Big Hands

Not all the time, but quite a bit of the time, I am amazed at how long they will hold a bait. We can even have a subtle tog-of-war. I have had times when I could (and in some cases, had to) let the bass swim several feet with a plastic bait before setting the hook with a Carolina rig. I'm talking 15-20 feet! Sometimes like they will clamp down harder and really put the munch down when I apply a little pressure to them. OTOH, I enjoy watching Scott Canterbury fish a jig. His reaction time seems lightning fast to me and he uses a solid and crisp hookset.

If I see the line headed for the surface, IME, if I keep the pressure constant, the fish is probably going to continue to head for the surface and will jump to try to dislodge the hook. I prefer to not have them jump if possible, so there are a few different things I might try. 1) If I have a single hook and relatively large diameter line (for me that is 10# or heavier line), I will wait until they are just about to break the surface and then pull harder on them just as they come out of the water. This can pull them over onto their side and completely FUBAR their jump attempt. If they stay on their side, I can often keep them sliding on their side on top of the water and keep them coming right to the boat. I have done this with some pretty large bass (up to 12 lbs+). 2) If I am using a rod that is loaded up pretty far, and especially with lighter line, I will actually ease pressure slightly to see if they will turn and either swim parallel to the surface or start heading for the bottom. Something, anything, that will trigger them to do anything other than jump. 3) Sometimes I will stick the rod tip down into the water to change the direction of the pressure even though the pressure stays constant.

The ‘heat’ arrived much later than usual this year, and it’s been a little less intense than usual too. On the other hand, my 18 year old refrigerator quit at the beginning of the month. And then, on my way home with my new fridge, the clutch was on my car’s a/c compressor decided it would go on strike as well. I haven’t had a chance to fix that yet. The steering wheel gets so hot when I am parked at work, I have to use rags or gloves to hold onto it. I would fish early and/or later in the day, but the fishing the past few weeks (after being other-worldly good previously) has been absolutely abysmal. I normally find summers very enjoyable overall. The jury is still out on this one.

The first bass I ever hooked CHOMPED one of these pre-rigged worms. I saw the beast and had a bluegill bait rigged, but knew I had one of these in the package in my tackle box waiting for an opportunity, so I ran back to where my tackle box was sitting and hastily tied it on. When I ran back to the clearing in the reeds where I had spotted the giant bass, he was nowhere to be seen. I was kinda bummed, but tossed the worm to where I had last seen it. . . . just in case. Suddenly, the beast appeared and took up a position right behind the worm, looking straight at me, and just stared at it for several seconds. Her mouth opened a little and the gills started flaring, causing the worm to start vibrating, but not moving. And then it disappeared in the blink of an eye, maybe even quicker than that. The fight was on. Much like a Mike Tyson fight 30 years ago, we had a short but BRUTAL skirmish and again, much like a Mike Tyson fight 30 years ago, POW, and it was over. It's still as vivid as a memory can be . . . . from nearly 50 years ago. =========================== Back to the original topic: There is nothing stopping anyone from fishing BFS-ish baits with spinning gear, and having success with it, like they have for several decades. Various techniques/baits may work best with spinning vs casting gear and vice-versa, but it certainly doesn't exclude you from using what you have. And lets say I have a spinning combo that works OK for slinging jerkbaits. It catches fish and I always want a rig on the boat and ready to go. I also like throwing small swimbaits, or microjigs or some other BFS-ish type of bait and would always like to have a combo for that on the deck at the ready. There's no shame in having two rigs that can each be utilized effectively for many of the same techniques. . . . even if I don't have a flipping stick, a frog rod, a pitching rig as well as not having a big swimbait rig. You might want to have two rigs with a lot of crossover, and have some areas not covered by anything at all. At the end of the day, all of this is an enthusiast endeavor. A hobby. An extravagance. If you want to give it a whirl 'just because', I say that it's your money and you should spend it as you see fit.

Checks out!

Those are the hands of a working man. What are you doing to maintain callouses like that on both hands?

