youngangler274

thanks guys for the info! hopefully I will get out there in the next few days and get after em. Ill keep yall updated!

Been really tough here lately in Southern Wisconsin. Ice finally got off most of the lakes a few weeks ago. Temperatures have still been pretty low with it dropping below freezing most nights and averaging around 45ish degrees during the day. Wind has been blowin real hard as of late but the past few days it has finally let up enough for me to get out. In the two days I have been out I have failed to connect with a single fish or even get a bite. Today I was out for 6 hours total from 7 a.m. to 1:00 p.m. without so much a sign of a bass anywhere. Originally thought maybe they'd still be on their winter patterns. So I tried deep water, rock piles and brush piles with nearby staging areas and spawning flats using small jigs, drop shot, ned rig with no success. next I tried some staging area like water, shallow ledges, drop offs, Islands near flats using a wide variety of baits also with no takers. Finally just to give myself peace of mind, I tried some skinny water (3ft average) channels, docks mixed with laydowns, rock, again with no takers. Somebody give me some hints or tips here! I have no Idea what to do at this point then hope the fish get into a better temperament soon.

Never had that happen to me personally, but if that does concern you then I would suggest switching to a plastic bead instead. otherwise you could peg the weight down on the bead so it cannot come back down hard on the glass bead but this would essentially be the same as pegging the weight to the head of the plastic anyways. Just my 2 cents, experimenting is never a bad thing and your mileage may vary. - tight lines

Be careful using tungsten weights with glass beads! the tungsten is hard enough that if the tungsten weight has any room to slide up and down the line, when it comes back down on the beads it will break them!

least it wasnt still walking when you hit it, I can tell you from experience that is quite messy

Thanks for the reply, email is on the way.

So first a little back story on me so you all can judge how capable I am for trying to pull this of. I am 16 years old and have been bass fishing for going on 2 years. I am the sole proud owner of a 1997 ranger r72 sport that I work and pay for myself, and fish 3 - 4 times a week when possible. I have numerous rods of varying companies and so I feel that I know enough about good rods to be able to judge what is right and good for one that I custom build. Now on to the reason for this post. My mother has been starting to fish with me more and more and she is getting much more into it. She doesn't know much about different techniques and such, I usually just hand her a setup and explain what to do and she fishes it. Normally this ends up being something along the lines of a wacky rigged worm or texas rigged plastics. But she has started to comment on how different rods I hand her feel. She has said things like "this one is too long and hard to cast". or "this rod doesn't bend enough and I cant cast it as far". So for her birthday (which is coming up: August 25) I want to either build or buy her a custom rod. I have narrowed down the specs for it. It needs to be a 6'6" M-XF rod with split grips. I would like to make it mostly greyish silver with some orange mixed in as she is a survivor of kidney cancer and orange is the color for kidney cancer. So what do you all think? Do you think I can knock out a decent build before august 25th or do you think I need to buy a pre built rod? Any help or advice is helpful thanks!!!!

I literally just take whatever small fabric bag I can find. Such as a small cooler, or a small utility bag, anything that can hold a decent amount of plastics bags. I keep all the plastics in their original bag and I just dump the plastics in the cooler type delio. One of the medium gandermountain soft tackle boxes work well, they are on sale often and come with 3 plano style boxes.

thanks for the advice!! I will most certainly try this out on my next attempt. Thanks again!!

Hello, I am young anger from Madison Wisconsin. I do not currently have a boat, and I am wanting to start fishing tournaments. I am 16 years old and I live on the east side of Madison although I will most likely be moving to the deforest area. I am looking to start fishing tournaments and competing in this great sport. Since I am a non boater I would obviously be fishing as a co-angler. I have been fishing for most of my life but I have been targeting bass specifically for most of this year. If you have any information or if one of you is a part of club near me, please let me know. Thanks for your time - Jacob

I fish out of a kayak, So I don't think I am making that much noise. From what I have seen the lake is pretty much untouched by fishing boats of any kind. I have seen one or two fishing boats out of all the times I have been out. As far as what they are feeding on, I am honestly not sure. By soaking do you mean letting them sink to the bottom, or what? - thanks for the reply

the boat launch over on sandy beach is a decent one, haven't seen any of the others yet. There isn't much for structure on rock lake, nor is there much for weeds. I have actually been going shallow towards the shore, and sight fishing with wacky rigged stick baits and other such things. the water is crystal clear once you get away from the swimming areas and you can see fish as deep as probably 8 feet down. I caught probably 8 or 9 nice sized large mouth using this tactic. It might now work for someone in a boat, but because of the kayak I can glide almost right on top of the fish and they never spook, it makes it near impossible for me to miss a hook set because I can watch the fish eat the worm haha. Right off of rock lake is a place called marsh lake, and in there there is an abundance of Lillie pads and such, and I have been told it is great for frogging and top water presentations. There are a lot of fish in rock lake, it is just kind of difficult to find them because there isn't much for the conventional "find the weeds or trees" approach to locating the bass.

