king fisher

I fished a flat with a drop off last June for two days. The first day they crushed chartreuse square bills on the flat in the morning and deep diving chartreuse cranks on the drop off in the afternoon. The next day started out the same, but slowed to a stop by noon. I tried a Chartreuse spinnerbait and got a couple more but that bite quite too. I switched to worms and jigs thinking that something slow would be the answered. After no success slowing down, I tried a shad crankbait and got two 5 pounders on the first cast. Switched to a white spinnerbait and got 5 more, switched back to the shad crank and caught fish until dark. I don't think the bass had to have shad colored lures. I am positive they were tired of chartreuse. They probably would have hit anything that didn't have Chartreuse. I should have switched to another color just to see if they would hit it too, but was having to much fun and didn't want to mess up a good thing. Sometimes I don't think it is important to find the right color, just don't use the wrong one.

buzzbait

Every once in a while I like to grab a shovel, dig some worms, break out a spinning rod, hook, bobber, and frying pan. Keep what ever I catch and cook a shore lunch. I'm not ever going to get rid of the bait monkey, but nothing wrong with making fishing simple, and relaxing.

I fish heavy line in two situations. When I'm flipping pitching heavy cover and when I don't want to loose lures. I fish a lake where there are many old commercial nets that snag everything. Only way to keep from loosing lots of money is to use $40 pound braid and pull until something gives. In open water with few snags, I use 12# and under.

spinnerbaits as wind chimes in trees.

I have an echomap plus on my Hobie. I can't imagine fishing without it. Mine has a six inch screen and does not have side view. My next one will have a larger screen, not sure about side view.

I fish dawn to dusk, I never know what time of day the best fishing will be, but I do know my line will be in the water when it happens. Overall I prefer mornings.

I catch more fish with inexpensive rods I take the money I save not buying expensive equipment and buy my wife a gift. When my wife is happy I I am able to spend more time fishing which means I catch more fish.

I have had an excellent year so far. I landed two over 10 pounds, and many between 5 and 9 pounds. My biggest success was finding a couple predictable patterns, where I could catch multiple fish, instead of simply catching fish at random. I haven't been bass fishing since June due to a bad right shoulder. I get my second surgery tomorrow, and hope to recover in time to catch another DD before the year is over.

GPS is not off, your charts are off. Not much you can do other than try another chart. If you fish the place often, you will soon have waypoints and trails marked to use as navigation points as well as fishing holes. Some of my best tuna fishing spots are in the middle of an island according to the chart. I have guests ask me all the time where we are at, and they get a surprised look on their face when I show them we are a mile on land according to the screen. You can try an updated version of the chart software, but you may simply have to get used to driving your boat on land. Be careful around islands. It can get confusing when the chart shows you are on the East side of an Island when really you are on the West side. I know a guy that drove straight in to an island one night making that mistake. He had a waypoint marked where he fished, and thought he could drive straight to it. Island only came out of the water a few feet. He didn't' see it, and the chart showed him on the other side. If you are careful, and remember your chart is off you get used to after awhile.

I stand if I am anchored, or slowly drifting a large area, where constant boat control is not needed. Much of the time I am sitting down, because I am constantly using the pedals, and ruder to change position. Small fish I land standing, big fish I sit down. If I am fishing in trees, I am sitting. I want to be able to start backing up as soon as I hook a big fish in timber. Otherwise the bass will pull me in to the trees, and get wrapped on a limb. I lost a DD that way once, and am not going to let it happen again. I don't use a net, I prefer to play the fish until it is easy to land by hand.

Does any one use double blade buzz baits? Where, when, why instead of single blade? How well do they cast compared to single? What make, model ,and size? Thanks.

BG is bulletproof. If you plan on using the reel in saltwater get the BG. The BG is as good other saltwater spinning reels that cost twice as much. If you are looking for freshwater only, then there are lighter options in the price range.

hoard them.

Instead of trying to get chartreuse worms to work, I would suggest trying dark colored spinnerbaits. You may be surprised.

Any shade of purple.

Bass fishing south of the boarder is good all year. My favorite lake's surface temperature peaks around 80 degrees in late Sept. and gets down to 66 degrees in early Jan. Most of the time it is between 70 and 80. July is my favorite month because the water is low concentrating the fish. August thru October is the rainy season, and the bass are in flooded shallow cover. Buzz baits and frogs all day. Problem is the bass are spread out, only catch one here and there. No bad time to fish here.

