BassFishingMachine

Would you consider 4/0 too big then also?

I'd recommend casting spinnerbaits towards the sides of cover and into the coves, flipping/pitching beavers, jigs or any other pegged creaturebait into the brush. Remember to use dark colors such as black/blue, black, black/red etc. If the water is just a little stained and nothing serious I'd use white/chart for spinnerbait, but if its real bad I'd use all chart on the spinnerbait or black. And about the confidence thing, just use the creature/spinnerbait that your confident in, good luck .

I like Yum crawfish spray on my jigs, not meaning to sound cocky by this, but if it dissolves why can I still smell it on the bait awhile after I sprayed it on?

Lol the walking worm.. what a peice of crap hahah. People actually buy that thing?

Ok, I have fished with "Walk The Dog Baits" such as zara spooks and LC Sammy and never really had much luck with them. So I have a couple questions regarding fishing this bait. First, how do you fish them, I believe I have the "walking" method down, meaning I can make the bait walk without a problem but do you give it a pause here and there or do you just keep it walking steadily with no pause? And secondly, when do you choose a walk the dog bait over another type of topwater such as a pop-r or buzzbait etc.

I peg it with a bullet weight and flip/pitch it into stickpiles and through weeds, works great for me this way. I've tryed it weightless and didn't have much luck, if im going to use a creature weightless its going to either be a yum wooly hawgtail or a beaver.

So what hook size are you guys using with size 4.20 Sweet Beavers? 4/0?

Rigged it weedless with the hook point coming out the top of the plastic and then slightly burried into the plastic. I cast directly in alot of stick piles and this makes it a bit more "stick proof".

Ok heres the story, I was fishing today using a 1/8 oz bullet weight which has soft plastic filled in the middle of the weight, thus making you be able to peg it using the "needle type" threading tool that the weights come with (I believe their made by Gambler labeled as the Florida Rig or w/e). For the hook I used Gamakatsu Offset EWG Worm Hook size 3/0, the sweet beaver was 4.20inch. Anyway I missed two good hits, the first hit immediately after I felt the quick tap I set the hook, maybe I should have let the fish had it longer, the 2nd hit I felt the fish with the bait in his mouth for a good 4secs so Im sure he had it in there long enough, came back on a good hook set and the fish made a jump and shook it. My question is, what do you think caused me to lose these fish? Do you think its due to the bullet weight being pegged so the soft plastic cannot slide up the line thus giving me a better hook up? Or do you think I should have let the fish hold the bait even longer? Any ideas on what caused the misses? Should I have used a 4/0?

Jigs and all softplastics are definetly worth the time of learning, once you catch fish and get confidence with the bait trust me...patience won't be an issue. IMHO more quality fish are caught using finesse style techniques rather then power fishing, I am not saying big fish won't hit a spinnerbait or lipless crank etc, but I do belive a big fish, if given the option of a fast moving bait or slow moving bait, would take the slow moving bait majority of the time, they just seem like lazy fish to me when they get bigger.

Do you think you can cast a big jitterbug? Amazing topwater if you didn't already know .

Jigs: Booyah Baby Boo 3/16 - 5/16ounce (Black/blue or Watermelonred depending on water clarity) Softbaits: 5inch GYCB Kut-tail, stickbait aka senko/knock offs, 4inch Powerworm, Yum Woolyhawgtail, Zoom Baby Brushhog. Toad: Stanley Ribbit - Standard size Jig Trailers: Yum Chunks, Ragetail Chunks, Paca Chunks, Zoom Super Chunks, Cut in half Chigger craws, and I just recently used GYCB Flappin Hogs as trailers.. worked great. Spinnerbait: Booyah Tandem Blade 1/4 oz chart/white or white. Cranks: I am garbage with any fat bodied cranks, lipless cranks work great for me though, I like LC Lv-0, Rapala Lipless Crank and Bill Lewis Rat-L-Traps. Topwater: Jitterbugs, Booyah Buzzbait 1/4 oz, Heddon Torpedo, Xcalibur Pop-r. Hollow Frogs: Original Scumfrog Hard/Soft Jerkbaits: (Hard: Rapala Huskyjerk, Yozuri Crystal Minnow, Xraps, LC Slender Point) (Soft: Zoom Super Fluke, Powerbait Power minnow) Tubes: 4inch Berkley Powertube Grub: GYCB Hula Grub, Fat Ika (If you consider that a grub :-?), Berkley Powergrub 4inch

Thanks alot guys 8-).

