Brad_Coovert

I seldom fish a Trigged bait in deep water. Not that it can't be donw, by I prefer a Crig better. I can cover water faster, cast better in the wind, I have better feel of the bottom and my bait looks more natural. I usually leave my Trigs to specific cover in shallower water. Brad

2 feet of visibilty is good water clarity IMO. Basic plastic colors that catch fish about anywhere they swim: Black Junebug or Redbug Red Shad Watermelon Green Pumpkin Rootbeer/Green Pearl/Silver Flake Of course, I seldom listen to my own advice, so I have just a weeeeeeeeeeee bit more colors than that. ;D Brad

Nothing against Pro Soft Glue, but it will dry out just as easily as any other glue. I had an un-opened bottle in the closet completely cure into a bottle shaped mass of glue. The on in the boat lasted a little longer, but did the sme thing. Super glues need moisture to cure - either from the air or the water. They cure quickly when you toss your newly glued bait in the water. One thing I have learned that causes many a glue bottle to clog up with dried glue is when you let the tip of the bottle touch what you are gluing. If you let any moisture get in the tip, it may be doomed to clogging. The glue I use if the LocTite gel in the blue bottle. It has a twist on/off cap with a locking ring. I have had this bottle for months now and it has yet to dry at all around the tip. Basic care, carefule use and proper storage will keep your glue around a lot longer. Brad

IMO, there are no masters of all techniques. Every successful touring pro I have followed is able to fish many ways, but they are always a master at one or two techniques/styles and they look for patterns that allow them to fish their strengths every time they are out. On most lakes, on most days, there are several patterns, any of which could win if the right fish are there. If your strength is one of the patterns that is on, then thats how you need to fish and you fish to win. If not, fish the best you can and move to the next event. Dee Thomas, one of the best flipper's if not the best flipper ever, was a master at flipping and was great at crankbaits. If either pattern was on, he could win and he won a lot. In fact, he was so good at flipping you can thank him for your current rod length limits on the tour. Dee just had a great article in the Inside Line magazine that partly addressed this very subject. So, for the non-boaters out there, you need to be prepared to fish in a way that works at the speed or in the area your boater has you in. Be prepared to learn. If you're like me, you learn to fish many ways, find your strengths, perfect them (which you will always work on BTW).......then buy your own boat so you can fish your way! Boaters, be prepared to share and teach. That's one reason why that non decided to fish with you in the first place, to learn. Brad

Sorry, there's a 3 lure penalty for being over the limit. ;D Brad

If I thinned my tackle down too much, I'd have no excuse to keep the 17'6" Triton tackle box in the garage. Besides, when I keep the baitmonkey occupied, he leaves you other guys alone. Brad

Bass can be odd creatures. One of my best jig days was fishing green pumpkin jigs around stumps when the bass were gorging on shad. Yeah, I caught some on other baits, but the big fish were eating the jig and the smaller ones were eating the shad. I think the bigger fish were being lazy and wating for an easy meal to float down to them from the carnage above. Brad

1) ZOOM Brush Hog - Green Pumpkin 2) 1/4 oz. Lunker Lure Rattleback Jigs w/Super Chunk Jr. Trailers - Green Pumpkin 3) 4" Prowler Flipping Tube - Roadkill 4) Yamamoto Fat Ika - Pearl/Silver Flake 5) 1/2 oz. Secret Weapon Spinnerbait w/blade kit - White Shiner 6) 1/4 oz. BuzzB2 Buzzbait - White 7) Pointer 78 - Ghost Minnow 8) Super Spook Jr. - Shad 9) Norman Middle N - Lavender Shad 10) 1/2 oz. Cordell Spot - Bleeding Shiner (Discontinued) Brad

Darn! Fotgot about Brush Baby crankbaits. They work great in the wood as well. Brad

I like square bill cranks in the wood. They deflect better IMO, but they also have a much wider wobble as well versus other models. Balsa BI, II and III Norman Fat Boy Bomber Square A Lucky Craft Fat CB Series 1, 2, 3 and 4 I use all of these and they all work great in the wood. Brad

Trigs are best for specific targets and will work at any water depth, but they excel in shallow water. Crigs are great at any depth as well, but they cover more water than a Trig and are better in deeper water IMO. Brad

If you're just trying out jigs, buy a dark color like black - not black/blue, black/red, etc. - just black. Then you can match up some blue, red, chartreuse, etc. colors for the trailers. That way, you can experiment with color easier without changing jigs. To go along with the black one, I would get a green pumpkin or watermelon color. These will match up well with green pumpkin, watermelon, cinnamon or brown trailers. Now you have a dark and a natural color. For weight, I would go with a 1/4 oz. Heavy enough to work on the bottom and light enough to swim. For swimming, just cast out and then starting reeling the jig back when it has reached the desired depth. Add some rod twitches here and there to give it some action. A little practice and you will learn some good retrieves. Good luck! Brad

I'm not a big Ike fan, but I do plan on reading his book based on the reviews I have read here and other places. Brad

