JustJames

Yes all lures can catch all size bass. I believe you, your 4" swimbait caught that 10.5. I don't wanna say that you are lucky to have your 4" at the right time and right place. All I say smaller lure would be harder to catch bigger bass, why? Because smaller bass which is faster and more active would get to your lure first. There are reasons why those who target bigger bass use bigger lure, and there are those who lucky enough to catch bigger bass with regular size lures.

That shows you have not kept any bass for quite awhile. Our state change to over 15" with 2 bag limit a few years back. I used to have an agreement with my fishing buddy to keep one bass of every tenth we caught. Most of the reason is to shut my wife since she always bug me about keeping bass. "That never happens" I did keep some last year with all bleeding bass.

What happened? Image is too big? You can get app to resize your image or use postimage.org.

Congrat nice hawg especially on jerkbait.

That is how I hold my rod/reel too but only when I first cast it out and lift the rod at 90 degree to feel the fall bite. After that I just use the tip in my index finger touching rod bank, don't have to change position at all.

That is hurt, but so d**n true. They are too busy getting rid of plastic bag and now drinking straw and yeah building houses for homeless.

I used to run line over my index finger but not a lot any more. Modern rod this day is pretty sensitive you can feel most of the bite thru your rod. I alway have part of my hand touching rod blank. To run line over my finger all I have to do is use my index finger wrap around nose of the reel no lifting of any kind. That why I prefer small reel like curado 70, 50e or tatula CT. In another word, I don't have problem with my CT type R Great mind think alike, since I start using aldebaran with tapered line guide, I start thinking of upgrade al my shimano reels. Too bad the tapered line guide alone would cost 56 dollars.

It depends on how and where you fish, what type of lure you have. If you mainly bank fishing and you are on budget, one rod one reel should work too, but also depend on rod and reel that you select. You don't have to use all known for mankind lures to be able to catch fish. Select lures that suitable to use on your rod-reel. You don't have to be in fashion and follow everybody when they said which lure work such and such. If I were you, I will get MH rod lure rated 1/4 - 1 oz 6'6 - 7', reel would be curado 200K or Daiwa tatula CT/R. With this set up, you should be able to fish quite a lot variety of lure from finesse Texas rig all the way up to some crank and some jig (up to 3/8oz). Forget about Ned rig or BFS style lure and don't worry about those big swimbait guys. Now if I'm gonna bring two rods and one reel to fish at the same time? Hell no, too much time to switch between each rod.

Compare to your hand that hold the fish, I guess 2.5lbs. What do I win?

When I fish small pond that where I caught the most within 5-10' from shoreline.

The hard part is done, now time to enjoy fishing.

Do you want me to drop it off at daiwa for you? I have to drive in daiwa head quarter which is only 50 miles away. The turn around time might be quicker.

I think @Darren.does this more often than other since I see his comments on this a lot. I did it a few time, first time I didn't have bobber stopper so I used Carolina rig keeper. I caught catfish on that rig and of course the hook slide down to where your weight at. last year I tried it again this time with 6th sense peg(get a pretty good review to hold strong) again the hook slide down to weight but not interfere when I set hook at all. The reason for me to try this rig, because I always have tag end pretty shot around 6" - 12", most of the time, when I caught fish the line from tag-end wrap around plastic and damage it or I have to spend another 5 mins to un tangle or cut the line and re-tie.

MH becuz I can throw heavy bait and work 3/8 jig properly. I have quite a few Medium power rated from 1/8 - 1/2 but those are techniques specifically not all around rod. My MH rod rated as low as 1/4 oz so I can do finesse as well as heavy like 1/2 chatterbait, 110 whipped plopper.

I don't mind, but I wouldn't spend money on one.

I used to fish city park pond where is very pressure and small. I got skunked a lot more than I could count. The rig that worked for me would be drop shot 4" worm. If you don't mind 6" bass, you can down side to powerbait trout worm on live worm hook with split shot about 6 - 12", drag it very slow with light spinning tackle.

Nice fish there. You gotta come and teach me how to find fish like that.

This ^^^^^ I can hear my sv 105 click (mag Z into work) after first initial spin. The mag Z will slow down spool depend on how fast spool spin almost all the way until spin slow down enough. This is why magZ help a lot with backlash and most of angler prefer magZ to skip. I got backlash with centrifugal brake(shimano) at almost the end when casting into light wind. This was tested, I have done with my aldebaran mg7 with Husky Jerk 06(1/8oz) and 1/16 jig with 1/2 Zinkerz(1/10oz). I had to set the tension to very slow drop and set to 3-4 brakes on.

Casting into wind, magnetic brake all the way. It is easy to adjust and less bird nest. Centrifugal, doesn't matter how well train your thumbis, you gonna have some problem or suffer a lot on distance. But like everyone mentioned a spinning gear might be better than both.

if you insist on using 20 lb fluoro I think curado 70 might not be such a good choice. Curado 200k or daiwa tatula CT might do the job better for both pitching and casting. Unless you wanna go braid the curado 70 is perfect.

I think mine is #2 hyper wire and it definitely bigger than most split ring those come with lures.

My chatterbait trailer most of the time will be Zman paddlerZ and diezel. I found that Zman Elaztech stuff is pretty soft even with slow crawl the tail still moving. It will not create a lot of movement as keitech but the vibration from blade alone should get enough attention from bass. I can let the whole thing sit and tail still moving with little current (caught a bass while helping my friend un-snag his lure). I also use different paddle tail like, keitech knock off, zoom fluke, gambler EZ and 5" grub.

For bank fishing, I can cast as far as to the other side of shoreline that all i need. Sometime it goes too far though,lol.

Daiwa tatula 6'10 MH/F here for everything from 1/4oz Texas rig all the way to 1oz whopper plopper. 40lb Braid is good line choice for all around and add leader as needed.

If you don't see any thing wrong on the main gear, may be you should seek for second opinion before replacing main gear. Clutch engaged while casting can damage a lot of things. I'm not sure since this never happened to me but it might be worm gear, pinion gear or internal plastic gear. Brass main gear should be able to withstand more than one mishaps I hope.