soflabasser

Sorry to hear about that, you will catch some nice sized bass sooner or later. I know the weather has been terrible in a lot of northern states, even snowing in May which is rare. Have caught some nice bass this year, including some big ones.

Black and blue is a very popular color combination for jigs and other lures.

I mostly fish soft swimbaits with a swimbait hook. Also fish them weightless or on a jighead depending on what presentation I feel will work best in the place I am fishing in.

One thing people need to understand is that professional bass fishermen tend to fish with gear from companies that sponsor them. Their job is to convince you that what they fish with is the best gear and convince you to buy gear from their sponsored companies. Once you fully understand this you will be more educated in what fishing gear to buy and not buy so much unneeded fishing gear.

Sounds similar to some of the places I fish. You have to know where the chain pickerel are and once you find the place you usually can do well and catch a good amount of them. Another lure I have done well with for chain pickerel is jerkbaits which is another good multi species lure.

The 0-5 days are the usually the days I am fishing for big bass or days I am fishing for other species and catch bass as bycatch. I live very close to the Everglades where it is common to catch dozens of bass in a few hours of fishing so I can always fish there if my goal is to catch a lot of bass in a short amount of time. Have had days I catch +200 fish of various species (largemouth bass, peacock bass, bowfin, gar, various species of sunfish, etc) in the Everglades, all on artificial lures.

The fish you are holding in your hand is a warmouth.

Lol! Another lure that does not look like a fish but catches lots of bass is a buzzbait which as we know is one of best lures for bass.

In the past I have written down how many bass I have caught but do not do it often now. Depending on the location and time of year I fish I can catch anywhere 1-5 bass to +100 bass in a single day of fishing. Spinnerbaits seem to be a good lure for both quantity and quality.

Bass are opportunistic predators and will hit any lure that triggers them. For example spinnerbaits are one of the best bass lures ever made and look nothing like a baitfish.

Spooks and other topwaters are very good lures for bass fishing in Florida. I also noticed most of the missed strikes come from little bass. I rather catch a big bass and have caught lots of them on topwater lures.

Reminds me of the Alabama rig. Bass don't seem to mind all those thick wires. Must be a good rig since the Alabama rig is banned from many bass fishing tournaments.

Where I fish there are much more bass than chain pickerel so you usually catch a lot more bass than you catch chain pickerel. Spinnerbaits is a very good lure for them.

Most bass fishermen fish ned rigs on light monofilament line. I prefer using strait braid for ned rigs and have caught a lot of smallmouth bass and other fish this way.

Those are northern strain largemouth bass.

Good advice.

Fish at night

Most of my bass rods are between 6-7 feet long. I prefer a shorter rod when bank fishing in a place with lots of trees and other plants.

Nice catch. Those private farm ponds have low fishing pressure so they tend to have big bass that are less picky than bass from a public pond. There are probably some channel catfish and bluegills in there as well.

Nice catches. I have caught over 20 species of fish in 1 day of fishing in South Florida.

Most of the time a bigger spool on size 4000 reels allows a further cast than a size 1000-3000 reel. You can also use heavier pound test on a size 4000 reel versus a size 1000-3000 reel and still have enough line capacity to land a muskie or other big fish.

For over 20 years I have used size 4000 spinning reels for bass. These reels allow me to cast far when needed, are more than strong enough for the techniques I use, and have enough line capacity to land fish far more powerful than any black bass (snook, tarpon, redfish, etc). Most bass fishermen that use spinning reels like to use size 2000-3000 spinning reels. I have a couple size 1000 spinning reels that I use for some light tackle fishing but mostly use size 4000 spinning reels. I cast spinnerbaits, swimbaits, crankbaits, hollow belly frogs and other lures on my size 4000 spinning reels. Have caught lots of nice bass that way.

Zoom makes very good soft plastics such as the horny toad, super fluke, trickworm, etc.

Sounds like you had a good day of fishing. I have been very fortunate and had many days where the fish where biting the whole time I was fishing. Some of those days I caught +100 fish, all on lures.

Welcome to the forum.