fin

I've had my share of trouble with Strike King spinnerbaits too, especially the swivels, but I also lost a nice fish after the wire broke on one. It was probably due to bending back and forth. I don't know if I ever had a War Eagle. I had a bunch of spinnerbaits somebody gave me, and I think there were some War Eagles in that batch. I don't remember any trouble with them.

My understanding is that polarization is pretty much standard, across the board. Polarization is not going to help much if there's not a glare on the water, so in low light it doesn't help, sometimes it makes it worse. Also your position relative to the sun and to the glare has a huge effect. For example, if the sun is behind you, and high, and the glare is in front of you, that is optimum to get a good effect from polarization. If the sun is in front of you, it doesn't help as much. If you are comparing them side by side with your old glasses as you said, then maybe it is the photochromism, I don't know anything about it, but I do have a lot of experience with polarization from old-school photography.

What makes you think the skirt ring is metal? I would assume it's a plastic or rubber material. Some spinnerbaits are made with skirts/rings like that. You might already have some. I've tried this homemade type before and never was very impressed with the way it worked. Never tried those Gamblers though. I've always thought someone should make sinkers like the Boss product @Catt linked. Then you could buy your own skirts in bulk, get some o-rings and you're set.

I've always fished with the lightest weights possible, but I like your logic and some of the other comments here about heavy weights. I think I may try some heavier weights in the coming days. The amount of weight I use is chosen based on how the bait looks falling or hopping, based on what creature it is. I'm trying to replicate how real creatures move. That means lighter weights for small to medium worms, heavier weights for bigger worms, heavier weights for craws, sort of medium weight for baitfish/shad baits. I see tungsten as snake oil. I'm probably wrong, based on how many knowledgeable people believe in it, but my belief fits my budget ? You realize you're going two different directions, right? One example you gave is going heavier, the other is going lighter. (1/8 = 2/16) to 3/16 (3/8 =6/16) to 5/16 Besides that, going from 1/8 to 3/16 is an increase around 33% and going from 3/8 to 5/16 is a decrease at a much smaller percentage. If I didn't suck at math, I could tell you how much of a smaller percentage ? ...around 18%, I think. So the answer to your question is yes!

If the bait was something like a Whopper Plopper then color might rule, because there's not much you can do with the presentation - it's either on or off. On the other hand, whether color even matters on a Whopper Plopper is another question.

One person tells two other people, those two tell four others, etc. etc. That's always been the case, and now with social media, it's multiplied by 100. Seeing is believing, but seeing a lot of people fish a certain area could all be based on someone's exaggeration from 10 years ago. I’ll listen to what people have to say, just like I read these forums. You don’t have to believe everything people say to get good ideas from them. I'd say both extremes are bad - ignoring everything or believing everything. You've got to sort it, that's part of the sport.

That’s the way I see it. I’ve caught fish on jigs, but my experience is very similar to OP’s. In my lake, I have to really search to find fish most of the year, and searching with jigs, I lose a lot more than with worms, and that aggravates me. Jigs are a lot more expensive than worms, so it makes sense to me to fish with worms or craw trailers or other soft plastics t-rigged or with weighted hooks. I don’t hate jigs, I like fishing them. I know they catch fish. I know if I fished nothing but jigs I would eventually catch more fish on jigs. I have tons of trailers and a fair amount of jigs that I’d like to fish, but experience has shown me over and over that other methods are more productive for me.

Take a look at the VMC catalog. It's got a lot of information in it. There's a lack of standards in the industry, that's for sure. Even the terminology varies depending on who you're talking to. Standards don't just occur naturally, usually there's a trade organization behind them that dealers, manufacturers and retailers pay dues to. I don't know if there's ever been one in the non-commercial fishing industry.

You definitely want to use the Closed Captioning on that one, but it's short and good.

And here we see a Rogers Big Jim in its native environment - a bird's nest. ? Love that color and sheen. I can see why that is a killer.

Oh wow, never would have considered that. I'll try it if I didn't throw out the can. I have one of those covid face shields I could use.

Not cheap anymore either. I've got a can that's half full but the pressure is gone from it. Aggravating. I said earlier I used water to clean one, but to be clear, it had Dawn dishwashing liquid in it, which is a mild de-greaser.

There's a lot of difference between the two, but I've never had a problem with either of them staying above the water. The Junior is possible I guess, but I think you'd have a hard time getting a regular to go under. All I can imagine is you're using some kind of big snap, or something that's adding a lot of weight.

