king fisher

Out of all those places which one is your favorite place to throw a spinnerbait?

Congratulations awesome bass. Where were you fishing? Please include exact Latitude and Longitude. I sure hope it wasn't at Lake Menderchuck, because I can't locate that lake no matter how many hours I spend on Google Earth.

1-My first lake is about 1.5 miles long and .5 miles wide. It is a 3-4 hour drive from my house. It is a reservoir created by a dam, is very similar to larger reservoir only smaller. One end is shallow and from August to March is basically a flooded cow pasture with lots of grass, and small trees. The other end is 35 feet deep with rocky points, humps, and ledges. There are large trees with huge branches all throughout the deep end. The trees are visible above the surface from Mid April until Mid July when the rainy season begins. Visibility is 6 inches during the peak of rainy season, and about 2 feet during the lowest water. During much of the high season I fish surface lures especially buzz baits. My favorite time to fish this lake is during the low water season. I catch the bass suspended in the trees, or on off shore structure. The in-between water levels are the most difficult, and many times the bass are located on submerged barbed wire fences leading from shore to deeper water. The Bait Monkey loves the time of year the bass on on the fences, but it is my least favorite time of year. When I first started fishing this lake, I hooked a 10 pound bass almost every time I fished the lake. This past year I only landed one bass over 10 pound's, but did manage a bass over 7 pounds each time I fished. Many days I only get a few bites, but it is my favorite lake, because the bites are often big bass. Sport fishing pressure is very light, but commercial netting is heavy. 2.- My next lake is only a 2 hour drive from my house. It is about 3 miles by 3 miles, and is a shallow bowl. I have found no structure, or irregularities on this natural lake. The deepest part is in the very middle and is about 15 feet deep. There is abundant vegetation, and flooded willow trees. The lake level and clarity does not seem to change at all from dry to rainy season. Visibility is about one foot. There is no river going in or out. The willow trees are always flooded, so I don't know when they grow, or how many years since they have been out of the water. I have been told the lake is an old volcano crater. I have yet to catch a big bass here, but I do know that the lake has bass up to 15 pounds. There is virtually no sport fishing pressure and commercial fishing is limited. I have had limited success on catching bass here, but keep going back because it is close, and I hope to one day find a pattern. So far the best bait by far has been T rigged worms. 3- My next lake is also 2 hours away, and is a classic high land reservoir. It is about 4 miles long, and 3 miles wide with many long fingers going into the numerous mountain valleys. During the rainy season it is flooded, and low visibility, and drops over 30 feet during the driest time of year. Visibility ranges from 6 inches to 3 feet depending on time of year. There is some sport fishing, and a small amount of commercial netting. My biggest bass so far has been 7 pounds, and I do have to bring a spinning rod and use a drop shot to catch fish on slow days. The water in this lake is colder than the other lakes I fish, and I have heard that the bass top out at 9 pounds. 4- My next lake is 4.5 hours away, and is becoming my favorite lake. It is the largest lake I fish, and the only one that I can catch numbers and good size bass. It is a classic high land reservoir with many bays, and feeder creeks. During the rainy season the water is dirty, and the bass are far back in the bays. During the dry season main lake points are productive as well as other offshore structure. The visibility in this lake is excellent with 4-6 foot vis. most of the year. The water level fluctuates more than 30 feet, and I prefer the low water time of year. It also has the most abundant forage in any of the lakes I fish. Besides the normal tilapia that are in most Mexican lakes, there is an abundance of Crayfish. I was only able to fish this lake two weekends this year, but landed two over 10 pounds, and caught a one day 5 fish 42 pound bag. This lake has great potential, and I hope to be able to fish it more next year. 5- I also fish Lake Chapala that is 5 hours away. Chapala has a large population of mid size bass. It is a shallow lake with year round low visibility. There are guides on the lake, but still considering its 50 mile long size very little sport fishing pressure. The abandoned nets make it impossible to fish treble hooked lures, but good number of bass are common. The water gets rough when the wind blows, and I flipped my kayak there a few years ago trying to get a lure unsnagged from a net in high winds. I only fished there one day last year, and doubt I will be back this year. My biggest bass there is 8.3 pounds. 6- I have found two more off the radar lakes I hope to try in 2024. Both have rumor's of bass in the teens. Both are 4 hours away, but if the rumors are true, I might find my new favorite bass lake this next year.

I like the video, but am disappointed he offered zero solutions to the problem. There probably is no solution to the problem, but if you are going to make a video pointing out how bad something is, than I would expect some kind of suggestion on how to fix the problem. As far as making a living as a professional fisherman goes, it is becoming obvious to me that having a video channel on the internet is going to be a necessity. If I was trying to market a lure, I wouldn't care who won a tournament if I could get my lure on a Video that had thousands of views. The most successful pros will combine videos with competition, and therefore get the most money from sponsors. I am glad he didn't end the video with a buy 6th. Sense products promotion.

