papajoe222

I get the same thing with the Gulp products. I used the TurtleBack worm a lot during the spring and was dumbfounded as to the number of cats I was catching. I wasn't surprized to catch a catfish while bass fishing, but like you I'm talking numbers not the occasional cat on a crank or spinner. One of the guys at my club hooked a 23# cat on the exact same worm, so I know it wasn't just a fluke thing for me. I stopped using them for a couple of reasons, price and the fact that if you don't use a hook with a keeper they're constantly sliding down the hook shank. BTW, I used them in a catfish contest later in the year and got skunked. Go figure

Well, today marked the final outing of the season for me. If I'd let the weather dictate my decision to go or not, I would've stayed home. Windy,rainy, changing conditions are not what I'd hoped for, but that's what I braved to get out one more time before waterfowl season starts. My rain gear proved it's worth and my persistance paid off even though I was driven off the water by lightning for the better part of an hour. My final tally was 17 bass and two walleye and although none of them were anything to brag about, I was happy to end the season on a high note. Now it's calendar watching time. Second week-end in March the power plant lakes open. Let's see, that's how many days?

So I decided to try my hand at rod building this off season and started out practicing wraps on a couple of rods we already have. This is the wife's favorite, so I did it in her favorite color and then added a little splash of color to the reel. I added the butt cap and did the guides with a silver under wrap and lavender over wrap. I know it isn't the best, but for a first try, I think it turned out fairly nice.

I fished spinning reels for over 30 years, reeling with my left hand and casting and holding the rod in my right. I am extremely right hand dominate and can't even buff the wood with my left hand let alone cast. When I started fishing baitcasters, however, I couldn't get comfortable reeling with my left. I'd end up moving my hand trying to get that familiar balance you have with the reel under the rod instead of on top. Luckily the shop where I bought the reel exchanged it out for a right handed model and I do all my casting and reeling with my right hand for baitcasters. I can't get my head wrapped around doing the same with a spinning combo, likely because of all those years of lefty cranking.

You'll likely think I'm a little loony (BTW, I am), but check one of these out in 7ft. M/H Fast. http://www.basspro.c...10183/#wishlist Don't let the price fool you. It's a boron matrix/IM9 graphite blank and sports PacBay guides. Very light and sensitive. It isn't a St.Croix, but you could spend $300 on G.Loomis and waste $200. I don't own a St.Croix, but I do have a GLX and although it isn't used for the same technique as my Browning, I feel the Midas is on par as far as sensitivity and is definitely lighter.

That'd be a good choice for two reasons. First is the cone shape of the head and second is the verticle line tie. Both help you get your jig through the weeds without catching on them, or should I say they reduce the tendency to catch weeds. As far as your brush/grass inquiry, brush is a type of wood cover (submerged bushes, cut branches, beaver houses, etc.) and grass is a generic term for vegetation.

A Stanley WedgeHead, if you can find some, are one of the best for fishing through weeds. I fish a stand up jig head that comes to a point at the line tie with either a Reaper or paddle tailed worm as a trailer. You can use craw trailers, but anything with an action tail, or limbs will give you some problems. Oh yea, don't forget to give whatever jig you're going to use a good dose of oil based attractant. That'll help keep the weeds from clinging to it.

Congrats on the twins. You're a very lucky guy.Don't give up on this season just yet. Waterfowl season doesn't start for a couple of week-ends. Although they're not my first choice for this time of year, you can still work on those finess presentations without waiting until next year (you're not a Cub's fan, are you?). I'm in the same boat as you when it comes to the long off season and also with my fav lake being only 12ft. deep at the deepest spot. I do drop shot and split shot, but one of my fav finess presentations for that shallow water is a Slider jig with a finess worm or 4in. grub. Charlie Brewer intoduced these jigs years ago and other than a Fuz-e-grub was the only finess presentation I used for decades. I too, consider myself a power fisherman and the past few years, it's been allmost impossible to switch gears when those tactics don't work. I broke out some of my 'old school' gear last week when the spinnerbait and crank weren't getting a first, let alone, a second look. The Slider jig and an old stand-up jig with a Reaper saved the day and got me my second largest fish this season along with half a dozen other nice ones. I don't ice fish, so my off season has been filled with fishing related activities. Last winter I took to tieing my own feathered treble hooks and attempting my hand at custom painting some well worn lures. This year I'll be doing some custom rod wrapping on my favorite rods and taking my first shot at building a rod. You, on the other hand, will be too busy changing diapers so I suggest just organizing your gear and maybe switching out some trebles if the boys give you enough break time. :-)