Thanks, QED and Tom, your replies have given me hope. I have always been able to reel with either hand, but have never casted with my left. I do think I might be able to get the hang of casting spinning with my left hand. Baitcaster will be tough, fly casting is going to be a disaster, and I am sure I will have to become a spectator only when it comes to big game fishing. At least it will be a good excuse for me to keep from having help land big tuna.

Has any one ever had to learn to cast with their non dominate hand? If so, How long did it take to get comfortable and reasonably accurate? Any tricks or advice that helped speed the process?

If you are sure you did not change anything ,you may be in big trouble. You could have a boat gremlin on board. The only way to find out for sure is to pay a mechanic way to much money to come trouble shoot the trolling motor. If it doesn't run backward when the mechanic checks it out and you have to pay him for doing nothing more than tell you it is working fine, then you definitely have a boat gremlin issue. Not much you can do. Gremlins are scared of mechanics. They hide whenever one comes around. As soon as the mechanic leaves the gremlin comes back and the problem returns. The only thing you can do is park your boat next to a more expensive boat with newer complex systems and hope the gremlin jumps ship. If you get really desperate you can pass him on to a friend with a boat. While that solution is perfectly legal in all 50 states it is highly unethical and can end up costing you a friend for life. Hopefully you do not have a boat gremlin and someone on this forum can provide the solution to your problem.

Eastern WA is going through the worst drought in recorded history. Last winters snow pack in the mountains was above average, so if you are a fisherman fishing any of the Columbia river drainage system, the water levels are almost normal. Same with the farms in the Columbia River Basin, that irrigate their crops from the Columbia Reservoirs. No effect from the drought. If you fish further east on natural lakes and rivers not fed by the Cascade mountains you will see the effect of the drought. There are small lakes south of Spokane that have completely dried up for the first time any one can remember. Dry land crops were a complete failure, and no one can plant winter wheat until rain comes because their is zero moisture in the ground for the seed to sprout. One bad year does not make a dust bowl. Hopefully next spring everyone will be complaining about to much water. Here in Nayarit Mexico we had the worst drought in many years. The fishing at my favorite lake was unbelievably good because of the low water, but the local commercial fisherman and I were afraid of a big die off, and bad times to come, if the drought continued. Fortunately the rainy season came early and the region is having the most rain any one can remember. It all worked out well. Low water made the fishing great, and the rains came in time to save the fishery. Hopefully the Western US will have similar luck.

I don't know if you consider Academy sports H2O baits knock offs, but I believe their square bills catch fish as well or better than many high dollar square bills.

Diawa Ardito travel rods. I own three, one medium, and two medium heavy. I have landed two bass over 10 pounds cranking with the medium so far this year. I have caught many bass, and numerous other species both fresh and saltwater with all three. Highly recommend them. I use Diawa coastal, and Tatula CT reels on mine, but if you want to put a Shimano reel on, I'm sure it will work fine. Just don't stand near me during a lightning storm if you do.

If the crankbaits are working, but you aren't trolling can be very effective. I know many bass fisherman think trolling is a sin, but it does work great with crankbaits. Another advantage is you can get about 1/3 more depth out of a crankbait trolling it than you can on even the longest cast.

I didn't even know it happened. I was guiding a moose hunter on the Alaska Peninsula. We were camped up a valley on the boarder of Katmai Park. On the 12 the hunter shot his moose. I was able to pack the meat cape and antlers back to the camp that same day. The next day I flew the first load of meet back to main camp early in the morning. When I landed at the main camp, the outfitters wife came out of the cabin and told me what had happened and that there was a no fly restriction for the whole state. I didn't want the bears to get the meat, so I made two more flights, for meat, and the outfitter flew the hunter and his gear back to main camp. It was a few days before we could fly and pick up the other 3 camps that were out. By then we had heard stories of float plane pilots getting forced to land immediately by military aircraft, even in the middle of nowhere. I'm sure glad that didn't happen to me. I only had a hand held radio, and always flew with it off to save the batteries. Not hearing a response over the radio, I'm sure they would have flown very close to me to force me to respond. By the time I got the radio turned on I might have had to change my shorts. All the clients had to stay where they were until the no fly ban was lifted couple days later. They allowed the air taxis to pick up all the remote clients and fly them to King Salmon, but they still weren't allowing jets to fly, so everyone got stuck in the town for another couple days. The hotels were full, and the bar was almost out of beer by the time they were able to fly to Anchorage. I was glad to be still living in a tent away from it all. I didn't see the pictures until a couple months later, when I got out of the bush, and back to town. That is when reality really hit home to me, when I actually saw what happened, seeing the destruction was way different than hearing about it on the radio. Very sad day for all.