RHuff

I've always wanted to see 12 man MLF field. A 6 man Round one with 3 Bass Pros and 3 FLW pros......then Round 2 with 3/3 again. Eventually get to a 6 man championship consisting of 3 Elites and 3 FLW. Scott Martin vs. KVD would be epic.

Watermelon with Red Flake

At least she is there and you are still in the game my man. Keep it up . Good Work!

I've read so many stories about guys who catch the bass of their life. Well it happened to me yesterday finally. I've been catching some solid fish this year in the 2-4lb range but have never caught a true mature 8lb or bigger bass. Yesterday evening I was out with my dad fishing a lake here in Southern WV. About an hour before dark we hit a large field of lilly pads that pretty much covered the entire north end of the lake. Neither one of us was having much luck so I decided to throw a Rapala jerkbait to slow down my presentation. Shortly after I caught a nice bass on the edge of the lillies in a break of the edge that weighed 3.2lbs. Big bodied bass pretty fish. Never got another bite so closer to dark I tied on a Castaic Boyd Duckett Walking Popper. I came to a long point in the lillies and made a perfect cast up into a corner and started walking the bait parallel to the lilly edge right down the line. On about the 4th twitch a big bass blew the bait up. It was the bite you dream of. I had my drag set tight and kept pressure on him because I knew if he went into the lilles I may not get him out (extremely thick). I got him almost to the boat and he darted back straight down to deep water again. I've been fishing for 25 years and I've never had a bass pull this hard. I got him up to the boat again and all I could see was his head and a tiny bit of hydrilla wrapped around his head. He was the by far the biggest fish I've ever hooked. My dad had the net and was going to help me get him up. When he got down to reach down the bass seen him and darted like a bat out of hell downward and snapped my line. I dropped the rod and went to my knees. Felt number for 15 minutes afterward. This bass was easily 7lbs and could have been larger. Not only did I lose my best fish, but I also lost my best lure..... Dad caught a bass 5lbs a couple of weeks ago and he said this bass was both longer and bigger around than his. I'm reallly struggling getting past this. I keep telling myself that I threw the right bait in the right situation to get hooked but it still doesn't make the what if feeling go away....

I've read so many stories about guys who catch the bass of their life. Well it happened to me yesterday finally. I've been catching some solid fish this year in the 2-4lb range but have never caught a true mature 8lb or bigger bass. Yesterday evening I was out with my dad fishing a lake here in Southern WV. About an hour before dark we hit a large field of lilly pads that pretty much covered the entire north end of the lake. Neither one of us was having much luck so I decided to throw a Rapala jerkbait to slow down my presentation. Shortly after I caught a nice bass on the edge of the lillies in a break of the edge that weighed 3.2lbs. Big bodied bass pretty fish. Never got another bite so closer to dark I tied on a Castaic Boyd Duckett Walking Popper. I came to a long point in the lillies and made a perfect cast up into a corner and started walking the bait parallel to the lilly edge right down the line. On about the 4th twitch a big bass blew the bait up. It was the bite you dream of. I had my drag set tight and kept pressure on him because I knew if he went into the lilles I may not get him out (extremely thick). I got him almost to the boat and he darted back straight down to deep water again. I've been fishing for 25 years and I've never had a bass pull this hard. I got him up to the boat again and all I could see was his head and a tiny bit of hydrilla wrapped around his head. He was the by far the biggest fish I've ever hooked. My dad had the net and was going to help me get him up. When he got down to reach down the bass seen him and darted like a bat out of hell downward and snapped my line. I dropped the rod and went to my knees. Felt number for 15 minutes afterward. This bass was easily 7lbs and could have been larger. Not only did I lose my best fish, but I also lost my best lure..... Dad caught a bass 5lbs a couple of weeks ago and he said this bass was both longer and bigger around than his. I'm reallly struggling getting past this. I keep telling myself that I threw the right bait in the right situation to get hooked but it still doesn't make the what if feeling go away....

At least now you know that fish is in there. If it is there, then there are others like it. Keep grinding man. I score it as a victory to put the right presentation to get bit by such a bass. Good Luck.

West Virginia is well known for its river fishing of trout and smallmouth. The New River is probably the most famous river in the state for this. West Virginia has some good largemouth bass fishing such as Stonewall Jackson Lake, Bluestone Lake, Summersville Lake, Cheat Lake, etc. The only problem with bass fishing here is the winter time. Bass don't really get as big here as they do in the south because they don't grow year round. I call any bass over 3lbs a big bass here. Anything 5lbs or bigger is an absolute hog. Stonewall Jackson has probably the most abundant big bass due to the catch and release restrictions that were on the lake for many years.

