BrackishBassin

I set my beard trimmer on 1 and do my face and then head. Only do it once or twice a week. I call it the 'Jason Statham'.

My local place has an entire case of Lucky Strike that looks untouched. I skipped those and went for the case of senkos. Bought way too many bags, but they were two bucks cheaper than anywhere else.

I don’t use BBS, but I do throw bells in them. Two or three of the smallest sized bells they sell at craft stores. Doesn’t add anything noticeable to the weight, but it makes a unique sound.

Been seeing posts in a Facebook group I’m a member of about there being a big buyout of Lucky Craft lures by Ollie’s. Don’t know if you have them there, but you might want to check it out if you do.

I’ve never had my braid snap on a cast. Ran everything from 30-50lb. I have had it happen with mono though.

I use a regular palomar knot for both braid and mono (use Siege for my leaders sometimes). Never had an issue with the knot slipping or breaking. I’ve even broken hooks on jigs fishing with braid and the knot was fine.

Interesting. Never considered throwing my weightless plastics with the M set up. I almost always throw them with either the MH (heavier plastics like senkos) or the ML spinning (trick worms and lighter stuff with lots of appendages like lizards). I’ll have to give that a shot.

You’re correct. It’s a M/F. If I had known more at the time, I may have considered a M/ModF or Mod, but I didn’t. However, that combo is spooled with mono and works great for almost all of my moving baits. I don’t know if the mono’s stretch combined with a little less of a backbone in the M rod that allows me to fish trebled baits effectively, or I’ve just been lucky. Either way, it works great for what I need. I don’t know why, but I get really hung up on covering the water column. May cause me to miss some fish because I refuse to move until I’ve covered bottom, variable, and top water in a specific location/stretch of bank. Doesn’t help that my new PB I caught this year came on a top water in February on a bright, sunny day with little wind. Now I have to throw a top water before I move on, or I know that there was a new PB I missed. Weird, I know.

Berkley Big Game is all I use for saltwater stuff, but I had issues with trying to use it on my baitcasters. Might just be because the spools are older (bought a few 900yd spools at once), but I had constant issues with overruns.

For me, it comes down to two things - fighting the fish and casting accuracy. I want to cast on my dominant side for greater accuracy and fight the fish on that same side for more power. Turning a handle on a reel requires very little in the way of ‘power’, so I do that with my non-dominant side.

No shad in the bodies of water I fish, so bluegill here.

Grew up in, around, and on brackish water. No matter where I’m fishing locally, I’m usually targeting one type of bass or another.

In my admittedly limited experience, I haven't seen a difference in catching or not catching fish that I could attribute to the type of line I'm using. I think Tom is on the right track, as well as some others that have posted in this thread. Personally, I believe that some species of fish are more likely to be line shy than others (e.g. trout vs. bass), but you're also going to have variations of 'personality' within a given population of a certain species. I haven't noticed this in bass fishing, but have definitely noticed it throwing a top water for red drum. This past summer there were a group of three drum that I could see hanging around near my dock. All three of them had a go at the top water, but one went for it every single time I threw the lure. The other two had a go at the lure and then, for whatever reason, decided not to give it another look.

Saw this post today and did some looking (fellow bank beater). Dobyns also offers some of their stuff in the 6’ 6” size.

Unfortunately, that would mean you have to register it here. Which means you would have to title it. So, even a DIY trolling mount ends up costing you a bunch of money. Which is just ridiculous, in my opinion.

I typically use three combos (MH casting, M casting, and ML spinning). When I start my day (usually changed many times by the end), they're rigged up to cover different parts of the water column (bottom, variable, and topwater). Then I attempt to adjust my lures to the conditions I find throughout the day.

It's a weird little pond in the sense that there is zero cover. No lily pads, no overhanging trees, no shoreline grass, nothing. It goes straight from 'lawn' to shoreline. You know, come to think of it, it may have just been that blue dog that told me about the big bass down here. And everybody knows you can't trust a blue dog...

A 9lb bass is plenty big to me!

I would normally agree with you, but this pondisnt actively managed. There are probably hundreds of little guys and gals swimming around. The big baits are more to eliminate having to wade through them to get to the big girls. I’ll check out the Hard Gill. Thanks! I think jigs would be tough to fish due to the amount of grass on the bottom. Even Texas rigged worms drag up chunks of grass in this pond.

I found out this past weekend that a local pond I fish has some very large bass in it, or has in the recent past. Multiple 7s, an 8, and a 9.5lb bass have been caught (also where my new PB was caught this February). The pond is relatively large and ranges from 12-15ft at its deepest to 1-2ft near the shore. The entire bottom is covered in grass. It’s not too bad right now, but the warmer it gets the thicker the grass is going to get. In some places it grows to within a foot of the surface. What big bass baits would you guys throw in that pond? I’ve decided to dedicate the entire summer to fishing that body of water in hopes of getting one of the big girls.

I fish 15lb PowerPro in the moss green 99% of the time on my spinning rod. The only time I consistently use a leader is when fishing a drop shot.

The fish in my picture was caught on a wakebait on 2/26/18. Bottom line - fish won’t hit a lure sitting in your box. Throw ‘em!

Protection isn’t really the issue. It’s space that’s the problem. Thanks though! Thanks A-Jay, but those are a bit outside of my price range. Pretty sure my wife would have a stroke.

So, I’ve decided to replace my current MH set up with something a little nicer. It’s a Black Max combo. It works, but I find myself fishing my M set up more often because it casts so much better and is far lighter. I travel once a year to NY and once to SC. I used to be able to pop my rods in the car with no problems. However, I now have twin boys. With all of our stuff loaded, there’s no room for 7ft rods. So, I’m leaning towards making my new MH set up a travel rod so that I could take it with me to NY for bass and to SC for red drum. Does anyone have any experience with any of the travel rods available now (e.g. Daiwa Ardito, St. Croix Triumph Travel, etc.)? Any and all input would be appreciated. Thanks!

Just use green braid and then don’t worry about coloring it. That whole coloring line with a Sharpie never made sense to me anyways (except maybe the bright yellow stuff). You fish black lures at night and in dirty water because bass can see them better, but color your braid black so they can’t see it...makes sense, right?