IndianaFinesse

If the plastic has salt, and most do, I take the hooks out at the end of every day. Salt corrodes the hook and promotes rust.

Horny Toads are my favorite.

Thanks, it makes me feel a lot more comfortable dropping the money on the rod knowing you use it for almost the exact same things I plan to.

Dang, man you stole all my pointers and my Kelly J's! I ordered a bunch of pointers, a couple Kelly's, and half a dozen cranks but they oversold product and I only ended up getting my cranks. Couldn't pass up on $6 lucky craft, that's the price of bandits and often less than strike king's.

Thanks for the tip, I haven't tried the big EZ yet. If I'm on a good frogging bite I always carry three rods rigged up, one with a hollow belly (usually a junior pad crasher), one with a horny toad on a 4/0 ewg hook, and if I'm not worried about cost I will also have a 3.8 keitech fat impact on a 3/0 or 4/0 hook. Cool thing about using the swim bait as a toad is that it can be used subsurface if a bass misses it or rolls on it, and it will often come back. The toad and swim bait get the more open expanses of weeds/junk that don't have much for specific targets, especially when I'm still in search mode. Caught one that weighed just over six even on the horny toad a few weeks back, up in Michigan.

Man, that looks like some prime frogging water! I'm envious, they've been spraying weeds around here so much that I haven't seen any surface vegetation (even algae) since I was up in Michigan. And I love a good frog bite on mats or pads...

Did you hook that bass in the stomach? If not, I'm guessing it had the crap scared right out of him.

For me, getting skunked for three months would mean not catching anything on about 60 or 70 consecutive trips. As much as I would like to say that I'd take the pb, it would be more fun to keep on catching instead. Now if I had a monster for a pb like WRB, that would be a different story.

Either a rage menace or a keitech fat 3.3"-3.8".

If it's the angler I think you're talking about, this guy would fish a buzzbait on the bottom like a jig, just to prove you wrong if you said it wouldn't work. And he would probably catch fish doing it.

If I got the 7'2" mh as apposed to the 6'10", would the extra tip help for throwing the lighter baits? I've read that the zodias tends to run stiffer than rated, and the 3/8-1 ounce lure range reflects that. Oh, and if it matters, it will be paired with a curado 70 spooled with 30 pound braid.

No pics of it, but i managed to land a 44.5 inch flathead on a medium-lite rod and an eight pound leader a couple weeks back. Caught her on a 1/8 ounce shaky head with a trick worm, fishing slightly offshore on a brushpile in 12 feet of water. Took me into the brush at first, bit somehow untangled itself and went out into open water. Followed her on the trolling motor, until the cat finally got tired about fifteen minutes later. My scale only goes to 25 pounds, but we estimated the 44.5 inch flathead to be in the 45 pound range.

I think that was a sturgeon feeding on something.

I think you guys know my position on this...

You forgot one more thing. You should never, under any circumstances, ask about weather bass care about line visibility or not. Selective harvest versus strict c&r is a dangerous topic to.

Well, what happened is I tried to order a dobyns champion, but they told me that the discount can not be used on refurbished/trade ins. In addition to that, they were going to charge me 25$ per rod for shipping, as apposed to free over $75. I was going to get the champion for 108$, but now it would cost me $175. Only 5$ less than the new condition trade in, without the discount. And I can't spend that much money right now. It actually works out to be cheaper to not use the discount on the fury line, because of the shipping costs. I still plan on getting the 735c fury for my frogging/flipping rod, without using the so-called discount. And yes, I checked to make sure that shimano doesn't do the same thing and that it's a legit 40% off.

I am looking at the Shimano zodias rods, specifically one for bottom contact baits. Mostly little 3/16-5/16 ounce jigs, light Texas rigs in the 1/8-1/4 ounce range, and occasionally jigs weighing up to 3/8 ounce. As such, sensitivity is very important. So for the people that own a zodias or three, what is the sensitivity like? How does it compare to other rods? Would you suggest the 6'10" or 7'2" medium, or the 6'10" mh or 7'2" mh, for the baits mentioned above?

When I tried to order the champion from dobyns, they told me that the discount does not apply to reconditioned/trade ins and you have to pay a shipping price of 25$ per rod, instead of getting their standard free shipping over 75$. So instead of getting the champion for 108$, I would have to pay 175$. Which is only 5$ less than a new condition trade in without the discount, a bum deal if you ask me. And I would actually save money on the Fury's by not using the discount. I still plan on getting a 735c fury for my frogging rod (without using the so-called discount), but I will be looking elsewhere for the bottom contact rod.

The only thing falling around here is my sweat. I'm a fan of buzzbaits in early/mid fall if the water's flat, and if there's some wind I'm going to be chucking cranks till my arms fall off. Jerkbaits are unbeatable later in the fall if you have good water clarity.

You can fish for pike flipping jigs, right?

Nothing like catching them on frogs in the slop, good luck in the national championship!

That is creepy... The technology is already in place for one of the events fortold in the books of Revelation, Daniel and Isaiah.

For me, it is not an if it's a when will I do something dumb and break the rod.

Go someplace where you know that you're going to catch a ton of bass. Helps me shake off just about anything.

The hooks on my pop x also broke, after catching about 300-400 bass, and what I did was replace them with #6 gamakatsu magic eye treble hooks. Didn't want to have to bother with the feather, they always came off after ~150 fish anyways. It didn't seem to affect the catch rate at all. Just use a pair of small needle nose pliers to get the hooks on, it is a little bit tricky with the tiny split rings, but it still only took about five minutes.