blckshirt98

I wouldn't accept any money either but a box of baked goods I'd take that no problem! A gift certificate to a tackle store is a great idea!

Hmmm, I wonder if I could cut those Rage Menaces right down the middle and turn them into 2 dropshot baits...

Big swimbaits but it takes a special mindset and ungodly patience to be able to fish those properly with the intent of targeting and catching trophy sized bass.

Don't set the hook straight back so if you miss the strike or if the fish grabs the tail and it pulls and rips out of it's mouth, it doesn't go flying directly into you. I learned this the hard way fishing at night off a jetty when I got snagged - I pulled straight back to free my rig, and I got it free, but my 1/2 oz weight hit me literally on the bridge of my nose between my eyes. I thought I might have broken my nose or cracked my glasses. Fortunately I didn't get a hook in the face.

What brand is that? I need a buff that has neck coverage like that, the normal Buff brand always slides up and exposes my neck and I always have to keep pulling it down.

I chuck mine on a Phenix X3 Glass Crankbait rod, with an Abu Garcia Gen2 Revo STX spooled with 20# FC Sniper!

Of the too-many-rods-to-give-a-number I have, my Phenix M1 spinning 7'2" M/XF rod has caught more fish than all my other rods combined and I've used it primarily as a dropshot rod. I haven't fished or felt the Phenix L/F, but if my entire rod collection burned to the ground and I could only afford one rod for the next 5 years, the 7'2" M/XF would be it. I pair it with a 2500 size Shimano with 15 lb braid, and use 7-10# fluoro for a leader when dropshotting. I also use it to throw KVD 1.0 size squarebills using a Norman Speed Clip tied to the braid. My favorite all-around spinning rod hands down!

If you've got moss it's just part of the unfortunate deal, having to clean it off after each cast. Like someone mentioned you might want to try a shallow running squarebill or a "wake" squarebill that will keep the crankbait off the bottom/vegetation where the moss is accumulating.

5" single tail grub is my usual choice! Cheap and easy to source matching colors!

Shaky head is where I had my first good day of catching numbers for bass! It was an Owner Ultrahead with a 5" Baby Bass GYCB senko!

I like to use a size 4 hook because I nose hook smaller plastics, and keep my weight to 1/8 or 3/16. I might use a lighter weight when I'm using a lighter setup in dead calm water, or a heavier weight if it's windy or there's a stronger current.

The Roman Made Mother takes about 12 hours to make, so even if you're paying say $25/hr for skilled labor, not including materials and markup, $400 is reasonable.

But how's the fishing pressure where you caught them? Out here where the pressure is really heavy, the larger fish seem to get bite shy.

The study probably omits targeted fish by the angler. There's a few people that routinely catch DD bass, and it's not by luck or by accident. They specifically target those big fish, usually fishing big baits and fishing for 8+ hours hoping for just one or two bites. The majority of bass fisherman are out there to catch bass of any (legal) size, and if a DD latches on to your offering, boom you win the lottery. But if you have a body of water nearby that has known DD bass, and you fish a big swimbait correctly every weekend for 8 hours over the course of a year, your chances go way way up.

I think there's a lot of luck involved when you're looking at the majority of anglers at club or novice one-day tournaments, but at the Elite or FLW level luck plays a much smaller role in an angler's success over the course of a season. All the high level pros know bass behavior, movement, and feeding patterns like the back of their hand, but also set themselves apart by the number of techniques they excel at, and, how quickly they can change or adapt to find the right pattern to trigger a bite. Any club or novice angler can get lucky and pull in a big bag in a single day tournament to win, but the pros can do this more CONSISTENTLY tournament after tournament, 2-4 days in a row, under any change in conditions. Most anglers might get on a hot bite one day but will get skunked or only catch 2-3 fish the next day if the conditions do a 180 degree turn and the bite shuts down. The pros will find the right pattern and still pull in those 5 fish limits of 15+ pounds no matter what changes, any day of the year. Anyone can take a boat out and have a great day and pull in a great bag when the fish are spawning, but very few can take a boat out for 4 straight days and pull in 4 solid bags in 95 degree heat in the dead of summer or in 30 mph winds.

From what I've read the larger bass will feed while it's still dark...smarter fish that have adapted and survived by feeding in low light conditions when there's no predators like birds that can spot them. I've tried to fish at night but the pitch black conditions coupled with the freaking mosquitos and bugs, makes it no fun for me.

