DitchPanda

I'm kinda in the senko as a last resort for bass guy. If that doesn't work I'll sometimes try a small grub for anything that bites. And if that doesn't work I'll pick up a 6pk go home...drink...and feel sorry for myself.

I use boss heads...make my own skirts...trim and tie them northern style. They run pretty true...as long as the trailer is rigged correctly!

I use several brands...booyah, strike king, war eagle...my hands down favorite the past few years is Nichols

If it's a nice clean bottom creek a net will work fine...if there is junk in it like wood, rock or chunks of concrete I would use a trap. A cast net likes to get tangled in everything and you will tear it up trying to get it loose in my experience.

I use the contrasting color only to highlight normally. Half tab blue to 2 tabs black. Bluegill skirts I use 1.5 tabs green pumpkin...3 strands each blue,orange and chartreuse. If I'm being honest the color is mostly for me...I catch just as many fish on straight brown, green, white or black as I do with multi color skirts. Maybe more.

The crawbug is one of those baits that intrigue me. Yes it looks real but it also looks like it has no action. Yet guys that use them swear by them. May be time to throw a few bags in the cart!

Didn't understand the whole deal. I can't get how with the way social media is and that many high profile pros including his dad running around...how he ever coulda thought he could get by pulling some dumb s#$% like that without it getting out. Pretty stupid.

Guess the point I was making is how long does this guy get to claim dibs on a spot? The OP said this has been going on for ten years...Ten Years. Now I'm all for fishing ethics...I don't roll up on somebody and I don't like it done to me. When it happens to me I usually leave the spot...sometimes I say something. But this guy can't Lord over a spot nonstop for a decade...at some point the ethical clock runs out and now it's just bordering on ridiculous. I agree with what you said about not fishing something in a tournament after a guy kills them on it. But there again we have seen this play out in big tournaments...lots of gray area...if two guys fish it first day without knowing the other one did who gets it next day? Biggest thing to me is how do you feel about it? If your conflicted about it then don't do it. For me I'm all about fishing ethics to a point. But if I know an area of the lake well and want to fish it but keep losing out because of boat draw or because some guy thinks he needs a 300hp in a club tourney and I should just bow down to him because I don't have 45k to spend on a motor...well that's not gonna happen. I will give him his space, I will fish behind him...but I'm going in.

Like I've mentioned before I grew up outside of Houston...in Deer Park, Texas to be exact...about 45 miles from Galveston. I also lived in Mississippi and Louisiana as a child. I'm familiar with how scary these storms can be. I'm praying for everybody down that way.

That is strange...that ring craw looks like a combo of the critter craw and the big bite. I bought those big bite one time and was not impressed.

Same for me just add in swim jig. Those are all I need once the temps start dropping until the water gets into the low 50s.

So what your saying is if a guy catches fish off a ledge that is a known community spot on let's say a TVA lake and wins a bassmasters tournament next year nobody can fish that ledge because he owns those fish? To me it sounds like everybody knows this spot and now this guy has a stranglehold on it..so the other guys should stay out of his way and just give him the money? I don't get that logic or understand where it ends. If you are getting your butt kicked throwing a swim jig by a guy throwing a Spinner bait are you supposed to not switch and just go down with the ship?

Who is using these? What are your preferred rigging methods? Looks like a great little smallmouth bait...I'm going to a small river tomorrow and I've got one T-rigged with an 1/8oz bullet,bead and a 1/0 round bend worm hook.

So today I went out to a local pond that's normally good to me in the middle of the summer. Hit it a few weeks ago for 2 hours midday and caught 11 nice bass. Today was not like that...caught 1 in 2 hours and was kinda bummed. But 2 things made me smile 1) realizing I could have been at work...2) finally managed to get a pad crasher jr. somebody lost out of a tree I've been working on the past few times out. Yeah it was hot and slow but I caught a bass and got a free frog..could be much worse.