I was thinking either a weightless trickworm/senko on the grass edges or flip a creature directly in the grass...... If that doesn't work and bass are active I would burn a swimbait (keitech paddle tail) with lightly weighted hook across the top of the grass.

I let it sink about 3 or 4 seconds and gave it like 4 or 5 quick pops to make it dart then let it pause and sink another 3 or 4 seconds... and repeated..they seemed to either hit it as soon as it hit the water or on the first couple of twitches..

Thread Update... hit the water at 7am. Caught 2 nice ones in the first 30 minutes on a Boyd Duckett Walking Popper using a walk the dog retrieve near small patches of isolated lilly pads... around 10am after the sun got hot I switched to a BX Minnow working a quick darting retrieve. Third cast another keeper hit it hard on a secondary point in about 10ft of water...When I unhooked and released him I noticed a small tail fin on my casting deck.. after investigating i came to the conclusion that the bass spit it up. It looked like a tiny bass tail.. switched to a weightless fluke in green baby bass color. Hammered them the rest of the day right from the bank all the way out to open water around 15 feet.. Most productive day I have had in a few weeks.... Don't feel like I solved the suspensed bass riddle but I took what was given and tried to adjust accordingly... Appreciate the support..

Will someone tell me how to catch these little you know whats.. Seems like these are the current conditions at every lake in my area and so far i've whiffed on senkos (texas and wacky), jerkbaits, deep jerkbaits, walk the dog, buzzbaits, squarebills, deep cranks, swimbaits, swimjigs, spinnerbaits, caffiene shads, and texas rigged worms.. i'm at my wits end LOL water is 83-85 degrees, clear, 90 degree days..

Spinnerbaits and Crankbaits by far so I guess the search bait technique.. Topwater produces if the conditions adds up.. Flipping heavy cover on hot sunny days will produce consistantly... I'd say these three makes up 85% of my fishing..

Tubes will catch bass year round. In the summer when the water is warm and clear go with an AC Shiner in foil silver with black back. Thank me later.

Just stumbled upon this thing a few days ago. My goodness it's quickly becoming my go to soft plastic. I always had great luck with the brush hog but this thing has produced great bass for me in the last few days. I've been fishing it texas rigged with a tungsten bullet weight flipping in heavy cover on braided line. Caught several 2-3lbers after daylight flipping gaps in lilly pads and another nice one flipping it right on a tree stump. Maybe its the coffee scent but when bass hit it they run with it.

I picked up a pair of under armor deck shoes last fall at Bass Pro. I love wearing these while fishing in my boat. If I need to step in the water when launching or retriving its no big deal they drain quick and dry fast.

Have you noticed this problem on every lake you fish or just one certain lake? I ask that because I had a similar problem one day of not getting the bow of the boat to center up with the rubber thing where the wench is. Come to find out another fisherman was having the same problem and we discovered that half of the ramp had dropped a little at the center making it not level. I started hugging the level side as close to the dock as I could when launching and retrieving and it fixed it instantly. I would have never have even considered that.

I had never really caught anything on them until this year. We were having trouble finding bass last month I had been fishing deep until we finally found the bass laying in shallow grass flats in 3-5 feet of water. My fishing partner started catching them here and there on spinnerbaits being slow rolled. I threw the chatterbait and it was game over. Been my best producing bait thus far this year. All in shallow water near hydrilla and lillypads.

It happens. Nothing really can do about it. I've fished before for an entire morning and never caught a thing or even had a sign that there were even fish in the water. Around 11AM that day it started to rain. I thought this absolutely sucks. 10 minutes later it stopped and the sun came out all bright and hot. It was like a light switch being turned on. Caught like 8 in my next 10 casts, including one almost 5 lbs. 10 minutes later a cloud rolled in and hid the sun. They quit biting as fast as they started. Weird day but proves conditions can change in a matter of minutes...

do you just work it like a buzzbait?

This thing has recently come to my attention. Can anyone fill me in on tips and techniques? My home lake has miles and miles of Lilly Pads that border the shorlines.....

Way to go fellas. Let's Go Mountaineers!

I have a 2007 Lowrance elite 3 so anything will be a heck of an upgrade lol

Will Do...Thanks!

My main desire is downscan, sidescan, and some sort of GPS for Navigating unfamiliar waters. The build in GPS on this unit seems to satisfy what I need. The Navonics or LakeMaster seems nice but isn't a necessity.

After looking at many models of fishfinders this is the one I think I'm going to upgrade to. I have a budget of $500 or less and this one seems to match everything I'm looking for in a unit. Also, for some reason the clearvu just seems easier for me to read as opposed to the Lowrance and Hummingbird downscan images. Does anyone on here use this unit. Can you give me any input or your thoughts and opinions. I appreciate it in advance.