If anything, in spite of the IPT of the reel remaining constant regardless of handle length, a longer reel handle will tend to slow your retrieve speed because you will have to move the knob further to complete one revolution of the handle due to the increase in circumference.

I have both of these reels. I think the Tatula casts a little better, but I'm not a big fan of the T-Wing when using braid to leader because the knots can hang up on the T-Wing if the knot winds back up on the reel (longer leader than 5-6 feet). With that said, with a $150 max budget, I prefer my Shimano SLX MGL 70 to both of those particular Daiwa reels. They're not that much better casting, but the SLX MGL 70 does cast a little further. Mixing and matching brands on rods and reels rates somewhere near zero on a scale of 1 - 10 for me. If it works, it works. No need to limit my potential for the purpose of aesthetics. ========================= I had a good friend that had a few sets of identical rods that were wrapped in different colors (red, blue and green). He then matched the reel colors and line colors to match them. He could then choose which colored set he wanted to fish with on a particular day. Those combos stayed together all the time and were laid out in fine order in racks on the garage wall. Then he had a five drawer chest of drawers full of his spare reels, all round ABU Garcia Ambassadeurs or black ABU Garcia spinning reels. To me, this was extreme, but it was part of the joy he got from fishing, so I understand it from that perspective.

I'm curious to know how this turned out. Group 24 to power a 21' fiberglass boat with a 24v, 70 lbs thrust motor seems underpowered to me. As I understand it, a larger trolling motor run on a lower power setting (to achieve the same power to the prop) is more efficient (uses less battery). However, if he was truly mostly using the lowest settings, even the Group 24's should last longer than 4-5 hours. I think if he wants to continue with the 70 lbs 24v trolling motor on a 21' fiberglass boat, he should consider running Group 31 batteries. Group 31 deep cycle batteries can provide up 100 - 130 ah capacity vs Group 24 which can provide up to 70 - 85 ah capacity. To be tournament ready, that 21' fiberglass boat should be equipped with three Group 31 batteries and a 36v trolling motor with over 100 lbs thrust. This will be more important on some days than others, but that 24v 70 lbs TM on your boat will impact your ability to fish how you want to at some point or another. With all of that said, if money is tight, (and I have to do this myself at times) you do what you gotta do to get by and be happy you have the opportunity to fish high school tournaments at a national level. Kudos to your family to be able to provide you this very extraordinary opportunity. It's good to see that you are interested enough to learn for yourself, and I'm sure your pops is doing everything he can to support you.

I've put hands on the Legend Tournament Glass rods at my local tackle shop (several times actually as they have caught my attention), and they are surprisingly lightweight and feel like they have a great action for crankbaits. Not sure how I feel about the thickness of them as they are relatively thick. My concern about that is that when it's windy, that can be a little irritating to me to have that wind resistance that comes with thicker rods. I'd be lying if I said I didn't want to try one.

Given my experience with buying a couple of appliances recently that just happen to have wifi capabilities built into them (I bought slightly used, so paid less than half price and got the features that come with fancier models and could have done without the ability to communicate with my phone). But I, out of curiosity, downloaded the app to see if there was any actual utility to it. Surprise, surprise, the first thing they want is to have access to personal information, INCLUDING credit card numbers/info. Bzzzzzt, wrong. Denied. App deleted before it even gets started. So, out of curiosity to see if KastKing is up to the same sort of shenanigans, I downloaded their app and alas, I am not surprised to find my suspicions validated. Of course KastKing wants to get their grubby mitts on my personal information. It's almost like having access to our personal information is as important to them as whatever gizmo they are selling is to us, maybe even more considering what discounts some companies are willing to offer in order to gain access to it. Almost. . . . Maybe. I don't have to give access to my personal information to shop at a store if I shop there in person, especially if I am paying cash. These days, it's hard to even look at a product website without accepting a plate full of 'cookies'. The vast majority of product websites wouldn't go to the trouble of doing all of this if it wasn't somehow enhancing their bottom line, customer privacy be damned. What's next, bluetooth crankbaits that tell us how deep they dive and what the water temp is down there. . . . in exchange for a plate of 'cookies' that gives them access to my data/information?

