fishwizzard

Honestly it isnt bright enough, not to match my kayak anyway. I like super bright rod highlights, but not the full blank being colored.

What kind of rod is best for like 1/2oz single hook spoons like a Timber Doodle or Silver Minnow? I have a Doodle that I picked up because I liked the name and while I have thrown it a few times, it seems like if I go light on the rod I risk not being able to get a bass out of cover or set the hook as most lures of this style seem to have really thick/dull hooks, but when I go heavier I can't cast it well and can't get it to skitter across the surface as well.

I have started fishing the Ika a bit and am having a lot of luck with it. In addition to several nice bass I have caught a few sunfish, a eastern water snake, and a large bullfrog. All caught casting to pads and then slowly popping it into the water. I am still up in the air about what hook to use. So far I am using a 5/0 Owner Rig-n-Hook and a 4/0 Owner Beast. The Rig-n sits close to the plastic, is very weedless, and gives decent hooksets, but the plastic's lifespan is poor. The Beast sticks out a bunch and snags a lot. But it gives almost perfect hooksets and I have gotten 6-8 fish on a single plastic with them.

The dropshot rod for sure. I have a Premier 6' L/F spinning rod and it is even a little too soft to get a good hookset.

The only issue with them, other than cost, is that they get gummed up more easily than a single large caster. Depending on the sawdust/dirt/grit level in your garage, it might never be an issue, but if after some time they get harder to move, take a look at the rotation points and give them a clean and relube. And yea, the first time I worked at a place with enough budget to afford them it was like magic moving huge set pieces around with just a gentle push.

In theatre those are called "zero throw" casters and they are the bee's knees for easy and careful moving of heavy stuff.

I only started fishing jigs this past winter but have had some decent luck with them in smaller ponds. But I have only ever caught when swimming them, maybe only one or two when the jig was falling or on the bottom. I have noticed a trend for bigger fish as well. I have been breaking my "per pond PB" more and more frequently sense I threw jigs into the mix. This one came from like a one acre pond, it was almost twice the size of the bass I usually catch in there.

I prefer the blank to be a darker, flatter color, I very much love super bright/loud highlights and hardware.

So I have been giving swimbaits a bit of a go and on Friday got my first hit on a Hudd Gill. Sadly the fish shook off right as I was reaching for her. While I was standing there looking at where my bass disappeared I saw my line moving off, grabbing the rod again I hooked and began to land the same bass, who had grabbed the lure sitting on the bottom. But again she shook off. I am trying to be more fearless about throwing swimbaits, but I don't think I am ready for an exposed hook yet, but man losing that fish twice was really annoying. It less annoying news I am learning to really love chatterbaits. Now that I have a heavy rod I can fish them on without shaking my wrist off, I am really getting into them. Got this guy yesterday on one yesterday morning. I switched ponds and picked up six around this size; Which is not impressive in and of itself, but what is impressive is that they all came from the same wacky rigged senko! Sadly the senko went flying off on the next cast and resulted in a nasty backlash. I have been fishing wacky rig senkos on a casting combo for a few months now but this is the fist time that happened. I called it a day and went to try a new bbq place in Brandywine. It's called Texas 202 and oh man it is good. Maybe the best texas-style sausage I have found around here and the brisket was great as well. It's a bit out there but well worth the drive. This is the area I fish, send me a PM to remind me and I will send you some spots tonight. I have never found a great spot, but have a few decent ones I can share. But in general around here, google maps is your friend. Most every pond in a park has some bass in it and there are a few private but unposted spots as well.

I have a small rubber trout net and I like it a good bit. It is too small to fully contain a larger bass, but it works great as a lift-assist for bank and kayak fishing where I can't be sure of getting a good grab on a lip due to terrain or the boat moving. Sadly I still have yet to hit on a good way to carry it on the bank so rarely bring it along. The other day I "caught" my first fish on a swimbait only to have her thrash off right as I went in for the lip. If I had had her butt in the net I bet I could have landed her.

I am giving frogging on 25lb Defier mono a shot. Mainly because I am fishing medium swimbaits on the same combo and figured that I would rather miss a fish then cast-off a $25 rubber bluegill. I have only had one hit on a frog so far, but I hooked and landed him, so a 100% success rate!

I fish from the Mill up to the first set of falls a few times a year. There are smallies in there in decent numbers, but I have never really gotten one of any real size. Above the fall is nice as well, but takes more scrambling to fish well. The patapsco river is also full of smallies and has a ton of spots to access it from.

I use their 2/0 and 3/0 offset worm hooks a ton and love them. They do rip up plastics but I get good hookset ratios and Culprit and Zoom worms are cheap enough that I am fine with burning through them. I am also trying some of their wacky hooks but I crimp my barbs for that presentation and the Trokers are not great for that.

I have never made it to Blue Heron, but have caught in the other ponds in the North Track. Some morning in the next week or two I am going to be there at 8am and make the hike.

#4 is as small as I have ever bought. I can't decide between #4 or #2 as my prefered size.

