the reel ess

I used to be a crusader against the use of clips because I lost a good fish on a speed clip once. Now I use a good quality snap for my treble lures on one combo. That's because I start out with a topwater, sometimes change the topwater, then end up throwing a lipless crank. I just don't want to retie that much unless it's because I'm catching fish. It's getting harder for me to see the knot I'm tying.

There's a ton of info on the InterWebs about this. I just looked at YouTube and you couldn't watch all the videos on the topic in one day. But basically, more action in warm months and less action in colder months. I'd bet a lot of people use one, exclusively. I will until they quit biting it.

This happens to me quite a bit. The biggest bass I've caught on a jig sucked it in before it hit bottom. It wasn't moving but it didn't feel right so I set the hook and it took off into overhanging brush. I had to reel up to it because ti was deep in the brush. I got close then it took off to deeper water, breaking all the limbs. Thank goodness for 30# braid.

So far, my favorite is the 4" Chigger Craw. They make 3" ones if you like, but if you want a shorter one, you can just cut a little off the 4". It holds so much scent, I'm convinced fish will hold it longer and the scent stays on a long time. I've put some other leftover craws I had in the bag with these to soak up the scent. I like the GYCB hula and twin tail grubs, but you go through more of them. I'm still a novice at jigs, but I'll experiment with different ones in the different seasons. Black/blue is the ticket around here. If I'm ever confronted with clearer water, I'll try a brown jig. It seems like the only rains we've had this summer were torrential and the water, which is rarely clear, has remained turbid for summer. We have another tropical storm headed our way with the promise of 5" of rain in a few hours.

Did you use that fish as a line thru swimbait? I believe you. My dad and I caught the same bass at the same time in the days before cell phones.

I've been doing it every trip for about a year, catching one here and there, including a 6.92 lb. I stopped fishing T rigs to force myself to learn jigs. But the jig bite is usually nowhere near this good. So glad I didn't just load up from the first spot and go home. I would have except my family were shopping and I knew they'd be gone most of the day. The first place is where I caught my PB but it's hit and miss. It's about 30 acres so you get a lot of exercise paddling there. The second place is maybe 3 acres max. It has at least 1 5 pounder in it because I've caught it. It's the best catch-exercise ratio.

I went this morning to a local reservoir and caught 4 dinks, 2 on the jig. I loaded up the kayak and went to my friend's pond and caught 10 more. All but 2 were caught on a custom @cadman black/blue hand tied grass jig with Chigger Craw trailer. I got a lot of practice skipping, detecting bites and setting hooks. Most of them were between 2 and 3 pounds. The two biggest were solid 3 pounders. So, that's at least 10 on the jig today. I missed or lost several more, including another probable 3 pounder that got off at the boat. If you're ever in the market for custom jigs, Cadman's are really high quality at a good price.

I get fewer hookups on the weedless hook. Unless you're bank-bound, you can probably go get your hook back if it gets snagged. I use the Gammy finesse 2/0, but any hook like it would work. I have a few weedless, weighted wacky hooks that don't work as well. I have also taken my Trick Worm off the straight shank worm hook and wacky rigged it with that same hook. It works great but you have to pay attention to line movement or they'll get the hook either down the throat or near it.

I bought these Orvis with 1.5X readers a while back off Amazon for my birthday. I got the amber lenses. They're very good for fishing, tying knots and driving, but I still keep my others for walking. Sounds stupid but I feel like I'm always about to fall down walking in bifocals. I should probably just stop using the other pair and force myself to use the readers. https://designer-reading-glasses.com/orvis-midway-polarized-bi-focal-reading-sunglasses-in-matte-black/?gclid=Cj0KCQjw9NbdBRCwARIsAPLsnFY8JOw99i9s5hJTkyrs61uThzIaPsBQ0M6Uhq4HC-wEFEvmKTVfUGUaAi1mEALw_wcB

And that Johnson Weedless Spoon! I have one of those in gold that I bought for redfish, trout and flounder. It's all scratched up from oyster shells. I only caught flounder on it, using a Gulp Mullet trailer.

Yeah, it was hard for me to start detecting the bites soon enough to set a hook. This plays a big part in catching instead of just getting bites. You have to expect fish to bite and be ready. Sometimes they won't give you as much of an opportunity to respond to them as they will with a worm. I guess it's the extra weight of the jighead. And, OP: SET THAT HOOK HARD! That's a thick hook with a weedguard usually going into the tough roof of the mouth of a bass who eats crawfish for a living.