For me I've had better luck on bone or shad colored poppers and walkers. But for buzzbait and frog I throw black 90% of the time.

While I would agree with this on something like a brush pile or rock pile on a point I would hardly say that a 9 acre stump field is a spot this guy found. Take me to a lake I've never been to and if I see a stump field like that I'm gonna fish it. This "hypothetical spot" sounds like a well known area that others are well aware of its potential but are losing a boat race. That's to big of an area for one guy to claim so id fish it...if you feel yourself getting to close back off. Hell some of the ponds I fish aren't even half that size...but when I get to it first I don't go up to anybody that shows up and tell them to leave since its my spot.

This right here. I have stuff that's really nice and stuff that's not as refined but still very funtional. Lures and terminal tackle I use is the same everywhere. I don't have boxes of good stuff and boxes of cheap stuff I throw in unfamiliar places. I use what I have confidence in and that's good, solid middle of the road lures and hooks with a proven track record...I'm not bending out a hook on a 6 or God forbid 8lber to save 50 cents. Top line perfectly sums up my jig and Texas rig fishing...when I flip in cover that lure is lost if I get it back for another flip that's a bonus. If there's a fish on it when it comes back...even better.

I to am like many above...didn't grow up poor but didn't grow up rich. Parents both worked..dad worked alot...both taught me the value of hard work at a young age. Been basically working full time since I was a senior in high school...I've has a few small short things but since I was 18 I've only had 3 jobs. So I work now making decent money...and while I don't buy top end gear I have a lot of nice stuff that I take care of but I use it. I believe that if I have the money to spend on it I should be ok with what happens if I'm using it and something goes wrong.

This time of year when it's super hot if it's slow enough for me to want to stop fishing I do that and go home. During nicer weather which for me up here is 35 to 80 so a big chunk of the year...the fishing is usually good. Sometimes if I'm out spring or fall and just want a break I'll walk shorelines and look for lures. Spring I'll sometimes hunt morels.

This past week we've had 5 days above 95 yesterday the heat index was 107 at one point which is very high for here when it's almost september. Looks like starting next week the temps are mostly high 70s with lows in the mid 50s...still need some rain tho.

Yeah that whole deal was a joke...Jed was kinda being a crook. From what I heard Tom tore the invoice up and told Mike Surman it was on the house .

It's hot here...not 114 but still hot. I can tolerate hot but what sucks is we are in basically drought conditions...we haven't had measurable rain in over a month easy and this is the lowest I've seen the river since 2011. I'm ready for fall to cool off and hopefully get a decent amount f precipitation. What I'm not ready for is the 4 or 5 months of winter after.

Never thrown that color but Houdini and Copperfield look good to me for trailers

Well for me in my waters it's pretty straightforward. I have 3 to 4 rods usually rigged as such: 1 medium or medium heavy baitcaster with a seasonal moving bait: spring and fall it's usually a spinnerbait or lipless..summer it's usually a swim jig or squarebill. 1 medium heavy baitcaster with a flipping jig or Texas rigged worm...worm more in summer. 1 medium or medlight spinning rod with a finesse presentation: grub and leadhead, weightless worm or Ned rig. Ned rig in very hot or cold water...weightless worm prespawn thru spawn...grub when they focus on shad like now until fall sets in hard. 1 seasonal rod which can be anything from medium casting rod for jerkbaits or poppers...heavy casting rod for frogs....medlight spinning for shad raps. You can get deep into colors and drive yourself crazy trying to match every forage species around you. For me my most consistent ways of doing things are: in hard to see conditions like low light time periods, overcast rainy conditions or muddy water I use black, black blue or junebug. All other conditions I use brown or green pumpkin base to match crawfish or sunfish species...or white base to match shad. One area where I think color matters is very clear water but I don't fish that often around me. Also it matters in topwater it seems...80% of my topwater fish are caught on black regardless of light conditions or prey.

Agreed...covering water with a C rig. Dissecting a piece of cover with a Texas rig.