TOXIC

@Catt taking a bunch to Headwaters next week. 👍🏻

Yamamoto Shad Shape Swimmer amongst others. With the Kieteck craze still fresh in my memory, I’ve been pleading with Yamamoto to come out with a small swimbait. They did.

When I repped Quantum, the Smoke line was my favorite. Both casting, spinning and paired with smoke rods. Good performance at a good price. My only complaint was there was a lot of anti-reverse failures on the spinning reels.

Just saw a vid with Scott Martin who said the big bass wave should be starting on Okeechobee with this warming trend coming up. I would assume the other lakes will follow. I hope so, we’re heading to headwaters next Friday for a week and it would be fantastic if the big girls turned on.

To me any need for a coach is to take your skill level above and beyond the normal range. We can all be self taught……to a point….In most of our fishing worlds we want to be skilled but nothing beyond what would require a true coach. Most coaches in other sports are retired professionals who are paid to impart skills and knowledge beyond the average level. As has been said, there are teachers who help us with the basics but a coach should be able to distance us from the normal range of skill sets. Coaches also instill drive, determination, mental strength and a lot of other traits above and beyond technical ability. As a matter of fact, Yamamoto Pro Clark Wendlandt is retiring from the elites and I listened to him say he is going to coach younger anglers.

I forgot to add, I am going to try the new Yamamoto Ned Hula Grub which I believe is a floating bait

My property.

Home base: Virginia 31, years. Potomac, Rappahonock, Lake Anna, Chicohominy, Buggs, James River. Florida, Annually 6 years. Okeechobee, Kissimmee, Headwaters (leaving next week) Some surf at Cresent Beach. Wisconsin, Annually 27 years. Waupaca, Wolf River, Winniconnie, Big Green. New York/Canada First trip was this year. St Lawrence river. I really like fishing new water and as my fishing buddies retire I will be traveling much more.

😆😉She knows where he lives and it’s not hunted. I’m not that much of a deer hunter, I more often went upland bird route. Pheasant, quail, chucker. Here’s a question, one of my buddies said there’s a way to tell if a buck is mature, has something to do with a crease on the nose or the nose shape? I’ve never heard of that.

Not directed to you at all. I was just stating my experience working and fishing with upper level anglers. I had an elite series pro stay with me both in Florida and here in Virginia. When in Florida he was prefishing for a tournament on the St. John’s, I had just moved there and was just fishing a small trail. I set him up with some of my buddies who were really good sticks and his comment to me was that they didn’t show him anything he couldn’t find on a map. He was out the door before sunrise and didn’t come back until dark. Best I could do was cook his meals. I did fish with him a couple of days and that’s how I came to my conclusions.

As has been said, Yamamoto has a 3” floating Ned Senko but I don’t throw it…gasp….I prefer a 4” regular Senko. I like the fall rate and if you are going to nail weight it, at least the 4” has the natural weight which accomplishes the same thing.

Not to be a buzz kill but if you have ever spent the day in the boat with an elite series professional angler, even the most experienced of us pale in their level of commitment, skill and knowledge. There is a huge gap between a good fisherman and a professional.

As has been said, most learn by being self taught but I can attest to being a guide and have taught many with varying degrees of experience. As a guide, many times I was tasked with teaching a specific technique but many were extremely novice that couldn’t tie a knot. I taught how to set up gear, read water, operate boats and 1000 other things in the fishing world. It was up to me to stay current on trends, baits, etc. When you get into the tournament realm, it’s different because even as a co angler, you are competing against the other guy in the boat. Not a very good environment to learn. That’s why I say, a guide is a paid coach in your definition and should offer his or her knowledge freely. How you build on it is up to you.

What do I look for in a big bass lake? Palm trees and a Florida address. 😂 Really though, I’ve fished a chain of lakes in Waupaca, Wisconsin for 25 years, I’ve fished the Wolf River from Winniconnie up, Big Green and Pine lake. What I have found in summertime fishing these waters is that the bass are consistently on weed lines next to deeper water. They either position on the inside edge or the outside edge. Once again, this is summer fishing. With the advent of FFS, I’ll bet some of the big girls who live out in the open deep water will eventually be tipping the scales and records.

