Airman4754

I use an NRX 894 as a do-all jig rod and I like it. I had an 893, but it felt under powered dragging 3/4oz footballs and trying to drag fish out of cover. If you're just pitching jigs or topping out at 1/2oz then the 893 is awesome. I have a Power Tackle football jig special that I C-rig with, but it would be a very good all around jig rod also. With an $800 budget you can get just about anything you want.

Fish Fishburn was the only show I ever really enjoyed. I screw around a lot when I fish so that always appealed to me.

Mag cranking is one of the few techniques where I think a dedicated setup is a must and I say that for fatigue reasons. An XD10 will ruin your day in a hurry if you don't have a setup to really tame it a little. For everything not big bait related a 7' MH/F will do the job. I run a 13 Crankenstein rod, Lew's Super Duty 5:4.1 reel, and 8lb CXX line for the true deep divers and really like it.

I have the Champion 805 flip/punch that I double as a rat/MS Slammer rod. You could throw a 1oz C-rig on it with ease.

The fat impact or the ten or so copies of it all work. The Robo EZ Shad works well for a bigger profile. I use a big salt water grub on mine, but wouldn't recommended that if you want to catch numbers.

Agreed. On a serious note there are spots that will have fish on them year round. You have to find them.

Cabela's is failing and is working on being bought out by BPS. Gander Mountain is failing. Sportsman's Warehouse failed, was bought by a Canadian company and closed a bunch of locations. Maybe if everything they sold wasn't 20% more than online dealers they would survive.

We got this little chunker on Guntersville today in the grass on a drop shot. Pretty slow day overall though.

Spinnerbaits on points or rocky banks along with hard structure like stumps and man made cover; docks, piers, etc. Chatterbaits in wood. Swim jig in grass. That's the way I do it, right or wrong.

I caught this little largie on my lunch break today.

Great fish man!

Finally got the big spot I've been after in the creek near my house. Rage Space Monkey did the trick.

Custom Leech on a drop shot, if that's not working 8" Hudd. If I'm not catching anything I might as well not be catching something big.

I caught a decent little bass a couple summers ago on a 10XD that I would think was swimming away from it and got hooked. The hook went all the way through it right above the tail. I was reeling one way and it was facing the other.

What's a Garthax? I don't know. We used to have really bad seats. These, are great seats!

My dad, grandpa, and I spent most weekends in a boat for the bulk of my childhood. My grandpa changing lures every five minutes, my dad complaining about him changing lures too much, and me always just catching fish lol. They've both been gone for a long time now, but I just kept doing it. I don't really know why I fish anymore, but I do A LOT.

That's a great story. My grandpa was about as poor as humanly possible in the sticks of Arkansas as a child. He had seven siblings originally and he was the oldest boy. Only he and three sisters made it past age 14. He just always said the others "starved." I can't imagine what his childhood was like. He tried to join at age 15, was turned away and joined the CCC for a year and went to Oregon. He loved it there so much that's how our family ended up there after the war. He joined the Army Air Core at 16, was a belly gunner on a B-17. He did five combat missions and asked to be reassigned so they made him an MP. He never said one word to anyone in the family about his time as a gunner other than he was one and pictures that he showed us. He got to drive General Eisenhower around once as an MP and that was always his proudest moment. He ended his tour in India and shot a Hyena there with a Springfield. He always loved to tell that story. He was the reason why I joined the Air Force. Whenever anyone asked him what his favorite part of being in the military was he would always say; "They fed us three times a day. I'd never had that before."

No one likes Load Toads! IYAAYAS!!!

4 years active duty US Air Force, 1 year US Air Force Reserve, 11 years Air National Guard. Only 4 more years to go! DoD Civilian for 9 years now.

Oh boy, the color and weather rabbit hole. If the fish have been taking advantage of a specific bait for a period of time then matching the hatch will catch you a ton of fish very easily. Examples would be crawfish coming out of their burrows as winter is ending, the pan fish spawn, bass fry hatch, minnow schooling in the summer, trout planting, etc. That's an easy guaranteed meal for a bass and if you match what they are keying on during that period and make it look even easier you're going to catch a lot of fish. Knowing when those events are happening and what the bait looks like is experienced mixed with time on the water. On the flip side I think color means very little in situations like summer when you're grinding a 10XD through a school of fish, flipping or punching, top water, drop shotting through grass, topping grass with a lipless, etc. Reaction is reaction. If someone throws something at you then you will try to catch or repel it regardless of what color it is. Weather has a definite effect on the masses, meaning the normal 2lb and under fish get less active. True predator fish 4lb and above fit into the "Where does a 500lb gorilla sleep?" category.

Hell, it might even be farther than that.

I've already seen a couple fish here that would push double digits in ponds no more than an acre. We will see how Spring goes, but I haven't caught anything over two pounds in any of them. Ponds can be amazing fishing or some of the worst there is. I can't ever remember much of a grey area.

Thinl of it like riding a bicycle from a stop. In first gear the sprocket is much bigger and much easier to turn because it doesn't turn very much. Now think about that bike in tenth gear. It's way harder to get going because the sprocket is much smaller and turns way more.

A 5 ratio for magnum cranks for fatigue reasons. Anything else is preference.

I have 15 or so Lew's and haven't ever had the slightest problem with them. I haven't had the slightest problem with any real I have ever spent more than $150 on new or used and that's A LOT of reels.