I always start out fishing a spinnerbait or buzzer with a trailer hook, it's saved the day for me on many occasions. I'll remove it if the fish I'm catching are hooked on the front hook inside the mouth as I've had the same thing happen when a fish takes the whole bait in it's mouth. If I feel I'm missing fish later on, I'll go back to a trailer hook. If you still want to use a trailer after having this happen, go to one with a shorter shank so it doesn't drop down between the gills if you hook one on the front hook.

Are you sure it broke at the knot? It's very uncommon for this to happen unless the knot was tied incorrectly and if that were the case, it likely would have failed with the fish on not after. I check my line after every catch for fraying, or nicks and I retie after every snag whether I see line damage or not. It sounds more like the line broke somewhere else. Check your guides to make sure you didn't loose an insert or there isn't a nick in one and strip off a few feet of line and check it for kinks.

Great work. On a side note, I LOVE the scale finish on that rod. Did you do that yourself?

There are two times I use them. The first is when marking a piece of structure like a bend in a creek channel. I'll drop enough bouys on the shallow side of the bend, to get a good idea of where the bend is and then fish the drop or deep side (just the opposite if I want to fish the lip). The other time is when I'm targeting a school. I'll toss a single marker out as soon as I hook a fish and if I drift off the spot I can get back without having to mark a way point or guess where I was. In either case, as mentioned, don't cast directly to the marker. Keep your offering to one side or the other. On a saftey note, use caution when retrieving markers that you've tossed into shallow water. I hit a boulder as I was reaching for one of mine earlier this year. I was going to just reach down and grab it as I went by, but the boat stopped when I hit that boulder and I didn't! Luckily when I was tossed into the water, it was between boulders and aside from ruining an i-phone, I was none for the worse.

Square bills were designed to reduce the possibility of getting hung up when fishing wood or rocky cover and it's there that they shine. Like most cranks, they can be fished any time of year, although you may need to vary the retrieve. Yes, they will trigger inactive fish when bounced off of cover. The sudden change in direction of the lure often triggers a reaction strike. There are much better bill designs than the square bill for fishing weeds and they're usually combined with a fat body to the lure. These narrow, pointed bills won't pick up as many weeds as a square bill and the fat body helps keep the swinging trebles from catching on the weeds. Square bills still get hung up and pointed bills on fat bodied cranks still catch some weeds, but they do their job better than the standard bill and that's why they're on the market. One thing to remember when fishing any style of billed or lipped crank; when that bait does contact the cover, stop your retrieve momentarily. Same thing when you rip it free from clinging weeds.

I use a good pair of side cutters (not the drop forged ones) for most bass hooks. I also keep a pair of mini bold cutters in my boat for the occasional saltwater hook and for my muskie gear.

