jumped off but I landed at least one. OK, finally.....my question! Is there a deep diving swimbait or a double jointed Rapala that will dive down around 15-20ft? I want something that has a realistic swiming action that I can retreive fast. My lake has really clear water and the bass are used to conventional baits. A fast erratic jerking crank that looks like a real fish would be a killer bait right now. Any thoughts?

I've sprayed some in the bag the plastics are in. The funk stays in the bag! So yeah, that can work. I prefer to spray after I've handled the bait and left my scent on the bait.

Self-taken picture...just held the camera out and snapped it. Lucky shot! One of my favorite spots My PB And the best one yet.....my son's first bass! Hey, it's white but I'm not racist! (haha)

Kiddin', right? I have a buddy in Lake Charles that swears bass love baby ducklings. I saw a baby duck bait in the store not long ago. I laughed when I saw it. Compared it to the Heddon Silver Bullet Torpedo bait and then remembered my buddy telling me he watched a largemouth chase ducklings one morning. They eat more than we think.

That's what my partner said. He has a Zoom Horney Toad and can't seem to get fish to hookup on them. He's let them run with them up to 7 seconds and still jerked it out of their mouths. I like the action on the legs.

Anyone have experience with the Rage Tail? I saw a video of the frog rage tail and the darn thing mimicks a buzzbait with a much lesser action and more realistic. Even the minnow looks like it would be a "finesse buzzbait" (is that a new term?) I bet this thing would be a killer nighttime buzzer. Think about it, frogs are active mainly during lowlight and dark conditions. My buddy has a scum frog or something like that and he can't get a bass to hook up with it. The bait is too hard and the hooks do not get exposed enough. does this one have that problem? Not a great bait if you can't hook up. here is a link to the video. if the link doesn't work, you can find it at ***.com http://www.***.com/descpageSFTSTRIKE-SKRT.html#

Yeah, I saw Basstrix on ebay before Bassmaster spread the news. They were already about $35-50 a piece and on backorder. Now the price will just go up. The baitmonkey is expanding his market strategies....

You've been watching bill dance. I saw where he made the statement about 1000x stronger than dogs. Should have seen my face. I think the only real way to keep a scent on a bait is to have the scent in the plastic as the bait is being made. Chompers for example.....my truck still smells like one little jig trailer. MAN that scent is pretty strong. I like BANG spray in the can and bottle. BANG crawfish is a good scent but I too question how long the scent lasts. Jay Yellas used GULP Alive! all year long on swimbaits and won the Angler of the Year on the FLW trail. Must be something to it. I've been meaning to try it because its supposedly stronger than natural bait. Do bait scents work? OH you better believe it. I had my PB on a stringer beneath a small jon boat while I continued to fish. I sprayed some YUM garlic scent spray on a buzzbait and the instant the spray hit the water, that bass started thrashing like crazy. He wanted off that stringer and the scent was so strong, it drove him nuts. Just a fine mist hit the water and he instantly smelled it. I got my lesson on spray scents that day.

My wife continues to ask, "why do you think you need all of those baits? You have so many now you can't use them all." or "why do you think you need a new rod? You already have a closet full of them." I try to explain to her and by the time I'm through stumbling with an answer, she has me confused. This past weekend, I got up early, went fishing around 6:00AM, fished till 3:00. Came home, ate dinner, and then went night fishing till 2AM. Yep, it's all an obcession and addiction.