jomatty

ive heard a few good things about these baits and was wondering if folks could share some rigging advice on how they use them. i mostly plan on fishing them weightless and Brad Covert said that they can be rigged on a 4/0-5/0 wide gap hook but it is still a little unclear to me. do you rig them essentially like you would a fluke or similar? do you skin hook the hook on top or is it generally exposed? any other info is also appreciated, matt

for me its a few things. first there is its accecability. i can fish for bass almost anywhere in my home state. secondly it is exciting to me. i like the variety of lures and the skills involved and also the chance of getting hold of a really big one. i mean i could take up fly fishing for trout and im sure i would enjoy it but for me i wouldnt enjoy the possibility of a 14 inch trout the same as the chance for a 7 lb bass. if i lived somewhwere where i could fish for redfish, snook, bonefish, or tarpon i might find myself enjoying that as much as i do bass fishing. for where i live now, there is nothing else that holds the same excitement for me.

i can confirm the rumor on the shad being int he works. i emailed matt to ask about a custom paint job resembling a shad and he said that it was already int eh works. didnt say when to expect it though

that trailer will be fine but you almost certainly have other options that you already have in your tackle box as well. any craw, grub, and most creature baits will work well. a favorite of mine is cut down brush hog. that jig will be great for 10 ft of water but if your gonna go deeper id get a half ounce jig. if your going all the way to 40 ft i would get a 3/4 or full ounce jig. your just gonna be wastin a lot of time waiting for the bait to get down there in 40 ft of water in essentially dead water. also if you are jsut learning jigs you might stay away from fishing them super deep. id concentrate on the shallow stuff where you will have a little easier time. that 1/4 jig is perfect for that and the smaller size will get you more overall bites.

fat ika baby!!

i was at a local pond today and tied on a swimbait too. i did it for the opposite reason you described as the water was choclate milk and i couldnt get anything going. my order of decent swimbaits hasnt arived yet so i was throwing a storm bait (which i did not like at all as it ran on its side no matter how slow i reeled it and wouldnt come straight to me no matter what i did) and on the first cast...fish on after about three cranks. caught another one after that but then couldnt get anything going. i think if i had a good bait that would have run true i might have done good with them. seemed like if i got past the first few cranks and let the bait start to do it's thing i was out of luck. matt

im with RW on this one but i usually dont even go to 12 feet. fat ikas are one of my very favorite baits and i rig them exactly how RW does. i just think there are almost always better options for deep water than a slow sinking bait like an ika or senko. can you catch fish with it? sure. but your gonna be spending a lot of time with your bait in unproductive water and im usually gonna go for a tube or jig in the deeper water. matt

i know id have a jig tied on and id start at the first drop to 10 ft that you spoke of. i would throw a 1/2 ounce football head jig if there is not too much grass out there

im no expert at this but here are my thoughts... downsize and slowdown if you can. if the boater is moving slow enough downsize to something like a shaky head. the other poster who said the coanglers in his club where doing great with a shaky head hit on a good point. you are gonna catch a lot of fish on a shaky head that guys miss using larger baits. same holds true for a dropshot or wacky rigged senko. problem is they can be diffficult to fish if the guy in the front is running and gunning a spinnerbait. if the front of the boat guy is fishing too fast to downsize and slowdown it is gonna be tougher. you may just have to do the best you can with what he leaves you. and be observant for spots he misses. matt

you can try it out a little to see if you like it for next to nothing. make a mold using senkosams tutorial and then melt down some old worms you have lying around. will give you a little feel for it. then you can order some plastic and a few colors to get started. my first order was for plastic, green pumpkin color, black color, and black and blue flake. honestly that is about all the colors i would ever really need, although now i can make any color with any color flake under the sun. you very well may find that you want to upgrade to aluminum molds but there is no need to. i like the way my baits look better with the aluminum molds but they dont catch any more fish than the ones i made using plaster of paris. start simple with things like chunk molds and other one sided plastics before making a two piece mold. there are lots of great worms and baits with a flat side. then you can move on to senkos and such. matt

the only thing i like better than catching fish is seeing the look on my sons face when he catches a fish. there is nothing more exciting than when they finally hook a good one and the suspense to see if they land it. i mean sometimes when i have a good one on ill think something like "please dont come unpegged" or something but when jacob has one on it is like "for the love of God dont let this fish come off" and all the while he is making every mistake imagineable and doing random things that appear aimed at losing the fish, but when he gets it in he is so happy that it make is so exciting. matt

when you start asking about line your gonna get a lot of different opinions. here is mine... you are not gonna beat braid for sensitivity although the line is more visible. personally i use floro for most jigging unless im in weeds or heavy cover and then it is braid.

