Boomstick

Here is my updated lineup: Rods: 7'4" Daiwa Tatula H/F frog rod 7'1" Daiwa Tatula H/F jig rod 7'2" Daiwa Tatula MH/XF - soft plastics, jigs, paddle tail swimbaits, chatterbaits, spinnerbaits 6'10" Daiwa Tatula MH/F - same as above except this is my preferred soft plastic rod, it's the older split grip and that is the one presenation I prefer a split grip for 7'2" Daiwa Tatula MH/R (mod fast) glass - spinnerbaits, chatterbaits, crankbaits or jerkbaits preferably in grass, deep divers 7' Daiwa Tatula M/R (mod fast) glass - crankbaits, jerkbaits 6'8' St. Croix Mojo Bass M/XF topwater - poppers, jerkbaits, weightless soft plastics 6'9" St. Croix Avid X ML/XF - drop shots, ned rigs Reels: Daiwa Tatula 150 7.1:1 - 65lb braid, frogs, jigs Daiwa Tatula CT 7.1:1 - 65lb braid, same as above but what is not being fished with that reel Daiwa Tatula SV 7.1:1 - 17lb fluorocarbon, soft plastics, jigs, spinnerbaits, chatterbaits Daiwa Tatula SV 6.3:1 - 15lb fluorocarbon, soft plastics, jigs, spinnerbaits, chatterbaits, crankbaits or jerkbaits in grass Daiwa Tatula SV 6.3:1 - 10lb fluorocarbon (used 12lb last year) crankbaits, jerkbaits Pflueger Patriarch 7.1 : 1 - 12lb mono for poppers, jerkbaits and weightless soft plastics Daiwa BG 2000 spinning - 12lb braid with usually a 6lb fluro leader for drop shots and ned rigs

You can get polarized distance glasses as well. I keep meaning to get myself a pair every year.

And I believe no live bait as well, but that might be MA I spend a few nights during a heat wave at the Button Bay VT state campground in early August last year. The last night, the heat broke and it was a field day, my youngest son and I were catching 3lb+ smallies every cast fishing from the point which is a half mile walk from the pool in the state park. That bay is noted for a good smallie spot, so that's something to consider hitting up if you return this year.

I also love crankbaits. There is nothing like fishing a crankbait when the bite is on!

I run the same setup but I either use 17lb Berkley Trilene flurocarbon for jigs or 65lb if I'm throwing into heavier cover. If I only had one reel for frogs and jigs, I would consider running slightly thinner braid like 50lb braid (or 65lb PowerPro Maxcuatro which is a similar diameter to most 50lb braid).

^7.

I cannot comment if it will still feel cheap to you or not, but I will say that I just my hands on a 100 and while I haven't got to use it yet, I will say it definitely has a more expensive feel than the old CT. It's designed more like the Elite. As to the original question, if you can get a Tatula 100 for less than a Fuego then it's not even a question, get the Tatula 100, it's simply a better reel. Something else worth taking note is they are rated for about the same amount of line, but what the Tatula 100 considers 12lb line is .285mm where what the Tatula CT (and I'm pretty sure Fuego CT too) considers 12lb line is .330mm, so you don't have to throw on almost 200 yards of 10lb line to fill the spool.

Well after the weather gets above freezing, and after all the snow melts and after the lake temperature hits at least 55, I would ideally use 15lb mono, but I don't have that rigged up on any other reel so I make do with 12lb mono.

If I recall right, the Black Max combo rods are rated as mod. fast, but are maybe a little bit on the fast side, so the medium seems like a better rod for crankbaits and shouldn't be too bad in grass either. I might also consider an Ugly Stik GX2 either medium or medium heavy with a Black Max reel as well. They have more bend in the tip, so if you're fishing it in grass, a MH would do nicely.

The rod is really for the lure you are throwing as well as the amount of weeds that you may bring up. That particular rod is used for a wide variety of lures like weighted soft plastics, lighter jigs, chatterbaits, spinnerbaits, paddle trail swim baits and other single hooked lures where you need a big hookset and is one you will use a lot, so you didn't waste your money by any means. Also, while it's not for the real thick weeds, a MH rod still has enough power to pull the fish up along with a smaller amount of weeds when the need arises.

Is that a typo on the length of the St. Croix Mojo Bass casting rod? I am aware of their 7'1" rod, it's a nice rod too, and super light. I've heard some complain about balance, but I haven't had that problem. It seems that you did pretty good to me, all of those rods are far more sensitive than Favorites. Well it is a dobyns so it's like a medium plus.

My drop shot rigs are simply. My go to is a nose hooked Roboworm 4" Alive Shad. KVD Dream Shots are pretty much interchangeable. #2 is a wacky rigged Daiwa Yamamoto Neko worm or similar

Thanks guys. I feel like I should celebrate, but I don't even know what to do...

I spend way too much time thinking about that sort of stuff too. What if what we perceive as free will is simple fates desire...

Well maybe nothing is truly random, but fish are never 100% predictable which is where random in AI comes in

Yeah, were going to have to rig something to solve that. I have some ideas

I have the Tatula 7'1" H/F "Jig" rod, which I believe is rated for 1/4oz to 1 1/2oz. I used it last year for jigs and frogs. Since I was using it for frogs and because I couldn't easily fit it in my truck without sticking it out the window or leaving the tailgate open, I chose that over a longer rod. It's surprisingly sensitive and it absolutely launches frogs and 1/2oz+ jigs further than I ever really need to cast them, in fact further than my 6'10" MH/F launched the very same frogs despite being a stiffer rod. You could make that rod a little stiffer and it would still cast just fine, so I can't see the flipping rods casting distance being a problem (they aren't as stiff as the frog rod, which is rated to cast a smaller huddleston!). If you still are concerned, I would imagine the 7'3" Tatula XT is probably fairly close to the 7'1" H/F 2nd gen Tatula in terms of casting but should cast even further due to added length. Today, I received the 7'4" Frog rod in the mail. I haven't got to use it yet, but it certainly is even beefier. It's not ideal for jigs because it is an absolute lead pipe of a rod that could pull a bullshark out of 30lbs of grass from the feel of it, but I bet you could flip a 3/4oz jig into the thickest possible cover with that if you ever had to.