When I was a kid, I tried fishing a T rigged plastic worm with zero success. I new that plastic worms were the number one bass lure, and assumed the reason I wasn't catching bass with them was the lack of angling skill. After all every article I read about worm fishing stressed the difficulty in detecting strikes. All the articles stated over and over, that until you developed your feel to a ninja level you would get bit and not know it. I finally gave up on the worms thinking I just could not develop the necessary skill. As my experience as an anger grew over time, I fished many different species and techniques that require the ability to detect bites, and determine bottom or current changes from actual bites. Drift fishing from shore for salmon and steelhead is one technique that requires skill in detecting bites because of strong current and a weight bouncing along a rocky bottom, making it easy to mistake a rock for a salmon. I had zero difficulty from day one determining the bite of a salmon from the feel of a sinker bouncing off of rocks. The reason is because I hadn't read hundreds of articles telling me how difficult it would be to detect bites. There were many other examples over my lifetime of fishing that I should have made me realize I had the skill, but didn't know it. Fishing jigs for walleye, no problem, subtle bites on live bait in saltwater, no problem, even nymph fishing for trout, without a strike indicator, difficult but still no problem. Thirty some years went by, I was fortunate enough to get back in to bass fishing. I still thought I lacked the skill to fish soft plastics on the bottom, so I continued to fish spinnerbaits, crankbaits, and other moving baits. Even though some of my lightest bites bass fishing have been while slow rolling spinnerbaits, I was completely convinced the T rig would never be for me. Then one day I went with a guide and he showed me how to punch mats. I had no difficulty with strike detection, but was sure it was because I was fishing heavy weights on a short braided line. After all detecting bites using lighter weights, on a longer normal cast with a soft plastic was only something very skilled bass anglers could do. One day I watched a video Glen made about learning to detect strikes. He suggested going to very shallow water and catching some baby bass to learn what the bite feels like. The reasoning being the baby bass were aggressive, and a person was sure to get many bites, therefore lots of practice. I new a place where I was sure I could get bit by small bass every cast, so when the off shore crankbait bite slowed down I decided to give it a try. After about a half hour of catching baby bass on a T rigged Senko I realized feeling the bite of a small bass was easier than detecting bites of other species and techniques I had experienced in the past. I started fishing soft plastics more and more, and found that large bass usually felt different than small bass. Instead of a tap tap, the large bass many times would have a feel difficult to describe, a simple change in weight, a mushy feeling, but I instinctively new it was a bite, not bottom. The first few times I got bit by bass larger than 5 pounds on a T rig, I would slowly reel down to make sure it was really a bite, but after landing a few large bass, my angling instincts kicked in, and now I only feel a second time for the bite if a little voice in my head tells me the bass has let go or is trying to reposition the bait. After a season of success with T Rigs, I expanded to Carolina rigs, and weightless soft plastics. Learning with each new technique, that yes they do work as well as people say they do, and I already had the skill set for detecting bites long before I gave the techniques a fair try. Now I catch about 1/4 of my bass on soft plastics. I even landed my biggest bass of the year for 2023 on a T Rigged worm, dragged through some standing timber on a long cast. A friend once told me I had so much nervosa energy running through me, that he doubted anything could possibly breath on my line without me feeling it. I always thought that to be true, for other types of fishing but could not get the bad experience of my youth fishing plastic worms for bass out of my head. Now I am positive the reason I didn't catch bass on plastic worms in my favorite fishing hole when I was a kid was because the bass didn't want the worm. It wasn't because of my equipment, ( which was sketch to say the least) or my skill level. The bass simply weren't biting worms the days I was trying to fish them, which so happened to be the days I wasn't catching them on anything else. Now I only try new techniques when the bite is on, and use my old faithful lures when it slows. If any young angler ever asked me if detecting bites of any kind is difficult I am going to tell them only if you make it difficult. Not to say I don't set the hook into objects other than the mouth of a bass. Abandoned gill nets are the worst. When I drag my worm over a net it feels exactly like the bite of a large bass, and when I set the hook, the net gives enough to feel like I am hooked in to my PB. after a second I realize what has happened and am glad no one is there to see the look on my face and witness the unhinged language that instantly comes out of my mouth. I don't know if I have the right stuff, but I do know I have the ability to adapt to new and changing conditions, with a variety of fish and locations. Besides I would rather be lucky than good any day.

I wasn't able to bass fish more than a dozen days this year, but I was able to catch some big bass. Largest bass was caught in early May and weighed in at 10.76 pounds, and was just shy of 27 inches. It was my PB for length, but not weight. I caught it on a Junebug T rigged Zoom Magnum trick worm. Later in May I caught my best bag of 5 which was 42 pounds, all but one hit the spinnerbait in the picture, and the other bass was caught on a Magnum trick worm. I caught 3 bass over 10 lbs. on three different lures. 1. Mag trick worm. 2 .Spinnerbait 3. Storm Cover Pop Other lures that caught bass over 7 lbs. 1. 6th Sense Magnum square bill. 2. Rebel Pop R. Many smaller bass were caught on a variety of crankbaits, Skinny dippers, jigs, Senkos, and Magnum Rage Bugs.

It took me 43 years to break my old PB record. It has been over 3 years since then and no new PB. I don't think I have another 40 years to wait, so I hope to catch a new PB every time I make a cast.