For me: Many times I know it was a good day because I am feeling it as I am on my way home. On some days, I don't realize that it was good (or bad) and why until sometime later as I reflect on the experience. I don't have a set criteria. I have had days where I caught plenty of fish, or a big fish that I don't look back on fondly because of something I was feeling inside. It's not always about fishing and catching the fish that makes a day good or not so good.

In the Spring, my nephew gave me an Owner Flashy Swimmer with a Yamamoto swim worm on it that got me thinking. . . . I use Keitech Swing Impact paddletails on my Carolina rigs with excellent success. . . . So, I got some 4.8" Fat Swing Impact paddletails and 5/0 Flashy Swimmer (they're an underspin type jig with either a Colorado or willow blade underneath. I caught several nice bass dragging them through tules that were just sparse enough to get them through. I'll even throw them up against the edges of the dense tules. I was having so much success with them, I started finding other paddletail baits to use with them like Megabass Spark Shad, and also a bait made by Deps that has a tail more like a Fluke, but had a 'lip' that sticks up instead of down and gives the bait a wobble (in addition to the blade on the Flashy swimmer). So now, I have a box (two actually) dedicated to Flashy Swimmers in every size up to 8/0 (1/0, 3/0, 5/0, 6/0 & 8/0). I have caught bass on the 8/0 size using a bait called a Little Creeper. I use a pretty slow retrieve, just fast enough to turn the blades and get bit most often when pulling them through and bouncing off of cover/tules in fairly shallow water (< 5 feet). Seems like something that could work in the water you fish.

Flambeau "IKE" Ritual 50 Holds either 4 or 5 3700 boxes Holds two rods Side pouches with slots for various items including one that holds leader spool Might even come with a box or two Relatively inexpensive: I see them widely available for $49 I paid $40 for mine a few years ago. I wouldn't say they are heavy duty, but I have had mine for a few years and have had no problems with it. ------------------------- Evolution Outdoor makes a "Largemouth 3700" backpack that holds three 3700 boxes and a 3600 box. My son has one of their "Drift" series tackle bags (not a backpack)and I think I like it better than my Daiwa D-Vec Large Tackle Bag, which I am tempted to get to replace my Daiwa bag. They (evolutionoutdoor) have sale prices often if you can afford to be patient (seems like every month) ------------------------- Lew's also makes a 3700 backpack. I've never seen one in person, but it looks nice enough.

Millennium B-100 are pretty nice and not as pricey as those particular Wise offerings.

Long Beach Marina Kettle Cove Marina

I had a spool of line I was using for leader material suddenly begin failing. Lost three fish in a row, way too easily. I have had it happen before. The exact cause, I can't say, but I know ditching that spool of line and using another suddenly cured the problem. There has been a common denominator that I noticed of having had those spools of line on my deck recently for extended periods of time right before the failures happened. Coincidence? Maybe, but I'm not here to debate why. I just swap out spools of line and move on. And I will go back to not letting the spool sit in the sun and we'll see what happens.

I have been genuinely scared by twice that I can remember out on the water. The first time was at Lake Mead in the 70's. One minute it was glass calm, and within ten minutes it got super rough. We were in a 16' flat bottom ski boat and as we were trying to make our way back to the marina, we came across another boat full of people that had stalled out. We were able to tow them back and we all got out OK. The second time was at Castaic Lake. The main launch ramp is at the south end at the vertex of the "V" and has never had any sort of barrier to buffer waves. The first bad part was travelling in the troughs that were 5' - 6' deep and you couldn't see any shore at least part of the time. I was able to keep my 19' Ranger in the troughs and criss-crossed until I finally made it back to the ramp. The ramp presented a completely different set of dangers. I luckily had a passenger and was barely able to get him onto the docks that were pitching up and down, and then I had to get my bow either into the wind or going back and forth in the troughs. Then I had to literally surf the boat onto the trailer as my partner slammed the hook into the bow eye and yanked me out while we took breakers over the transom. Castaic Lake and Lake Isabella (but Isabella is about four times bigger) are similarly shaped and oriented and the wind can come up suddenly there too. They have a light at mid-point and if it comes on, you better get your boat to the nearest shoreline pronto. These incidents are why when the wind gets ugly, I am happy to head home sooner rather than later, and live to fish another day.