I very rarely figure out how fast or slow the fish want my presentation before I hit the water. Actually, I don't even attempt to. Neither should you. If you stick to one retrieve speed, or one lure retrieved at a particular speed, you'll often than not get frustrated because you're not catching. A fish's strike zone (how far it will go to chase down a bait) can very from inches to yards and anywhere inbetween. This is why on some days you can only catch 'em on finess baits dangled in their faces, or jigs flipped tight to the cover they're holding to and on other days you can burn a spinnerbait or crank around that same cover and almost get your rod ripped out of your hands. You, as the angler have to determine the speed and type of presentation that will work best on any given day, and that takes experimentation. It's foolish to go out for the day with only one bait tied on and the rest of your tackle left at home and it's just as foolish to go out and fish at the same speed the whole day. You may catch some fish either way, but the best presentation (lure and retrieve speed or fall rate) is going to turn a not so good of a day into an enjoyable one. Many guys will change colors before varying their retrieve. Of the two, color or retrieval speed, the retrieve rate is much more important. One of the easiest ways to determine what speed is best for any given lure on a particular day, is to vary it throughout the same cast. Once your crank, spinner, soft plastic gets to the depth you want it you can change the speed from moderate to fast or moderate to slow, or even stop it. Just remember what you were doing when you hook that first fish. Then use that as a guide for subsequent casts. It's like trying to figure out where in the water column the fish are. Once you catch one, say at 15 feet in 30ft. of water you should target that depth until the fish tell you otherwise. Then it's time to go back and figure out where. how and what they want.

Do a search on the tackle making forum under personalized rod making. That, hopefully, will get you the answer you're looking for. I just got into custom rod wrapping and am curious as to how you want to personalize the rod? BTW, I think it's a great idea to personalize rods, even if they're not custom rods, for someone.

no doubt here. Super Spook Jr. in bone color.

No easy answer here except one. KNOW YOUR QUARY. If you have a good idea where the fish will likely be, what their activity level is, what forage is available, etc., your choice is narrowed down for you. First and foremost; what is the fish's primary concern now, when you're on the water? Is it spawning, feeding, hiding from other preditors? Is the current bringing the food source to the fish, do they have to chase it down, can they hide in cover and ambush their prey? Lures are tools, just like your line, rod, reel, electronics,etc. If you have a good idea of what the job is that needs to be done, you will also have a good idea of what tools you'll need to do it. As I said: No easy answer here. The key to catching fish on a consistant basis is in finding them and as one great teacher (Buck Perry) once said: "90% of the fish in any given body of water are in 10% of that water."

Lately it's been CB's Hawg Sauce, but I've used many others. As long as it's oil based, I'll use it.

By far, a tube jig. The shape is perfect for skipping. I've skipped one under at out the other side of many a dock. If you lengthen the tentacles by cutting them a little longer, you can get them to flair out a little more when you let it sit.

Addict and trophy hunter here. I'll spend six hours without a bite in search of a hog one day and then go after schoolies that night only to be out at sun up the next day and do it all over again. BTW, I'm married, but she likes to get me out of her hair more often than not.

Black lights are popular because lines like original clear/blue Stren reflect the light similar to anything white. That makes detecting subtle hits much easier. The also afford enough light to assist in moving around the boat. I read somewhere that blacklight doesn't affect your night vision and doesn't penetrate the water the same as regular lighting.

Concerning the jig bite, I'd change your presentation to more of a swimming type than a drop or hopping style. You can combine it with a traditional jigging style and let the fish tell you what they prefer on any given day. Just give the reel handle a turn or two at the top of your lift. If they start hitting on the fall, stick with a straight jigging style, but if they hit while you're turning the reel handle........well, you know what to do. Here in the midwest I've found that the forage fish tend to move shallow before they move to their deeper winter haunts, so don't rule out those areas like beaches or spawning flats close to the deep water. If they're ignoring your craw colors, switch to a white jig. On the lakes and pits by me, that's my number one jig color once the temp drops into the 60's and below.

Sight is the bass' primary sence when it comes to feeding and that is what makes this type of bait so appealing. Although the scent may turn them away, it's the movement and silouette of the bait that gets their attention. I add scent to all my plastics and some hard baits also. My reasoning is to avoid rejection once I have a fish's interest.

Welcome to the board. I wouldn't be too concerned with that weight in moderate current/shallow water situations. You may, however, need to either trim down your trailer for a faster fall rate to get it down into the deeper holes, or if you run into a situation where you're trying to fish a current break. Too much bulk there will get your jig past your target before it gets down where you want it. If you've been fishing the same waters with, say a 1/4oz weight when worming you should be okay with a similar weight for your jig selection. Sorry, you mentioned that you've never fished those rivers, so it's going to take a little experimenting on your part