forget the lunker sauce when is the chicken hot dog fish scent coming out!

i ddint realize that ufc purchased pride. will they still be run as two completely seperate organizations. if couture had to fight fedor it would be a sad day... maybe now everyone will get a chance to see what a real heavyweight champ looks like after watching silvia for so long.

im not too far away in charlottesville and this is incredibly sad. only good thing is the way tradgedies bring folks together. i had a long talk with my mom and some other family members yesterday and we really dont talk very much. puts things in perspective and makes you want to be close to your loved ones. matt

i think the only thing you really need is a vise. it sounds like you just want to tie rubber or silicone skirts and all you really need is a vise and one of those bobbin thingys. thats all i have and when i want a thicker skirt with more poof i have no problems. often i dont even use the bobbin thing and just use braided line which as best i can tell works just as well (aaron martins tip from some show i watched but it works well). i like the jigs ive tied and they do seem to have some extra poof, so good luck. matt

i use the same things i use when its not raining except for the fact that i take into account that the visibility is less due to the cloud cover and sometimes stained water. one thing i always like to try in the rain is a topwater, but that has more to do with the visibility and cloud cover than the rain itself. matt

catts absolutely right about supporting two households. i am a proffesional poker player and used to spend a lot of time on the road in vegas and atlantic city. even when my wife and son would travel with me we had to keep up two households. i mean we still had rent, cable, internet, phone and all that stuff even if we werent at home all month. for me it could not work. i had to make too much just to break even on the trips and i dont see how many of the mid tier fishermen do it. i mean even guys we think of famous probably arent making that much (with a few notable exceptions). not only that but i would never go through that lonely feeling of being on the road and realizing that all i want to do is be at home with my family and not caring how much i enjoy my work or what kind of money i was making (which in my case wasnt nearly enough). anyhow that sounds lame as most people dont think they would be up at nights in las vegas wishing they were at home but i assure you they may after doing it for awhile. matt

so the reason for prefering a single blade over a tandem is that it stays down better? thanks for replys

the dicks in my area has em, although they also got in spot removers for the first time. im praying they maybe have an actual fisherman ordering the stuff for them for a change

when i first started fishing jigs the toughest two things for me were understanding that mushy feeling and not setting the hook every time i whacked a branch in a brushpile or laydown. what helped me with the not setting the hook on the branches was finding some shallow brush near the shore and standing there for awhile not fishing but just dragging my jig through it and paying attention. with the mushy feeling watching videos of bass eating helped me understand what was happening. you often see them eat it then you go to move the jig and its just heavy and gives a little. so hard to describe but clear once you know what your looking for. the biggest trick to learning jigs imo is to keep one tied on and keep it wet. pay attention and with time the rest will take care of itself. matt

the two baits that i have success with on those cruising bass are fat ikas and senkos, both fished weightless. that slow fall is super importaint. the only other thing i would usually throw at them is maybe a trick worm or other weithless plastic, although personally i would even bother. sometimes those cruisers are not going to cooperate and will not eat anything you throw at them. one thing that i sometimes do is to cast well past them and then swim the senko across the top of the water very fast before killing it right on their nose. even the best cast can spook some of these bass... personally i dont spend a lot of time on these bass if they wont hit an ika or senko. i used to throw everything i had at them but its been my experience that if they dont go for one of those options they are just too skittish or something. now if the bass is on the bed its a different story and i will spend a long time on em trying different stuff to get em agitated and find the sweet spot but it dosent sound like these fish are on beds. matt

are you fishing for largemouth bass? if not you may not get that great of responses and it sounded like you were after the shad and stripers. anyhow in all that wind and murky water that you describe i would have a spinnerbait tied on. take a look at what the folks that are catching fish are doing and follow their lead.

i keep reading about folks prefering the single bladed willowleaf spinnerbaits and im wondering what in particular makes them preferable to some people. I know RW is a big fan and a few others. ive always used tandem bladed willows or a big willow with a small colorado. i do use single colorado's at night however. just curious, matt

i would probably start with a trap or spinnerbait but if i couldnt get anything going pretty quick id be ready to slow down big time. id have a jig tied on and also consider senkos or the good old t-rig or c-rig.