Airman4754

Green Pumpkin

6th Sense. I use the heavy rattle when it's warm and light rattle when it gets colder.

Grande Mutant, Rage Anaconda, Rage Lizard, Brush Hog, 8" Kicker Fish lizard.

Kickerfish Hightail and it's not even close. They are all I use. Ridiculously productive worm.

I also use the Big Hammer ringed swimbait. I only use the Bull Gull color to fish for Spots in the fall. Kokanee turn that red and black color when they spawn and they run up the river arms and Spots go after them like crazy. It's a hatch match that no one really has, but that bait has been extremely successful and durable. They are at a good price point too and come in a lot of colors.

I like the Cane Thumpers. I don't think I have had any last more than three fish, but at $3 a bag I can live with that. I also use them for swim jig trailers. Big Bite would be what I consider the "generic" to the $7 a bag companies and they have never let me down yet.

6th Sense lipless in one of the craw colors, they have a bunch. I had a number of 100 plus smallie days this summer with it. 99% of the time they were all 11" little turds, but boy there were a lot of them. I fished a tourney on that lake last summer, caught 124 fish on that same lure, weighed in with 5.34lbs and finished Top 5 lol.

Peg, tungsten, skirt, craw. They are in there, go down after them.

Oregon bad, California good.

I used to spend $7 a pack for GY's, then I switched to Big Bite's 25 pack for $6. I noticed zero difference in fish numbers or size.

20lb Power Pro, 10lb P-Line flouro. It does the job.

Spot on.

I've never seen a smallie with a defined gut before. That is awesome! Great fish!

I used to have a sled for a long time. On step I could run it in about 6" of water. Having said all that growing up in rivers, you would have to run an absolutely absurd number of boats on a river to compare with what a solid five days of rain does to the banks. Think about this in terms of common sense. You run by in your boat and a few 2' waves hit the shore. If you're in current it's even less and if you're in rapids it's zero. Now compare that to 300-500cfm on every inch of that bank, moving at a faster speed than normal 24/7. Boats aren't the problem. 30+ years of rain and high water is why your river is different. Pour a bunch of spices on a cutting board, now splash some water on it. Now just stick it under the faucet. See the complete and obvious difference?

Peg 1/2 to 3/4 of an ounce, rig a Brush Hog or craw type. Make your cast, let it sink to the bottom. Hop/drag it for three to five feet or however far you can get before it mucks up. Then reel it in, cast about five feet shorter than you did before. It's like long range punching in a way. I have to deal with that a ton in the summer.

Rick Clunn to pick his brain because there is no one better at finding fish when the conditions and electronics aren't in everyone's favor. KVD just because I'd like to huck spinnerbaits at his pace for a day.

I've heard Hackney speak out against it to, but he was pretty diplomatic about it and stated a couple times that because there are no rules against it you can't fault anyone for doing it. Rick Clunn had the best take on it. Regardless of how good a fisherman you are, the guy with the card is going to beat you most the time. If a cove has 30 docks the average guy has to fish every dock to find fish. The guy with the card zooms in, fishes the two that hold fish and is out of there. I love KVD and I'm a spinnerbait disciple because of him, but if you're not on the cutting edge you get left behind.

The Hook 7x does operate with the same quickness as my HDS-8, so if the previous model was slow they did fix that. It jumps like a frog on a dynamite pond when you press a button.

My best day ever was last year. The area I live in now is probably the best trout fishing area in the world and that's not an exaggeration. There is one reservoir close to here and I was told that it sucks for fishing in general and doesn't have much of anything in it. So last year I took my birthday off (late March) grabbed my spinnerbait rod and decided to just give it a shot from the bank. 1st cast, 6 pounder. I caught an army of fish over 4lbs that day. My best five were just under 30lbs. That's the best day I've ever had and will probably ever have in this state. 1 rod, 1 lure, no boat. It kind of makes me laugh that I spend so much time in my boat and have a specific setup for everything and my best day was with none of it.

KVD and all the top pros today do their homework along with fishing with local guides, getting GPS waypoint cards from fans and locals, and pre-fishing as much as possible. That's why the average Joe and most pros can't touch them.

For my poppers I just turn the legs up and trim them even with the top of the head. For those the less you have for them to aim at that isn't the main body the better. For walkers I trim one leg a half inch down. It makes them walk so much easier.

Plano 3700

KVD chunk on footballs and Paca Craw chunk on flippin/casting. If visibility is low I'll use a Gambler Mega Craw.

Punching. It's a good one for it. Peg, tungsten, skirt, Devil Spear. I'm guessing they'd be OK for a Shakey Head too.

Let me just preface this by saying I will own a couple of these and will fish them. I think they are an unnecessary bait. You have hollow body frogs, Horny Toads, Spooks, rats, buzz baits, etc. Where is this bait going to be fished primarily? In the junk. A bass isn't going to know if that's a bluegill or a frog it's tracking and sucking down once it hits that hole in the vegetation. It's just like that bass has no idea what it's eating when I send a 1oz weight with a skirt and Pitt Boss down at it at a high rate of speed when punching. This is paying $13 for an $8 bait, but I'm absolutely going to pay it lol.