I just recently got a fishing kayak, so that has helped a lot. I have been getting good results on lake Monona, and Rock lake in Jefferson. That's nice, its always fun when young kids get something on their line and get excited.

this is awesome! I am actually currently looking into pushing to get one started in my high school this winter so that we can be good and ready once the ice thaws (yeah, I live in Wisconsin, and the ice will be on the lakes before we know it). I don't think it would take a lot of convincing of the school, I just don't know how many people will be interested. I have a couple of friends that fish with me all the time, but apart from that I'm not sure who will want to participate.

yeah this is what I was afraid of, if they are carp, they are probably hurting the bass population.

thanks, I admit those weren't the colors I was using. I will give it a try sometime this week hopefully

Its possible, but I mean they are coming out of the water and they sure look like bass. That would be a relief. here I am thinking I am just sucking it up, and they might not even be bass, haha that would be funny. Well, even if that is was they are, how would you suggest fishing this lake? This lake is extremely murky and really low visibility. Its pretty shallow, And pretty much the whole lake is covered in lilly pads and laydowns.

So I just recently graduated from bank fishing into kayak fishing. I have been out about 3 times with poor results. I live very close to a lake that I know for a fact holds bass. The first time I was out, I was exploring the lake and I was running the shore line. All day long there were bass jumping everywhere! They were jumping through the lilly pads, jumping in grass mats, jumping underneath laydowns, they were everywhere!!! I tried everything to get them to bite. I hopped frogs, of every color and size, over the pads. I tried wacky rigged senkos, shakey heads, creature plastics, craw plastics. I flipped and pitched jigs and plastics under the lay downs. To spite the jumps, I didn't get even one to bite in the first 4 hours!!! Eventually I got one to come up and hit the frog I was throwing, it was a decent 3 lber. But after that fish, I went dry for another 2 hours before decided to cut my losses and left the lake in frustration. I don't really know what else I could have tried!!! The thing is, this wasn't just a one day thing. It has happened to me all 3 times I have gone. Any ideas guys/ gals? The lake I was fishing is called Cherokee lake, in Waunakee Wisconsin. Any advice would be much appretiated! here is a few links so you guys can get an idea what this lake looks like: http://www.bing.com/maps/default.aspx?encType=1&where1=Cherokee%20Lake%2c%20Wisconsin&cp=43.1585807800293~-89.3757400512695&qpvt=Cherokee+Lake+wisconsin&FORM=MIRE# http://www.lakeplace.com/lakefinder/wi/dane/cherokee/806500

I'm pretty sure this is the same seat that is on the new ride 115x which I just bought and will be picking up tomorrow morning.

I will hopefully be getting mine this week or next. I'm looking at a 1998 bass tracker v 17 with a 75hp mercury force on the back. it has a minnkota trolling motor and 2 fish/depth finders plus lots of storage and 2 live wells. I will be 16 in august but I have my boaters safety and have been shore fishing the local lakes since I was 10 so its about time I get a boat. I'm buying it myself with money I have made through my 2 jobs I currently have this summer. I'm super excited and I can't wait to get off the shore and catch some big fat bass!

WOW!!! thanks for all that information!!! I will get out a bunch this week and check out some of those spots! I have tried the locks at tenney park and haven't been successful, I will check out Verona quarry also.

I have recently been bitten by the bass bug and I now have the uncontrollable desire to go bass fishing every second of every moment of my life... I think you all know what I'm talking about. I have gone about 4 times in the past 2 weeks but have been for the most part unsuccessful. I am relatively new to bass fishing, I have all the equipment, but not a whole lot of experience or knowledge to go along with it. I am currently boat-less and I am restricted to fishing off the shore. I live on the east side of Madison, about 10 minutes away from lake Mendota and lake Monona, and all the other small ponds and lakes in that area. I guess what I am asking you guys is does anyone know of any good spots anywhere near me that have good shore fishing. I am willing to drive 30 minutes or more, if there are any lakes or bodies of water that are worth the drive. Or if anyone has any advice on what I should be throwing to try to find these bass? Thanks for all the help guys

this helps a ton!!! thanks!

yeah this is what I was thinking. I am a young kid so I do have an abundance of time so I'm not worried about that. especially now that its summer (only for about another month for me) but I can probably crank out quite a few. I'll check out those zman and elastic strike king worms. thanks for the replies guys

I apologize if this is the wrong place for this post. I have a few questions, I have been fishing senko's a lot and as you all know, its expensive but it just plain catches fish. So I've been looking into cheaper alternatives, I have looked at off brand imitations but they just aren't as good. recently I have been looking into making my own. here are my questions: 1. truly how much cheaper is it really? 2. how time consuming is it? 3. how close are they too the real thing? thanks for all the help