I largely agree with A-Jay's assessment of just hitting the water, getting to know lake/lakes, what sort of cover you expect and what works. I think you will find what's missing fairly quickly. What might be a better next upgrade might be the Dobyns Fury 704C (Heavy/Fast). That is more of a MH+ rod as Dobyns is maybe a half power down and it's a good rod for spinnerbaits, chatterbaits, weighted soft plastics, paddletail swimbaits, and swim jigs among others. You will use this rod for many presentations and it might be your most used rod in the arsenal. It has a decent tip to it, so you can even fish 1/2oz or lighter pitching jigs as long as the cover isn't too thick. You can even run it with 40lb braid and fish a frog as long as it's not too thick cover -- although personally I would go back to 15 or 17lb flurocarbon once you add a heavy rod with braid (personally I only use braid when I need it, but some people like it for everything so that's just me). Due to not owning a boat and not having access to the real weedy spots, I made do with a similar rod for a few seasons before I added a heavy, but you know your honey holes better than I do too. I will say that I do fish a lot of 3/8oz and sometimes 1/2oz jigs in less weedy situations on a MH+/F rod with 17lb fluorocarbon. Likewise, the Dobyns MH/F is more of a M+ rod. I wouldn't fish more than a 1/8oz weight on a senko on that rod but ideally 1/16oz. I just got a 703C Sierra for my oldest for weightless soft platics, crankbaits, topwater and so forth and it seems like it will be perfect for those presentations. And the Ugly Stik works for crankbaits or jerkbaits in open water (around weeds, use the Dobyns 703C) so you got that covered. I use the 6'9" Avid X spinning rod for my finesse baits with a Daiwa BG 2000, and that's a great rod and you can get bass all year round on a drop shot or ned rig. I now have so many rods between myself and the boys. They even have a pretty full lineup minus a heavy rod (but I now have two). My logic about adding new gear is pretty simple. I think of where I was fishing, and what couldn't I fish because I didn't have a heavy enough lure or the cover was too thick, and where would I use this rod? My point being if I added a heavy rod two years ago, I wouldn't have known where to fish it. Sorry to ramble, but I hope that was helpful.

Welcome to the forums! You are maybe two hours from me, although I don't fish out that way much. I will likely try the Oxbow this year. If you need a spot with some shore access and a couple of docks and a pier you can fish and get them early in the year before they move to the deeper side, check out DAR state forest in Goshen MA. I never get any big ones there, but my youngest usually gets quite a few on a crankbait. My profile picture was taken on one of the docks there actually! They have grills and picnic tables so you can make yourself dinner too, it's became a tradition for us to start the year there and it's halfway between myself and a friend who lives in W. Springfield. Heck, if you want to join us this year I will offer to give you some tips on using the baitcaster.

Well it's not just you who had a tough time up here this year. I had a good 2nd to last day of the season on Onota (I got my first Onota fish on a spinnerbait, at least two actually, can't recall if I got more or not), and a good trip to Button Bay but other than that I had to work to not get skunked. I talked to many other people who also had a tough season, but a group of guys on Cheshire said they had the year of their lives night fishing. Go figure! Grats on the pike! I caught my first Walleye, but it was tiny

Last year I believe half of one of our local lakes thawed out before my oldest's birthday, 4/14. I forget the exact date. Unfortunately it's the shallow half and the majority of the fish were still deep, but we still tried anyway. I would be happy for the same thing this year, as long as the rest of the year isn't so tough to catch them

I like your ideas. I would really like a fishing sim that puts my gained knowledge of fishing to use, but also applies some randomness in a realistic sort of manner too, you know what I mean? If the AI was good enough where I could hone up my fishing skills in the winter when lakes are frozen, that would be really sweet. As a developer myself (I'd like to think I'm fairly skilled) I understand that will not be easy to do. I did once build a baseball simulator as a college project where you play team manager and the chance of a player getting a hit depended on both the players batting average the prior season as well as the pitchers batting average against, and the chances of getting a home run or double increased against pitchers who gave up more long balls as well with a fairly complex algorithm based around manipulation of a random number. I simulated a few hundred games and logged the results and each players numbers roughly reflected what they should be, batters and pitchers a like but there was some room for improvement of course. Something like that may potentially be of use.

Oh no, I am so sorry for your loss, that is so awful it is just beyond words, I can't even imagine what that must be like.

Wow! My local stores do not have the greatest selection and has discontinued selling some of my favorite line as well, but I hope they don't stop carrying fishing gear altogether. That said, my local store seems to stock up every spring and buy late June the fishing section is cleared out for the year, even for basic things like hooks and weights. I must admit, I am a TackleWarehouse fanboy, they have almost everything. There are a few local stores I can get things like hooks and whatnot at and the people who work there are also helpful should I have questions as well but they're not open at hours I can always get there.

One thing I do not want to do is add a trolling motor, I actually want to get myself in better shape, which is one of the reasons I'm not using the same money as a downpayment on a bass boat.