MIbassyaker

Pretty much. Inline spinners, small crankbaits, and small tubes and grubs especially do a good job for stream smallies, panfish, and trout. I don't think color matters that much, but I like black, golds, oranges, yellows, and reds in the streams I usually fish, which have a brownish stain.

Ordered another closeout Elite Tech Smallmouth casting rod from FFO tackle (6'10" MH-MF) on a sale right before Christmas. Also a reconditioned Pflueger President 6925 for my UL rod (which makes me one of the cool kids, I hear...). Under 100 together, shipped. And a free gift of power worms? Yes, please!

Go with MH, unless you primarily want to fish plastics weightless. Most plastic bodies you'd put on a texas rig, for instance, are around 1/4oz or more, so you're really talking about 1/2oz+.

Powerbait, especially power worms and Chigger Craws, have been staples in my tackle box for a long while. I have only used a few of the baits from the havoc line (pit boss, juice worm, subwoofer), but they strike me as both affordable and fairly innovative in some of their designs.

Great bait -- I haven't gotten the hang of the rage rig, but it works for me very well on a texas rig

Hopefully mike will chime in and set us straight, but my understanding is the differences have to do with combinations that can be made from variation in the type of hook (Mustad ultra point, Owner deep throat, Owner with the cutting point), the type of head (brush, football, arky, swim etc.), and the skirt (number of strands, silicone vs. rubber). I know the supreme jigs use mustad hooks, the dredge jigs use deep throat hook, for instance. I use the brush and grass/punch jigs mostly as I'm usually pitching to targets or swimming them through/over grass. I don't use football heads much as I rarely fish rock. Just got some dock-rockers in my last order, but I won't get to try them until spring -- I expect they'll fish a lot like the brush jigs, but should skip particularly well, being based on an arky design.

I don't own or make use of a ton of different rods -- I count 10 currently in the rack to my right, 3 of which I'm not using anymore, just haven't gotten rid of. Right now I see Shimano, St. Croix, Cabela's, No8, Fenwick, Berkley, Shakespeare in there....when I decide I need a new one, the brand I end up buying depends mostly on timing and chance -- it will come down to what brand has a particular kind of rod I need and can find at that time that looks/feels good, especially if I can get a model on sale that would normally be above my price range.

I was looking at the Ikes for awhile this fall and saw a couple very positive reviews by BR members here -- ah, just found them here: I was really attracted to the % tip vs. backbone breakdown on the various models, and it sounds from the reviews like the ratings are dead on. (In the end, though, I didn't get one, but not because of any negative input -- I blew my rod budget instead on some big closeout/discontinued discounts at the St. Croix bargain room I couldn't resist)

Mike should do a Swim Jig Pack with the top patterns, like the Dredge and Grid Iron sets.

I don't know about New Orleans area specifically, but a chartreuse with black back, firetiger, and red craw patterns are what I like in stained or muddy water.

Seriously. We even have a Meijer botannical and sculpture garden: http://www.meijergardens.org/

A nice score. I live in Meijer Central (Grand Rapids)...there are about 800* of them in a 20 mile radius. Unfortunately, the nearest one is a wasteland and I don't have the patience to check them all. *exaggerated for effect, but only slightly.

All I know is, I'm right handed and I learned to fish with a spinning reel, always holding my rod with the right hand, and reeling with the left. No switching hands, always casting and fighting fish with my dominant hand. It wasn't until I first tried playing around with baitcasters this year that I really grasped how awkward it would feel to reel with the right while holding and working a bait in my non-dominant hand since i had been doing it the other way all my life. It was so alien, I just decided I would use lefty baitcasters, and so far that seems just right (as it were). The reel selection is indeed more limited -- for some reels, the left doesn't have as many gear ratios available -- but after 30 years of always using my right hand to hold a rod, and reeling with the left, my hands just don't want to cooperate the other way.

I'm probably not the one to ask, but I bought a 7'2" MM Rage from the st. croix bargain room for $89 a few weeks ago, to serve as my first dedicated cranking rod. The rod is just under 4oz, and also seems to have a bit of that noodle quality gulfcaptain mentions. It feels good to hold, but I don't know what it's like to fish with it yet... sure casts well in the backyard, though...

All the Siebert skirt colors I haven't bought yet haunt my dreams. I only fished these jigs for the first time last summer; so far I have gotten the most mileage out of the pumpkin/orange, green craw, and green pumpkin/purple. I try to match the base color of jigs to bottom composition and water color/clarity where I fish, and then whatever highlight colors give a little extra contrast that looks good.

If people started spending less money at big box stores because they could get free shipping elsewhere, you might see them offer it more often. Until that happens, they have no reason to do it -- as flyfisher says, online ordering and shipping cost money; it would have to start costing those stores more to NOT offer free shipping in order for them to consider doing it.

Fair enough. Still hilarious.

Anglers are hilarious -- always going out of their way to avoid sounding too literate...

I haven't tried any with the alimony skirt, but I can verify the other three work here just fine!

And here I thought I was the only one...

It's kind of funny to see people so surprised at the Ned rig, since small plastic bodies on jigheads have been all-purpose fish-catching-machines for years, effective for many species, almost anywhere.

TW gift card for the win. 10% off right now, too. Can't lose.

No leftys in stock or I would have grabbed one. Looks like the sale is on until midnight central tonight.

I fished it a lot this last summer. I caught mostly largemouth, but also a few white bass and crappie depending on where I was throwing it

There's more quality advice here in just a few sentences than in some entire threads.