Hook2Jaw

I'll second the Berkley stick and the Trion. I used to fish the tar out of those reels until I started using my spinners in the salt.

I don't think anyone has mentioned it yet, but bright braid really helps me detect the bite. I try to keep about 7' of light fluoro FGd to the end of it. More often than not, you will see the braid react to the bite. It's almost like bobber fishing.

You can just quiver it in place after the bottom treble catches on a pad. Game. Changer.

Baitcaster, broomstick, bream. This is my most expensive combo, and I know the price pales in comparison to a lot of the reels and rods you guys own, but I'm very proud of it.

Power fishing an H2O Xpress Ultimate Jerk Shad.

I like my Daiwa DXSB 8' HF, it's rated for 2-8oz baits but it comfortably throws 1-4oz. If you go with that stick, I would step up one power. I believe that will handle your bait range just fine. I started off my swimbait setup with a Daiwa Millionaire Classic UTD, but I'm switching to a Daiwa Lexa-WN 300. After throwing my buddies Daiwa Lexa-HD 300 all day, I've become a fan of that reel line. You can get the stick for 110ish and that reel for about 130 on Amazon.

@J Francho, I think I'm about to give the Southeast KBF Trail a go next year.

Come on this way, @J Francho, and we'll find a 120 pound tarpon to tow that Compass. Do you fish KBF?

lol, leave your drive down in the big rollers off Tybee Island here while fishing for Spanish Mackerel and let me know how that added stability works out.

the screws on the prop scare me. I personally doubt they'll start selling replacement props and it looks like a great failure point. I plan to grab one of these guys this weekend and fish it, and I'm gonna put a dab of locktite on the screws to make sure they don't back off and try not to throw the thing into seawalls. I wish it was just a single, molded tail section like the R2S and Berkley offerings with two props. Still, it's only 7 bucks and when Academy does their sales on their H2O line I bet they'll be listed at 4 bucks.

I think it just happens sometimes, I had a wolf pack of bass attacking my jerk bait the other day and couldn't get a hook in them. Shortly thereafter I started catching them back to back to back, and the day before that had a small double on it. All my hard baits have VMC hooks because they come stock with them, or, in the case of my Red Eye Shads, I switched to them. I like lighter wire and set my jerkbait rod to 2# of drag with my scale. 10# fluoro. My soft baits all get BPS XPS hooks, and I use them with soft plastics in the inshore salt as well. I don't miss many fish with them and when they're hooked, 19 times out of 20, they're in the boat. I do keep a diamond stone in my pocket and often brush my hooks down until they pass the nail test. My suggestion is to keep a sharpener handy, use it, and realize that sometimes, **** just happens.

I just posted a nice bass caught on a cheap bait for folks like me, on the fence about it, or folks who didn't know about it. Of course it's not going to sound like a WP, not even the Choppo does that, but I could see myself tying this on when the fish are more aggressive or in dingier water to help them find the bait.

Awesome thread, guys! I cannot wait to take everything I've learned here and apply it.

The Choppo is a good bait. The only thing I own from R2S is S-Waver 168s, and they're probably the only thing I'll ever own from R2S when the Berkley Choppo already crushes fish for me.

I guess someone decided to take the sub 10 dollar hit and has been throwing the H2O Xpress Double Plopper from Academy. Saw this on Facebook this morning, he also had a picture of the scale reporting 10 pounds, 8 ounces. I may have to add a couple of these to the topwater box. The man said he catches them all the time on that bait, and that he throws it more than his Whopper Ploppers.

If the casting distance difference is gonna be negligible, I'm gonna save thirty bucks and grab the CT. The smaller reel will work better for my baby hands. I was mostly just wondering if the 100mm handle will make a difference when it comes to deep plugging all day long.

With one of my goals this year being learning to fish lakes and starting from the most glaring difference between lakes and my comfort zone, ponds and rivers, being the offshore bite, I've decided that with the summer heat quickly rising and my first lake trip with the kayak being about a month away, I want to finally purchase a deep cranking setup. I'll be sticking the reel on a 13 F-a-t-e C-h-r-o-m-e 7'9" cranking stick and hoping I like the rod. I like that normal series of rod, so that makes sense to me. My question is, am I going to see a noticeable difference with my casting distance between the Tatula 150 and Tatula CT? I'll be spooling one of the two with 12# fluoro and tossing Berkley Dredger 17.5s to 25.5s, for those who want more specifics.

I fished in the downpour on Saturday and culled 35 dinks out of a local pond. Lost a good one, tried to walk the log she wrapped up on, and ended up busting my tail. I was soaked anyway, so I just toughed it.

I can't catch squat on a bladed jig. @J Francho, never again.

Like someone mentioned above, kinks are bad for fluoro so if I get a bad backlash, I'll change it before the next trip or on the spot if I've got line. Otherwise, I change braid almost never and fluoro about every 3 or 4 months.

As a budget rod guy myself, I use the 13 Fishing Defy Black series for jerkbaits, topwater, small paddletail swimbaits, spinnerbaits, chatterbaits, and squarebills. Basically, anything that's a tight line presentation with either treble hooks or excessive feedback. They're not the most sensitive rod I've ever thrown, but they're sensitive enough. They're also budget friendly and in my opinion, attractive. As far as bottom contact goes, I step up to the *** line, and they're light, sensitive, and strong. I also plan to get two more, one for frogging and the other for pitching jigs. I've seen some of these sticks go for 60 bucks on Amazon and eBay. I still haven't decided which line to go with for crankbaiting, but I think the devil is in the details with that technique so I might opt for more sensitivity.

@fishwizzard, do you think an 8' 1-4oz will handle that task?

Glad to hear that about the gill, about to pull the trigger on one.

Yep, and Rayo still managed to beat him beating the banks.

Thanks, Francho! Sadly, most of the kayakers around here are strictly inshore fishermen.