Way north bass guy

You need to get the one that has bearing buddies attached, keep it greased up and it’ll last for years flying down the road ?

Picked up the new boat hauler today. Told the kid we were going shopping, when we turned into the dealership and I said this is the last ride your gonna have in the green one, his eyes lit up like just about any other male of the human species ?. Ahh, the smell of new truck!

I think a lot of it depends on what they’re feeding on. I’ve caught a few decent ones on some big baits while Muskie fishing, but the majority of my bass over 5lbs have come on smaller plastics or standard sized spinnerbaits, jerkbaits etc. Every lake is different and time of year will dictate what the bulk of the fish are eating, but it never hurts to try.

It was way too wet to work outside today, so I went shopping. Managed to find a new boat puller that I pretty much got at cost. Hopefully it’s drier tomorrow so I can get back to work to pay for it.

Finally, got the boat out for the first time this year, the main lake was only 37 deg with skims of ice in a few spots, but we found a small river coming into a shallow bay that was 48 deg and loaded with small pike and smallmouth. No big girls, but it was still a last to have the rods bent a bit and enjoy some sunny weather. Only gonna get better from here on.

Hope everything turns out alright slonezp, sucks to have to deal with family getting older. My old man is currently in the hospital with stomach cramps/bleeding etc and they’re gonna do a scope tomorrow to figure out what’s going on. He’s in his early 70’s, and has been fairly healthy his whole life. Mom had a small stroke a little while back, luckily it didn’t really do much to her other than some headaches. Sometimes I have to stop and realize, they’re not getting any younger and one of these days something serous is gonna happen, guess that’s just the way it goes but it still sucks.

I caught a 4lb smallmouth on a spinnerbait that already had a full grown squirrel in its throat. Talk about a hungry bass! I’ve also seen largemouth take down squirrels swimming across a small, pad filled channel.

We call it the “sandwich technique”. Find a big gravel/boulder flat, cast out a tube jig on a spinning rod and let out some more line, depending on the depth of the flat, close the bail and grab a sandwich. Let the boat drift along, and grab the rod when it starts thumping. Works great when you want to have a break but still want to fish, especially when big smallies are cruising flats looking for crayfish or gobies.

Pretty much any combo of pb and j is good with me, except our 9 year old is allergic to peanuts, so now it’s almond butter or sunbutter for me. Sometimes if we’re out without him, I’ll load up on the Kraft extra creamy pb, cause nothing compares to the real thing ?

That’s the worst thing about an outboard, no air filter. Doesn’t take much to suck some crap into the engine. Bloody mice used to chew the wires inside my old man's old Nissan outboard every winter, till he finally started storing it in the basement. On a good note, I pulled mine out of storage last week and not one single dropping anywhere in the boat or motor. Been using mothballs in the boat for years and it seems to work to keep them out, maybe try a few in under the cowl next winter ( but don’t forget to remove them in spring?).

Where’d ya get it? I’m looking for something like that now and haven’t seen much about this particular model or the price of it yet.

Finally pulled the rig down to my house garage from it’s hibernation at my shop. And just checked this afternoon and the entire sound here is about 90% open water, so I guess I’ll be rigging up stuff this week and FINALLY splashing next weekend! No bass here for a while yet ( seasons closed), but lots of big trout and pike season opens in 11 days ( not that I’m counting or anything ?).

I’ve caught a ton of fish the last couple years with one around docks. If there’s a couple inches of snot grass on bottom, it’ll keep the bait up high enough to stay clean and seen by the bass, and I think it’s something they haven’t seen much under and around docks yet.

And thank you a bunch for this, it’s very nice to come on a site and not have a constant bombardment of crap advertisements etc. Keep up the good work folks, I appreciate what you guys do to make this a fun forum to be on ???

You want shoals, come up here to Georgian Bay. There are literally thousands and thousands of them, and yes, many have eaten a lower unit or two over the years ( mine included?). Once the smallmouth get out on them after they spawn, and throughout the summer and into fall, you can catch them until your arms are sore on good days. Usually start with topwaters or a spinnerbait or jerkbait ripped fast around the edges and over top, and if they’re off the edge a bit then a drop shot or tube dragged along the edge into deeper water gets them. Deeper shoals tend to get more attention when it’s calm and sunny, and the shallower ones often have biters on the top when the wind is frothing the shallows.

Maybe go for a bit of a drive and try somewhere else, unless there isn’t a “somewhere else”. I guess I’m a bit spoiled in that there are literally hundreds of small to medium sized lakes within a half hour drive of me, and that doesn’t include the big lakes. Seriously though, maybe it’s time for a change of scenery for a little while.

Careful, your gonna wear that thing out ?.

Nice looking baits, looks like you have a handful of smelts there ?. Those would be good on a lot of the big, deep inland lakes around here where smallies gorge on smelts.

Yup, works pretty good on hard or soft water. Good luck ??

A sure sign of spring around here, got the bikes out for the first run of the year. Remembered how to ride and didn’t even wipe out once ( the kid anyway, I did a nosedive right at the truck because I was hot rodding and hammered the front brake too hard).

Should be plenty heavy, I often use a 1/2oz tube on a 7’ medium spinning rod, and we jig as deep as 100’ in the summer and do just fine. If it’s calm enough or your anchored etc. sometimes a lighter rate of fall will get you more strikes than a fast drop down, it just takes a bit more patience to get it there. Try the heavier ones first, as it covers the depths quicker but if they’re a bit finicky, don’t be afraid to lighten things up a bit. And it’s way more fun fighting a big laker on lighter gear than heavy stuff anyway, just make sure your reel is full in case they decide to make a big run to the depths!

If it has whitefish, there’s a real good chance it has herring (Cisco) in it as well, which look almost exactly like a small whitefish. If not, they’ll be eating whitefish a fair bit, and that’s where the white matches.

It’s a pretty easy match to the smelts and herring they feed on here. Lots of colours will work, especially when trolling spoons but white is almost always the best choice around here.

I troll for and catch a lot of big lakers on Georgian Bay every year, but when conditions are right ( calm, flat water), this, is the absolute number one bait around here for vertical jigging.

From my experience, when my now 9 year old started at about 3, he used to cast a hookless rapala xrap off the back of the boat while we trolled for trout in the spring. Once he was ready to cast for bass, I started him with single hooked lures. A simple jighead with a grub or 7” Berkley powerworm will cast a long way, can be swam back to the boat or if they get bored, can be dropped/drifted behind the boat and catch a ton of fish. Single hooks are also much safer when little ones are learning to cast around others. A Texas rigged senko type bait is also a great lure, as they can work it fast along the surface if they want or like my son often does, cast it out, sit down with a book, and let it stroll behind the boat while I cast a shoreline,( he often will outfish me this way until I smarten up and switch baits). Once they graduate to treble hooked lures, a crainkbait or jerkbaits can be productive, as well as give them something to watch as it moves along. It’s all about keeping them busy and having fun. And if your fishing around cover, they love a good topwater like a buzzbait or frog, especially when they can watch it come over the surface.