You can use that for just about anything. I don't use a BC reel under 7:1 anymore. I don't use any big deep cranks anymore because most places I'm fishing are shallower. Life's too short to turn the crank more than necessary.

Bump

I watched this YT video and decided to follow his advice and always try a jig every trip, all year round. I put it on my worm rod so I would be sure to use it every time I go. I started with an Arky jighead and a Chigger Craw. One thing I discovered was that most bites happen either on the drop or when the bait is still and often they don't feel like anything. I was only noticing the bite by the line moving. Keep the line tight. To me, it doesn't seem like a bait that will get a lot of bites on most trips, but they'll usually be solid fish. I try to toss one to all the wood cover and overhanging trees I can find. My setup is a 7' MH Falcon LowRider rod (because it's by far the most sensitive I have), 7.1:1 reel with shallow spool and a good drag, 30# PowerPro braid and I use a leader of 15# mono a little shorter than the rod. I like the mono just in case fish actually care about the braid visibility. I've caught them on straight braid as well. I ordered some custom hand tied jigs form another forum member. Not really necessary but they're wire tied and the skirts won't be coming off anytime soon. I've had a jig tied on for more than a year and I caught a new PB (6.92 lb.) on one a little over a month ago.

I was going to say not to go too cheap on your first baitcaster. But it looks like you have that covered. As for the braid, I'd go with 30 lb. You can then use a leader of mono or fluoro if you like. But you might want to start with some cheaper mono until you have the hang of it. Big Game is a good cheap line that you can cut out and replace in case of a professional overrun.

If visibility is that low, I'd probably slow roll a black spinnerbait with Colorado blade and try a black/blue jig and trailer with rattles. Work it slowly. Seems like you got a bite when the bait wasn't even moving so you probably can't go too slow. I'd still stick with the frog. You have to try one every time you go to a pond ringed with weeds or lilies-it's the law. If all else fails, go somewhere else. The bite just sucks every place at certain times.

Most times I've tried it, it hasn't worked for me. Black/blue, black and purple have worked better. I guess it's because of water color.

For the longest time my dad's lakehouse on Google Maps had my truck and trailer backed into the water with the boat off. I was gone fishin'.

I've used it to chart the distance of some kayak float trips. Rivers in this area flow an average of 3 miles per hour so you can estimate a float time if you know the distance.

Then you can't get hurt on the deal. Our Dick's never has what I go looking for. I only go in because my wife goes to the craft store next door and there's nothing of interest in there for me. Dick's fishing department is like Big Lots. You can always find something to buy, often on clearance, but you can't go in reasonably expecting them to have something you specifically need. And they thin out the fishing department by half during the offseason. I don't have an offseason. There's an Academy in the same town that kills Dick's.

Welcome! Yeah, this site is the best, bar none. I used to be on the Bill Dance Outdoors board, but it dried up. You could ask a question in a new thread and someone might answer it a few days later and there was some acidic snark. Once I discovered this one I never went back.

I try to fish in a real boat when the water is really cold. But I will go in smaller waters wearing the aforementioned muck boots, I wear thermals underneath and sweatpants, black to soak up some sun. If it's mild I'll wear a long sleeve tee and a hoodie over the thermals. If cold, I have a Cabela's Guidewear zip hoodie that does the trick. I also have some Guidewear gloves. But honestly, I try to wait for some really mild weather in the winter and go to some ponds where I can walk the banks. We get pretty mild winters here and a three day warming trend can be just what the doctor ordered.

Not really sure of the question. Bass will be in all of the pond at some point. I'm assuming it gets a lot of pressure, being in Manhattan. Soft plastics will be a good assumption, year round. Maybe even smaller ones. Try to do things other anglers don't or won't. They have to eat. @Mike D from Lunkerville did a couple episodes from Central Park. I love seeing people fishing in Central Park right across the street for the Ritz Carlton. From that video, I'll bet perch patterns work. Go in the rain, even.

There's a good spot on our local hydroelectric lake that used to be a well-kept secret. It could produce a good bit of the year. Once the secret got out, on tourney days, there would always be a boat on it and a boat "staged" waiting to get on it.

I use 15 lb. mono on my trebles BC combo. It floats well for topwaters and allows some stretch so you don't yank the bait away too soon and it's forgiving at the boat when they're thrashing around. I still have it on my spinnerbait/buzzbait combo as well, but I'll probably change that to braid at some point. I've switched to braid on my spin combos for the lack of line twist.