Had a bad day at work and picked up these guys; Could not find anywhere with both of these and a White Python in stock, so still need to pick one up in that color. The paint jobs on these things are really insane for a freaking fishing lure. If I had a desk I would buy one of those little display stands. But I don't so I am going to fish them and be really cranky when a pickerel bites one off. Also found a guy on ebay who would make be some MWF jigheads with #4 hooks. Every Time I have gotten them with #4's I look at them and think they are too small, but they work so well.

Thanks for the info guys. It sounds like any truck or van that I buy with a v6 should be good, but even "can tow a bit over 3000lbs" us a good benchmark when I am looking. The reservoir/bay question is still out there, but I have time to sort that out. There are a lot of small tidal rivers around that I have seen some tiny boats in, like from Jug Bay and north on the Patuxent River in MD. Owning two boats for the two applications sounds best, but lets not get ahead of ourselves And yea, learning how to launch/drive/land a boat is on the list as well, I was planning on trying to join a club next year if I can get my work schedule to a more regular place.

Caught a ~3' water snake today. Had him landed and was trying to figure out how to get the hook out when he just let go of the lure and shot off. I dragged him through like 10-15' of water and lifted him up like 3-4' and he held throughout all that. Must have really wanted that Skinny Dipper.

I have a pair of the medium heavy\fast Smallmouth Elites and I'm very fond of them, I would absolutely try to repair it.

The trick to escaping SVT with any money left is to only buy what you can carry in your hands. Once you grab a basket it's all over. I once took about a three hour detour coming home from Philly to stop by there and it was absolutely worth it. Coming from somewhere with a very heavy salt water focus I had never actually seen a real bass fishing store before. I lost consciousness and woke up hours later my car, covered in rubber worms and crankbaits.

In some of my reading of old threads here someone talked about using a 5" senko with a pegged 1/4oz weight as his high wind bait. The idea being that it gets to the bottom and keep enough bow out of your line to let you feel a hit. When faced with heavy wind I usualy just switch to a spinnerbait, but I mean to give a weighted senko a try next time.

Hi, I have been fishing from the bank and out of a kayak for three or four years now and I am getting the itch it get a boat. I didn't grow up around them and don't really know anyone with one so I am flying blind here. I have been reading this forum for the past year and am slowly gathering bits of info, but there is still a ton of stuff I don't know and honestly I don't even begin to know where to start looking. Right now my plan for boat buying is as follows; Step 1: buy tow vehicle Step 2: find a indoor spot to store it Step 3: buy a boat. But to even get moving on step 1, I need to have an idea of how much weight I will need to tow, so I need to at least narrow my searching down to a general size/style. Here are my thoughts on what I want out of my first boat and some of the conditions I will be working with; I will mainly be fishing alone, but would like to be able to take one to two other people out in it with me, assume we are all around 150-200lbs. Most of my fishing will be done in electric-only reservoirs. However, I live right by the Chesapeake bay and would like a boat that I can at least throw a small gas motor on and fish the many tidal rivers that feed the bay, if not the bay itself. Most of the tidal spots I am thinking of are pretty shallow and marshy and any open water fishing would be working docks or close to shore cover going for white perch. I don't have a lot of interest in fishing the bay proper for stripers. My wife grew up around boat people, so while her interest in fishing is minimal, she is very into the idea of cruising around, so something where I can mount a bimini top would be nice, but not an absolute need. If I was more into tidal fishing I would be looking at skiffs, but I think that I will mostly be fishing alone in reservoirs or lakes. I am thinking of starting with a small aluminum jon boat for reasons of cost and convenience. My wife is a pretty skilled metal worker and has a shop we could roll a boat into, so the idea of buying a basic to mid-range jon and upgrading it ourselves seems like a fun project for us. The issue I am having is trying to decide what length/width/hull shape to start looking at. I have found a huge range of opinions over the net as to what I should be looking for in terms of a nice middle ground of something that will be stable enough for local conditions but still light enough to use a trolling motor as my main propulsion most of the time. Thanks for any imput or suggestions.

I have been buying my tungsten from Omfishingsinkers.com for maybe a year now. Their prices are the best I have found, but the shipping times can be a little long. I was a little worried about the quality at first, but spent an evening checking them with a qtip and didn't find a single rough spot. They offer free shipping at $40, so I order up to that price and if they suddenly dissapear then I am not out too much money.

Over a day of fishing I put all my ripped and damaged plastics into one of the cargo pockets on my fishing shorts. When I get back to my car I dump them all out and pick out any that are in good enough conditioned to be repaired. The rest getting dumped in a pile in the back of my hatchback. That pile sits there for weeks, uncovered in the sun, until I get around to trashing them. I have never noticed any drying out of any brand or style.

I have used the slider heads a good bit but they do not like being repeatedly thrown into dock pilings. A tiny unpegged tungsten weight lets the plastic fall a bit more slowly and doesn't deform. My favorite zman plastic to fish on a slider head are their Tubez. I use them as an inserted jighead and find that the hook will pop right through a single tube wall so you don't even have to mess with skinhooking them. It makes for a very snagless presentation.