The best thing I can say about the wind is that if it blows hard enough, it makes all of us more equally ugly, and for some of us, that's a good thing. As for fishing, I like to have my boat holding while facing into the wind, but at some point, I just have to have the skills to be able to fish in whatever conditions are presented to me. Often, if the wind is blowing steady in one direction, it's blowing kinda hard. Less than that and it's more like the wind is 'light and variable' even if generally from one direction. The late Spring through early Fall weather pattern where I live is that on an average day, the wind will be coming in gently from the N/E early in the morning. Then, at some point in the morning, it goes slack for a period of time, and then comes in from the S/W, gently at first, and then blows 10-15 until the late afternoon/early evening. Then sometime in the middle of the night it shifts back to coming out of the N/E into the next morning. If I try to duck out of the wind, say behind a point or in a cove, it often changes directions over and over and I simply need to constantly adjust. The bottom line is that I don't worry about it that much, but I do find that some spots seem to turn on with a little breeze blowing across them and I have other spots that are holding fish regardless of how the wind is blowing and the question is 'do I want to fish here in these conditions?' Since no one is paying me to fish in conditions I find unpleasant, I am often not angry enough at the bass to insist on fishing in those conditions. If I can't find fish in a place where I enjoy fishing, I head home.

When using straight anything, you will be using your main line up much quicker. Every time you break off or retie, you’re losing length from your main line. With braid to leader, you can retie several times and lose nothing. Also, when you retie a new leader to your braid main line, you generally only need to lose less than a foot of braid to tie a ten to fifteen foot leader onto a nice fresh section of braid. For me, it’s far more economical to use braid to leader. Add to that, the fact that line twist is now negligible (albeit with the increased probability of wind knots), I find that I much prefer using braid to leader in terms of performance and cost. I’ll live with the extra complexity of having to tie the occasional Alberto knot vs. the other two factors. I use 10 lb braid (usually J-Braid, PowerPro or Sunline) and leaders of 6, 7 or 8 lb fluorocarbon. Mostly 7 or 8 lb fluoro leader. The ever-rising cost to put line onto a reel makes it even more appealing to use shallow spools or at least use something to essentially make the spool function as a shallow spool (backing of some sort) so I only need to use 50 to 70 yards of braid main line each time I refill. For example, I can get three refills out of a 150 yard spool of braid and that refill lasts much longer. An initial investment of buying two spools does hurt the first time, but it is much more cost effective from that point forward.

So glad we could share that day (morning, really). I won't ever forget it, that's for sure. We had at least five doubles and with fish like that on 7 lb leader on the edge of the tules, it was as good as it gets. Such a nice thing to see this today after I have been grappling with a refrigerator that decided that a holiday weekend would be a great time to go on strike. Then, on my way home from a 110 mile trek across Los Angeles on said holiday weekend to pick up a fridge, the clutch on my car's A/C gave up too. I took this as a sign (two signs actually) from the universe that because our fishing excursion was soo good on Friday, I needed a little grounding. Tom has been so giving of his knowledge and experience, I'm sure there are countless others that would like to be in a position to fish with him. And Tom, no one can take that epic morning from us. It happened and it was a blast. Well played my friend.

Hard to tell by looking these days. I suspect it's probably monofilament purely based on how old it is, but today, it's identifying as fluorocarbon since fluorocarbon is more expensive and I am looking to buy a spare. I actually saw a FB post on a local board by the individual that currently 'owns the business' and he has a couple spare nets left that he is looking to sell. I was going to pick one up as a spare since I heard about an unfortunate fellow angler that happened to scoop a VERY large carp that blew a hole in his.

I do look a bit like a cat that just swallowed a canary.