Since I fish mine on 10lb mono and spinning gear, I stay with 1/2 oz most of the time and in most all depths. I’m usually not shallower than 10-15 and can go up to 40-50.

Close in shape other than tail up and tail down. I would buy a couple of SteelShad to fish alongside your current ones and see for yourself. Good luck. I really enjoy blade baiting.

Thank you for opening your arms and allowing us to channel positive thoughts and prayers your way.

We pick up trash. I snagged a piece of braid on Headwaters last year and started pulling it up by hand. I ended up with what had to have been a full spool of line. At least 300 years. This was in an area only accessible by watercraft. No excuse. None.

My daughter has a 300 acre farm that’s loaded with deer. She’s going to take this buck next season. Common consensus is that he has more room to mature.

Going to go far enough south to find the warmth. Leaving on the 31st for Headwaters in Fellsmere, Florida. You southerners make sure you have the roads cleared enough for me to pass through. Here at home we fish the discharge cooling ponds of a nuke site. Three 3,000 acre pools connected by canals. If we can get there, we can fish. Water stays 55-60 and ramps don’t freeze.

Before GSM acquired SteelShad, I wasn’t much of a blade bait user. One year in Michigan on lake St Clair we decided to spend a day vertical jigging for walleye. I had a full box of different SteelShad blades with me and we spent the day drifting the St Clair river and hammering walleyes, I was hooked. My partner used Damiki blades and the 2 aren’t even close in appearance. As for others that look like SteelShad, I can’t do anything but guess on the differences whether it be body style, hook quality, multiple rigging snap holes, weighted belly style and shape, etc., but I can tell you they didn’t foul on the main line near as often as the Damiki and in our case caught more fish. I brought them back to Virginia and as my original post showed, they worked just as well on our winter largemouth. I’m getting ready to order the new style of SteelShad with the weight all in the front. Supposed to eliminate more hang ups.

Decided to go start the truck and top off the fuel getting ready to travel to Headwaters next week and my truck cover was frozen to the driveway. 😆 A couple pitchers of hot water and I got it free. Needless to say I’m the only one in town with a clean truck and with the forecasted temperatures, nobody’s going to washing their vehicles in the near future.

In February of 2010 Virginia got back to back snowstorms deemed snowmageddon both dropping double digit snow amounts on the 95 corridor. 200,000 without power, roads impassable. I was commuting between my house in Florida and my house in Virginia. I left Florida heading to Virginia in my 3/4 ton SilveradoHD, 4wd truck and about halfway home, my wife called me and suggested I turn around. I did not. Everything was fine until I got on the 295 loop to go around Richmond, Virginia and I started seeing cars in the ditch. When I merged back on 95 north of Richmond it was like a war zone. Plows trying to clear the snow and ice from the first part of the storms made ice boulders on the interstate and reduced traffic to a crawl or you would literally destroy your vehicle. My truck was doing well but taking a beating so I dropped it in 4wd and made my way to the shoulder which was just deep snow. I watched multiple cars behind me try to follow and one by one they got sucked into the ditch. Due to my trucks higher suspension I was able to get through. When I got to my exit I had another 30 miles to go so I stopped and topped off my fuel and headed up route 17 which had not even been plowed once. I was pushing snow with the front bumper of my truck the entire way. I finally made it to the beginning of my culdesac which descended into a deep valley before going up the other side where my house is. I literally floored my truck because the valley was almost flat level and I knew it was deep drifted snow. My truck literally disappeared under the snow bank and I blew out the other side. I didn’t let off the gas until I slid into my driveway. That’s my snowmageddon story.

Between 8-10. Just got a bit of an ice storm last night.

Jobbie Nooner happens every year on St Clair. You can only imagine.