Glaucus

Only a bass fisherman's autocorrect changes "needs" to "neds."

12# YZH

Medium for everything you described. Funny enough I had something similar happen to me 2 summers ago. I was fishing a shallow river with my buddy and my Whopper Plopper caught my Ned Rig rod on a cast and cracked it.

I caught this big girl a year and a half ago on a green pumpkin and orange Ned Rig in about a foot of water. This river is a glorified creek in Central Illinois. It seems like nobody but myself and people I trust to tell know that big bass live here if you know how to find them and catch them.

I don't know. I haven't used them since I first started fishing a decade ago, but I can't recall ever having a problem with them other than pitching with them made me miserable but that could be because I was newer to it. But here's this:

A little above your price range but Dobyns has this: http://dobynsrods.com/rod/sa-705sf/

That's not what I said, but we are on different wave lengths. "Great victory today, Jeff! How'd you do it?" "You see, we eliminated half the crowd right away with terrible boat positioning. I made especially sure that the guy in my boat had no opportunities. He's probably better, so I had to screw 'im." Not into it. If you are, cool.

So much for respect and courtesy amongst gentlemen who share the same passion. I guess my morality and integrity is a lot different. Personally I want to be a better fisherman and a good host. I don't want to position a guy out of fishing effectively and make him have a miserable time.

Strange thing about the Fury and many Dobyns rods. Some people swear their F action is MF and some people swear it's XF. I'm in the MF camp.

Interestingly at 3/16oz my Fuegos are sketchy but cheap reels like the Silver Max sling them.

It would be nice if companies would print both the weight of the lead and the total weight of the lure so we didn't have to scale everything.

One time I was in the back of somebody's boat picking off a ton of fish with a lipless that he wasn't catching with a Texas Rig.

They've always shipped to me in strong cardboard tubes like TW. I'm not so sure but ok.

If you order through Fenwick they ship similarly to TW.

I've never had a problem with Fenwick, from Eagle to HMG to Elite Tech.

I believe in a 6 rod and reel system, especially if you're not fishing from a boat. The staples for me are: M/F Spinning 2500 Reel M/F Casting 6 Speed Reel MH/F Casting 6 Speed Reel A M powered spinning rod can handle all of your finesse fishing needs, although not always being optimal, but serviceable, for Ned Rigs and dropshots. A M powered casting rod can handle everything from squarebills and lipless crankbaits, to Senkos, to finesse jigs, to lighter spinnerbaits, as well as poppers and more. A MH powered casting rod can handle Texas Rigs, jigs, chatterbaits, small swimbaits, spinnerbaits with trailers, some larger topwaters and more. A 6 speed reel, somewhere from 26-29 IPT is very versatile. Next is specialty in my mind: ML/F Spinning 2500 Reel M/MF or MH/MF 5 or 6 Speed Reel H/F 7 or 8 Speed Reel The ML powered spinning rod optimizes things like the Ned Rig and dropshot. The Moderate Fast casting rod is a crankbait rod. Power and reel speed is determined by what types of crankbaits you will throw and where. The H powered rod is your pitching, flipping, frogging stick. You can go 7 speed for more torque or 8 speed for more line pick up. After the staples, pick 2 of the 3 speciality setups depending on your needs for your trip. Or just up the number to 6.

I know very little about how a rod is made. I just know higher quality, more expensive rods are generally lighter, better balanced, and actions are truer (cheap rods tend to be more parabolic). I'm chiming in to say that Favorite rods are garbage and I would never shop anywhere where staff is pimping them as the best thing. The Googan Squad popularized them, but even they've moved away from them. Saying Favorite is better than Loomis, Dobyns, Croix, etc is like trying to convince someone this year's Dolphins team is better than the Patriots. It's laughable and blatantly false.

Drag systems are so good these days I don't understand why guys still need to ability to back reel. Shimano knows it so the scrapped it.

A lot of people have problems with the line lay on the Fuego LT. The Fuego CT baitcaster is great but the spinning reel needs work. Shouldn't have to add washers to a $100 reel out of the box. Nasci all day.

Shimano Nasci

The Sierra is more sensitive but it's a slower action. A fast Fury and a fast Sierra are not the same.

The Fuego is more user friendly and more forgiving to novice baitcast anglers. Awhile back I had a spare rod sitting around without a reel. I was trying to decide between the SLX and the Speed Spool. Ultimately I went with the Speed Spool because the SLX is tiny; it doesn't hold as much line and it has a much lower IPT by gear ratio compared to the Speed Spool. I only used it once due to certain circumstances, but it was smooth and very palmable. I like the Speed Spool better than the Fuego because 1. I can use any baitcaster due to experience and 2. It fits in my hand a lot better; the Fuego is a big tank. If you have small hands like me and you're not afraid of the learning curve, I'd consider the Speed Spool.

Negative.

I'm doing some stocking under the assumption that I will be back on the water sooner rather than later. I typically fish between 1-10 fow, usually around 5-6 fow. What size Dark Sleeper should I get?

I'm a left handed reeler. In a perfect world I'd probably chuck and wind reeling with my right hand and fish bottom contact baits using my left hand to reel, but the majority of my rods serve multiple purposes so I stick with left handed reels.