Is that bead or beef? I've used red beads before, but I would think a big ol' hunk of beef might be hard to cast rigged to your worm. Do you fish it rare, medium or well done? Would A1 be a good attractant to go with it. ;D ;D A Trigged worm is one of the best baits ever. It used to dominate the pro circuits, then other baits became popular and it has fallen to the bottom of the tackle box in many pros boats. Brad

Good post EW and good info for everyone to file away. Brad

If the water's pretty calm, I will work the rig like any other plastic, moving the rod up and down. If the water is rough or windy, I will work the bait by moving the rod to the side and keeping the line closer to the water so I can watch it better and feel better. Either way, I get a good hookset using a 7'6" rod. Brad

If it broke at the knot, my bet is you tied a bad knot. With any knot that has double line around what you are tieing onto, like a Polamar knot or Trilene knot, make sure that the lines are not crossed over each other where they go around the hook, swivel, line tie, etc. Otherwise, they will cut into each other very easily. I have heard this from several pros and I always make sure that the lines of my Polamar knot that are going around the hook or line tie are parallel with each other and not crossing over each other. If they cross, I retie the knot. I seldom break off since I started doing this. Brad

RW - I get hit on baits when not hitting anything and when hitting objects, but I get far more when I am hitting something, the bottom, weeds, rocks, wood - anything to make the bait do a change-up. IMO, Skeet has banged his head a few too many times on the rod deck dancing. ;D Some will say I'm crazy :, but when you fish a spinnerbait, crankbait or topwater, you are not trying to emulate a healthy baitfish or crawfish. You are trying to emulate something injured, something erratic and out of place OR you are trying to just to get a reaction strike. Injured baitfish do not swim straight. Crawfish have to crawl around and over things. A crankbait moving along steadily above a grassbed becomes stuck in the grass and is suddenly popped free from the grass by the angler an bass suddenly slams it. A crankbait running on the bottom suddenly jumps off the side of a stump where a bass was sitting and he eats it. A spinnerbait is run down the side of a log and then is "killed" near a branch and a fish engulfs it. All of these bites came on triggers when the bait did something different from its normal course. IMO, none of the bites would have occured on steady, uniterrupted retrieves. Brad

Just like any plastic, you may only feel a tap. I have also had fish fgrab the bait and swim sideways and the only way I knew was by seeing the line moving off. I have had them grab the bait and move at me or with me as I pull - that's the hard bite to figure out sometimes and usually leads to the gut hooked fish. The other bite is when the fish garbs the bait and with no warning, tries to pull you out of your shoes and into the water. I love those the most. It took me about a season to really learn the Crig, but once I got it down, I was catching fish every trip out with it. Just keep trying! Brad

Not all Senko style baits fall slow, just the ones with less salt, such as the Tiki Swirl series. The slower falling baits will require more patience and like the others said, you gotta fish these baits slow. They do their best when you just let them fall and sit - no action required by you. You can weight them. I like the screw in weights. These baits, when matched with the proper weight, will actually spiral like a tube. I've watched video of a weighted Senko and it had a very deadly looking fall. Brad

I like to use weedless tubeheads from Falcon Tackle that have fiber weedguards. Wireguard tubeheads will work as well. I use a rattle insertion tube such as the one sold by ZOOM for their rattles and put a small hole in the top of the tube where I want the weedguard to come out of the tube. I then rig the tube head into the tube through the small hole hook first and pull the head inside of the tube. What you now have is a tube with a tubehead rigged inside, the weedguard sticking out the hole, but no hook eye sticking out. Next, I slide the tube forward a veryt slight bit and poke the eye of the hook out and tie on the line. The weedguard is sticking out the holw I made and the tube is straight as an arrow and ready to fish. No glue ever need to seal the hole, it is not necessary. It takes quite a bit to tear a tube off one of these heads rigged this way. Brad

7lbs 9oz. West Boggs Lake, Indiana ;D Not bad for Indiana though. That fish cursed me though. I've hooked a few that size since and have lost them all. :-[ Brad

If you only fish s...l...o...w in really warm or cold water, you ARE going to miss out on some great fishing at times. Don't just live by the slow "rule". Fish are sluggish in cold and hot water and we like to think that a slow bait is always what is needed, but at times you have to get the fish to react to a fast bait to get a bite. It's always worth a try fishing quickly for a few casts here and there throughout the day. I have had days when the water was 45 in the spring and fall or 85+ in summer and the bass would only hit a crankbait as fast as I could reel it in. My wrist was worn out in no time, but the catching was great! If you wanna fish slow though, try stitching a worm - you can spend 20 minutes per cast. Fish trailing a bait but not hitting can be a tough thing to figure out. The fish are obviously atrracted to the bait, but the presentation lacks the trigger. You could be fishing too fast, too slow, with too small a bait, wrong color, wrong size, etc. You gotta change-up something though to get bit. Brad

Roadkill Camo is fast becoming my #1 tube color. It works in any color water, anywhere I go. Sweet Beavers in the same color work great as well. I have some worms in that color too, but have yet to try them. Anyone know of any Senko baits in Roadkill Camo? Brad

So far this summer, all of my best days have been catching fish in shallow, very warm water, bright days, no wind and HOT! Never have I had a year where a tube in 2' of water outproduced a Crig on points trip after trip. As long as the fish are bucing traditional wisdom though, so will I! Brad