I have learned that fishing bass out of a canoe in Maine on many days is better than bass fishing in Mexico and that Menderchuck is not the name of a lake on Google Earth.

Fished 3 days out of PV. Landed 25 Dorado, 2 sailfish, and 2 tuna. We spent one night drifting out on the fishing grounds rather than returning to an anchorage. In the middle of the night a porpoise jumped in to the boat. Was a real rodeo getting it back in the water. Another first in my life as a fisherman.

Press the thumb bar to cast, turn the handle to retrieve.

The only ice I have here, is in a Margarita after a great day of bass fishing.

I wish I could go ice fishing, but I live to far south, so I have to settle for starting the day with a buzz bait.

I recently returned from a two week trip to Mag Bay on the Pacific Coast of Baja. Two guests arrived in PV to help take the boat to Cabo San Lucas, where I picked up my usual crew, who where already in Cabo fishing the Bisbee Black and Blue tournament. On the way to Cabo we managed to land two blue marlin, along with many dorado. We lost a big blue marlin, but considering I only had guests for crew 2 out of three on blues ain't bad. I picked up the owner of the boat along with two more of his friends, plus my two crew members, put fuel in the tanks, and headed for Mag Bay. On the way to Mag Bay we stopped at the Finger Bank, and got in to some red hot striped marlin action. At one time we had four striped marlin on at the same time. We drifted the night at the Finger Bank, and woke up to the same off the hook marlin bite we had the night before. About noon we we had enough marlin for awhile, and headed north to Mag Bay. When we got to the ridge the dorado, tuna and wahoo were biting well. After a few days of loading the boat with meat, we decided to head back south, and catch more striped marlin. We heard the stripers had moved to the Potato bank, so we went straight there. The striped marlin were there, but so were the most dorado I have ever seen. We had to troll only teasers no hooks, in order to keep the dorado from hooking up. The marlin hit the teasers ok, but the dorado would beat them to the pitch baits most of the time. It was fun to hook the dorado on light tackle, and I gave my new Diawa Lexa 300 a good work out. After 10 days at Mag Bay, we headed back to Cabo. On the way we landed striped marlin, yellowfin tuna, and lost two blue marlin. My crew and I took the boat back to PV for a needed rest. It was a great trip and as usual my only regret is I didn't take more pictures. I hope the guests send me some of their pictures. I did get a couple pics of stripers the first day, which I included here.

Bass fishing.- Washington, Florida, Georgia, Jalisco, and Nayarit. Other species- Alaska, Idaho, Montana, Oregon, and Baja. My favorite bass fishing is in WA, fishing the small lakes and rivers I fished growing up. My biggest bass came from Nayarit, and my best bag 5 bass bag, came from Jalisco. Best saltwater fishing was Mag Bay in Baja. Largest fish was a blue marlin off the coast of Jalisco. Alaska has the best fishing over all, of any state I have been to. I was fortunate enough to fish almost every region of AK, and I was never disappointed.

Hair jig under a slip bobber. Cast up stream, and let it float, drag free down river. You may have to mend your line, and free spool your reel, on and off to help get a drag free drift. For those that are laughing, give it a try.

The most popular spinning real in the 60-70's was the Mitchel 300, it only came with left hand retrieve. Most bait casters at the time only came with right hand retrieve. I am very stubborn, and it is hard for me to learn new things, so I reel with my left hand for spinning and my right hand for bait casting. No logical reason, I simply don't want to change.

Mastering a few lures and techniques will help you catch more bass, but for me there is nothing more fun than buying and fishing a new lure. Unless you are a tournament angler, bass fishing is about having fun, so the Bait Monkey and I will continue to search for that magic lure even though I know it doesn't exist. I know this is not logical behavior, but is spending all my free time chasing a fish I rarely eat logical?

A friend brought this down to me today. Leaving tomorrow for Magdalena Bay for two weeks. I hope to be able to give good review after I get back from the trip. I am afraid that the Monkey will be convincing me to buy some swimbaits now that I have reel made for larger baits.

An old bush pilot once told me, it is better to be on the ground wishing you were in the air, than to be in the air wishing you were on the ground. Works for water too.

Winter fishing for me is sunshine,shorts, top water, margaritas, and big bass.

This is very bad. It means the lake does not get enough angling pressure. Please tell me the location of the lake, and I will help manage it properly.

If you don't want the Bait Monkey to move in with you, don't buy your first crankbait. Just one step down that path, can lead to a life long journey down a never ending road. All you need is a few baits that cover the depths you fish, in just a couple color patterns that are vaguely similar to what the bass eat in your lake. You may only need a few, but what an angler needs, and what an angler ends up buying can be as different as what a politician promises and what a politician delivers. I admit to being a crankbait addict. I tried to quit with a twelve step program, but ended up at the tackle shop on my very first step. All I can recommend is keep it simple, and good luck.

If the bass don't want a white double willow spinnerbait fished mid depth, try slow rolling a black single Colorado blade spinnerbait on the bottom, and don't be surprised if you catch your PB.

Spinnerbait - no trailer Chatterbait- Spunk Shad.