I'm a 100% shore guy and if I had to fill up a tackle box for a day on the water I would grab - - A topwater rat/mouse type of bait, like a Spro BBZ Rat (I currently bring a CL8 Mighty Mouse but those are hard to find). - A misc topwater bait - Whopper Plopper 90 - KVD 1.0 and 1.5 size squarebills - Sexy Shad/Chartreuse Sexy Shad/Ghost Bluegill/Natural Shad. - 2-3 lipless cranks - Strike King Red Eye Shads and Rat L Traps - Chatterbaits - Dropshot plastics up the wazoo - KVD Dream Shots, GYCB Kut Tails, Molix Sator Worms, Jackall Crosstail Shads - Wacky style plastics - 5" Senkos, Jackall Flick Shakes - Plastics that can dual purpose as a dropshot and shakey head - GYCB Pro Senko, Damiki Air Pocket Worm, Gambler Shakey Shad Dropshot covers "off the bottom", and shakey head covers "bottom" finesse. From the shore the bass are chasing baitfish that swim shallow/on the surface, so the 1.0/1.5 squarebills cover that. The lipless cranks sink and can be cast a mile, so those can look for the deeper/suspended bass. Topwater covers topwater if you see the fish active. I'm not a topwater Frog/Spook person or jig guy so I don't use those, but if you're confident with them by all means bring them along. I don't carry deep diving cranks because like you said you rarely encounter that from the shore, and if you did you still have the lipless cranks and chatterbaits for deeper water. I don't bring any wire baits because the whopper plopper works like a buzzbait and the chatterbaits work like spinnerbaits and are both easier to carry in a standard Plano. By keeping my finesse presentations limited to what I'm comfortable/confident with I don't bring a bunch of extra plastics that take up space. If I feel like I need a crawfish imitator I'll throw in a bag or Damiki Air Craws and use them on a shakey head. EDIT: One thing I forgot to add is that I can throw everything above on 2 rods - a spinning rod and a glass/composite crankbait rod. I can throw most of it on a spinning rod if I really don't feel like taking two rods and it only eliminates a few of the options (like the chatterbaits or heavier lipless cranks).

The Vanish got a really bad rep when it first came out for being brittle and breaking. Berkley reformulated it and the new stuff seems fine. I use 2# Vanish as leader for trout fishing and that stuff has been beastly - I landed a 5 pound trout on 2# mono with 2# Vanish for a leader. I have a stockpile of InvisX that I got at Sports Authority clearance sales that I'm working through but I would have no problem using Vanish as a leader after seeing how it's performed with my trout rigs.

I like 2 better but i think it extends too far down where stuff might fall out. 2 but with some sort of brace to keep it from opening up past say, 30 degrees might be better!

I'm also in San Jose and fished almost all of the Santa Clara reservoirs. Never been on a boat, 100% shore guy. Anderson and Coyote are usually your best bets from the shore. Anderson you almost always catch something, but usually on the small side. Coyote is your best bet for a trophy fish but that lake can be really good or really horrible on any given day. Go join sanjosebass.com and introduce yourself on the forums! I'll hit you up there if you ever want to check a place out.

I always keep my plastics in the original packaging! I tried using those worm binders at first but over time the oil/lube used in some of the plastics start to build up and the plastic sleeves just got all gross and messy.

Don't see an attachment!

A bit over your budget but the Phenix Elixir ULs are amazing! I use an FX 802 as a dedicated dropshot rod and it's one of my favorite rods to fish.

I use Norman Speed Clips and no longer tie direct to anything except spinnerbaits (because the Speed Clip easily slides up and down the wire if it's an open eye). I don't think bending out a clip will be a problem because I use a fiberglass/composite rod and also with the drag set the fish should never generate enough force to bend the clip out. Snap swivels I could see the small single wire possibly bending though.

In terms of hard bait organization and storage, the Owner Hook Safety Caps are the greatest invention ever. I first just got a few to protect some of the pricier baits, but once I saw how easy they made it to move lures around, I got safety caps for almost all of my hard baits. Nothing is more annoying that wanting a specific hardbait, pulling it out, and getting a chain of like 5 baits you need to untangle and the subsequent skin pricking. Get some Owner Safety Caps and you'll kick yourself for not getting them sooner.