It’s okay to believe in magic lures. It’s only when you start trying to explain them that you sound nutty. ?

I just went through the process of cleaning two Lew’s baitcasters that had been underwater for a few years. The insides were full of mud. On one of them I cleaned the one-way clutch with a Q-tip and mineral spirits, on the other, just water and a Q-tip. No oil. I’ve made that mistake before. lol. I had no problems with either of those bearings - no slipping, no grittiness, nothing. The only problem I had was with one of the bearings behind the spool tensioner on one reel. That reel had a rough feeling to it, but that feeling would go away when I took out the spool. That’s how I tracked down the problem. The bearing would turn freely, but occasionally it would stick a little. It’s kind of strange that translates into a ‘rough feeling’, but if you think about the spool shaft turning inside a bearing that's locked-up, it makes sense. Anyway, I sprayed some PB Blaster on the bearing and let it sit for a few minutes, then it turned freely. I re-oiled it, put it back in the reel and after that, the reel turns smoothly. I’ve found that just because you expect the problem to be one thing doesn’t mean that’s where the problem really is. Sometimes you just create new problems. I would suggest checking all the other bearings very carefully. I used an old broken rod that I removed all the guides from. Slide the bearing down the rod until it gets stuck, and then it's real easy to check how well it turns.

This is the first lefty reel I've ever tried, so I don't know if it's true for all, but only the crank shaft is threaded backwards, the spool tension knob isn't, but it turns backwards for a right-handed person. Classy. They use water bottles around here. I saw one guy using things that looked like ping pong paddles that were carved by hand. Obviously a pro. He was probably a tournament fisherman.

On this lake I've fished for like 10 years, normally the bass will school up and feed on shad at a certain place. They still feed there, but only one or two at a time and not very often, when it used to be like 10 fish at a time much more often. I've caught doubles there before when they were feeding like that, but I think the odds of me catching a double this year are like one in a million.

The only thing I can imagine is you're casting side-arm and your timing is off. Maybe your rod is heavy and your lures are too light? Or vice versa. If you're casting overhand, then I have no idea. If you catch a fish from up there you're liable to break your rod trying to land the fish. Or kill the fish dragging it up the bank. I second the recommendation of watching a lot of videos.

A wind-surfing rig? I finished cleaning and lubing the Lew's Mach Crush reel I had found. It's a much better reel than the Mach1 Speed Spool, and I like the feel of the rod better too. If only the Crush wasn't left-handed. I played around with it some at the lake this morning, but the lefty thing is too much for me. It's hard enough for my uncoordinated self to turn the reel, but setting the drag backwards on the fly and setting the tension knob backwards is too much.

If you do it with shoestring you can see that when you put the loop on top, it's really hard to get it cinched down tight. There's a bit of a gap in there unless you really work at it. That maybe why it looks less compact.

I'd be lucky to have two fish within a hundred feet of each other on my lake here lately. lol I wonder if you could do the same thing with a small lipless, just remove the rear hook? Like a 1/8 oz Bill Lewis Tiny Trap. Or just break the lip off a small crank bait. I may have to try that.

I suggest you try this with a piece of shoestring, or something large enough so you can really see what's going on. When you do that, you'll see the answer is the loop goes towards the bottom, around the bight. You'll see that you end up with two pretty different things when you put it at the top or the bottom. The point @TOXIC made about keeping the bight open with your fingers as you're bringing the loop around is good - it helps make it easier to be consistent with where you place the loop.

There's some fishing line way up in a tree at that lake that I can't get to. It's actually got feathers hanging on it. I think we just aren't around when birds run into it. There are lots of limping ducks and geese around that lake. The old park manager used to capture injured ones and remove the line/lures from them. He got a job at another park though, and nobody else since him has the patience to do that (including myself). The ducks and geese aren't valued, they are a nuisance to a lot of people, so nobody cares enough to do it and regulations prevent them from killing them. I figure the least I can do is pick up line and pull it down from trees. It's not that hard to do. It's not just for the ducks, there's also bald eagles, ospreys, several types of herons, etc.

I just posted those two rods because they were pretty nice, but I've found probably 5 or more other rods, with or without reels, since spring. That's a pretty impressive roll of line you've got there. I've been picking up a lot of trash lately too. Hoping it will help my fishing karma.

Good question. I always thought it was supposed to be on bottom, not on top. Those little details can sometimes make a huge difference, and that detail is not shown in any of the illustrations. Animatedknots shows it towards the bottom, kind of in the middle.