Hey, just got into fishing tubes, but the only way I know of rigging them currently is inserting a tube jighead. The hook up ratio is incredible like this but they tend to get caught up in sticks and weeds very easily. Just wanted to know is there a way of rigging a tube weedless, only way I can think of so far is a standard t-rig with a pegged bullet weight in the front. Also a picture would really help if possible.

Hey, I am terrible with shallow crankbaits, or fat crankbaits in general :-/. Can you tell me how you fished it, would love to try learning these baits as I have a few.

What type of weeds is it? Can you bring a spinnerbait through it fairly well? If so I'd try a spinnerbait or a buzzbait. Should imitate the baitfish pretty well .

What he said .

Great bait, particularly like it because its something the fish haven't seen, and won't see for along time.. if that. I rig it with a size 4/0 EWG Gamakatsu, backwards, and fish it pretty much exactly like you would a senko. Only difference is I tend to hop it a little more here and there then I would a senko, I do this just to get them really interested or make the bait stick out ot the fish. So for example pretty much every cast when the bait initially hits the water I let it fall, pause for a few secs, then bring it back up and repeat, then while in the middle of the process I'll give it a good 3-4 hops to get the action really going, and then work it back in repeating the first step of working the bait slowly. So generally 75% of fishing it on each cast is done slow with high to short hops and 4-6sec pauses.

I highly believe scent only takes place when "bass" have the bait in their mouth, I believe the effect of the scent is to make them hold on a little longer. With that being said the action of the bait is what gets them to hit, if the action of the bait I'snt anything great your most likely not going to get many bites IMHO, so therefore the scent would have barely any effect. I don't know if you bought the food source baits before, but they are stiff (or atleast the ones I bought), so the action is pretty crappy. I would choose a nonscented soft plastic with better action over a scented low action bait. But why use unscented baits with high action when you have scented baits with high action like Yum, or Berkley Powerbait, then again you can just scent your own baits. Basiclly what im saying is action is alot more important IMO then scent. And food source baits from what I have found have low quality action.

What lb test tippet are you using as leader?

I missed another 1 today... about a 13incher Im guessing.. on the bumble bee popper.

Does the leech have a weighted head? If it comes in both weighed and non-weighted, which of the 2 you recommend?

I am determined to catch a quality bass on a fly rod (with a fly), so far I have caught a dink about 8-10inches on a wooly bugger, and a 1lber (which I would have been happy with), but I put a killie on the fly so it was sorta cheating IMO. Well I really don't have any flies designed for bass, so I went out to sports authority, and looked in there dispicably pathetic fly selection, I went there to buy powerbait, but the sobs only had the crap with the sparkles, that place doesn't have crap! Anyway, I picked up a fly popper, in Bumble Bee pattern, cause that was all they had , and there was 1 left. I then headed to Rahway Pond, and fished the crap out of the popper the best I could, hooked into a sunfish, and had a few other sunnies hit me, then just as I was going to leave, I had a nice blow up, set the hook, and it was a chunky fish, he jumped out of the water 2 times, by the look I got at him I'm guessing 2 - 2 1/2lbs. Well on the 2nd jump he spit the fly :'( > . I am going to see if I can pick up some better flies for bass at Dicks, and give catching a quality bass on the fly another shot. I'll get one eventually! Just makes me mad I was so close to completing what I was determined to do.. By the way, any recommendations on bass flies? I am clueless when it comes to choosing flies, all I know is the large fly poppers are intended for bass.

Watch Doug Hannon's video on fishing jigs, you'll see what he says about fishing jigs on spinning gear http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OU8lvUQrvws.

Soft plastic frogs are good for small weed patches here and there with open water spots, I would not use them for fishing the thick muck where its just "green everywhere" to a point where you can't see the water. They tend to pick up some weeds for me. If your fishing the thickest of slop I highly recommend a hollow body frog instead, try a Original Scumfrog.