bagofdonuts

Probably work ok, but i don't like a lot of unnecessary stuff hanging off my lure. Like weedgards on a chatterbait.

Another vote for the big ez.

Any of you seasoned anglers that fish a lot get tendon pain in your trolling motor foot? Any cures or tips on foot control placement would be great. It's getting bad enough to keep me off the water lately. Like tennis elbow in the top of my foot.

as long as its running true and catching fish, why not use it till you hang it up or the rest of the bill breaks?

Anytime you feel something different jack him. As the Gman says "he aint got it in his pocket".

So, you pronounce it "breem" and not "brim". Never heard that before. If you come down south don't say it that way or people will look at you funny. For color, green pumpkin is a pretty good bream imitation.

Haven't fished Dardenelle this spring, but, I would expect it to be similar to Arkansas river here in the Little Rock pool, which i fish a couple times a week. I've been catching them way off the main current (like 4 or 5 miles up a back water) in shallow weeds/pads. My best baits have been swim jig in blue gill, swim jig in white, and a white buzz bait. Catching them around spawning bream and some fry gaurding. Havent really seen the shad spawn I would expect but the white swim jig is still working. If i were going, I'd start looking up the Illinois Bayou in the shallow grass, there are also some strip pits up there that will have cleaner water in case everything else is chocolate milk.

I store frogs and cranks in used peanut butter jars. just put some baby powder in for the frogs, fill it full of frogs and throw it in your pack. For cranks i rubber band the hooks together and stuff them in jars.

Hit lake ouachita before you head south, beautiful lake. Then the bend.

I picked up an h20 tac 40 reel today. Can't wait to try it. The guts look identical to the older curado but it is super light low profile with carbon handle, shallow spool and smooth as any I've seen. Anyone have any experience with them?

A-jay, you have to swim to shore to get those pics?

My brother caught this 22.5", 7lb smally on Ky Lake out of the back of my boat a couple weeks ago.

another vote for the plopper. hangs on everything but fish for me.

fluke

Kentucky Lake. Headed there myself on Wednesday. Water is rising bass are moving shallow and catching them out of the flooded yellow flowers is lots of fun. Not many lakes you can catch trophy largemouth, smallmouth, and spots. We stay at ky beach resort in blood river area, nothing fancy but they have a nice protected bay and docks with electrical hook ups.

They're smart enough to keep all of us fully occupied.

Another vote for the Bandit. Never seen a bomber with the little ridge down the side.

i always use a plastic trailer and have completely dropped the trailer hook. I feel the plastic keeps bait up and gets on plain quicker. as most bites come early in the retrieve, I want it up and going quickly. I haven't notice any difference in hook up ratio with or without a trailer hook. Almost all misses are user error, can't jerk on the blow up. Just keep the hook sharp. beavers make good trailers and the rage tail worm is also a good one. I also pull about half the strands off the skirt to help casting ease (less wind resistance, less tumbling on the cast = less backlash) and bend the prop out a little to slow down the retrieve speed.

1/4 for real shallow or slow, 1/2 for anytime i don't have to trow the 1/4. I like the sk hack attack swim jig.

No. Big O, last year on a big ez. It hit about 10' from the boat, the hit was so loud my brother though I had fallen in. Still wake up in cold sweats over that one.

I like falcon bucco rods as well, not sure they make them that long but they have a slower action than most.

Sometimes it's the Indian, not the arrow.

Another war eagle vote.

Congrats. That's a pretty bass.

Im a river rat. Home water is the arkansas river. On the arkansas a big difference is its mainly shallow water presentations. Even in summer the bass aren't what most would consider deep.