Big Hands

F.O.M.O.

Strangely enough, that is my dog's reaction when I am in the truck.

And, I pull the loop up over the rest of the knot before cinching, pulling the main line to get it down a ways, wet it, and then pull the tag end to get it tight. The pic from Team9nine looks right.

I've always been enchanted by fishing, but I have one fish related encounter from my childhood that I remember most. Early 70's and I am around 13 years old and would often fish either a park lake or there was a golf course pond across the street that had better fishing opportunities. One afternoon, I was looking out into a clearing in the reeds about ten feet across and a behemoth slowly drifted out into the opening and sat there for a moment. I ran back to my tackle box and quickly tied on a Creme grape worm that came pre-rigged with two propellers on the front of it and ran back to the clearing. The bass was gone. I thought "what the heck" and tossed the worm out about ten feet from the shore where the bass had been sitting and just let it lay there for a minute while I was bumming out that I was ill prepared for the opportunity of a lifetime. Suddenly the bass mosied out from the reeds on the left side and took a position facing me, directly behind my purple plastic worm and sat there for what seemed like forever. Then, her gills began to flare and my worm disappeared in a flash. The fight was short but very violent and lasted maybe ten seconds before my line snapped and it was over. . . . Midnight, on the water I saw the ocean's daughter Walking on a wave's chicane Staring as she called my name And I can't get it out of my head No, I can't get it out of my head Now my whole world is gone for dead 'Cause I can't get it out of my head Breakdown on the shoreline Can't move, it's an ebbtide Morning, don't get here tonight Searching for her silver light And I can't get it out of my head No, I can't get it out of my head Now my whole world is gone for dead 'Cause I can't get it out of my head, no how? I feel for you my friend.

A couple shots of my Striker 5 from yesterday's outing. Fishing has been a little slow/hit-n-miss. The water level has been going down, but really went down about a couple of feet within 2 to 3 days at the end of last week. There was some bubbles/foam, algae, and some other floating and suspended debris present, and the fish have not been relating to bottom structure for a couple weeks, but more so very recently. Just curious what others may see that I may be missing from interpreting my electronics.

I have been using braid to fluoro for dropshotting all summer. There aren't a lot of trees or other structure that sticks up into the water column, so my braid doesn't suffer much damage with a 6 to 10 foot leader. If I was using several feet of line to reties and breakoffs on each trip, I would be getting down on line capacity pretty fast. I have been getting pretty good at tying a 7/7 alberto knot pretty quickly so it isn't a big deal to retie a leader on the boat if needed, but I usually replace the leader either every trip or every other trip and only lose enough braid to tie a new alberto knot instead of several feet if I was using straight fluoro. I am going to try some Maxima monofilament vs fluoro to compare for leader material, but have decided to stick with braid for the main line for the time being.

I have been using 10# braid to 8# fluoro leader all summer for dropshot fishing with a 7/7 alberto connection (and a palomar knot for the hook). I like the 10# braid for as little wind resistance as possible, increased sensitivity, and of course, the low/no stretch. I have settled on a 10 foot leader because I can break the leader several times and usually still have enough leader to fish with for the day (at a minimum). I fish mostly rocky bottoms and hangups/break-offs are frequent at times. I often replace the leader between each trip. I can replace a leader on the water, but would prefer not to if I don't have to.

Does that tail look as if it may have been clipped?

Thanks for letting us know.

After catching this from a well lit fishing pier on the MB Vision 110 (in February no less) and getting to watch the fish charge over and smack it, there's a likely a good reason others are battling for 2nd place. It also casts easy and far. The Lucky Craft Pointer 110 SP is similarly nice, but maybe it would be good to have something considerably different. . . Which then begs the question: Can an angler have too may jerkbaits? LOL

Those were the final two in my swimbait reel derby. The Tranx is much more compact than the Lexa, and for me, size matters. The biggest downside of the Tranx that I am aware of being that sometimes the latch securing the non-driveside plate cover can accidentally get flipped to the open position. On my rod, it is tucked in so far that it is very difficult to open intentionally let alone accidentally. I heard reports of the weight of the oversize handle on some Lexas putting the reel into gear on hard casts, thus snapping off some expensive swimbaits. The latter may absolutely be due to user error, but given that I already preferred the smaller profile of the Tranx, I opted not to personally find out for myself.

I don't think it has negatively affected the fishing noticeably for me anyway.

I tend to use only a couple of different line setups, and therefore don't feel the need to have such a device. If I did have such a need, I'd probably use a small removable sticker on the reel with the line #'s written on it, but YMMV & JMHO. So, yea-nah.

The best experience I had as a co-angler was due to the communication I had with the pro on a particular day. My fish counted toward his bag, so it was to his advantage to have me contribute as much as possible. We met the night before and he asked me what kind of setups I had. He told me that there was only one he wanted me to bring and he would supply the rest. He explained exactly how he wanted me to behave, exactly when I should get up as we were entering an area, when to take off and put on the life jacket, and exactly when to stop fishing if we were changing spots. He told me that he would tell me when to come up front to fish off the bow with him if necessary, how to handle netting fish, and what baits we would using. As mentioned above, communication is key, especially before you blast off so your productive tournament time can be maximized as much as possible. I hope you draw a good partner. That can make it super fun.

So I have noticed a change in the general wind pattern the last week or two at Castaic. It used to be out of the west for most of the day, and then shift to more of a SW direction right at the end of the day. Now, I am seeing winds from the east and north later in the day and even during the recent night fishing event. Should I be looking for bass to vacate some of their summertime homes in favor of banks that the wind blows into? PS: I came across an article you contributed to regarding 'feeding benches'. I know of about seven places that can turn into islands as the water level recedes (one is an island when the lake is full), which I have interpreted to mean they could at some time prior to that be regarded a possible feeding bench (in addition to the handful of long sloping points on the lake). Would these be those benches you refer to? I have not had much luck with jigs (as in no luck at all) and feel like this is an area I'd like to address since it can yield larger fish.

I fished a Pro-Am at Lake Mead in 1991 as a co-angler. I drew Duane "Doc" Watson (ever hear of 'Watson's Wrat'?) for Day 2 who was leading after Day 1. The guy I had fished the first day was pretty average in most respects (probably why I couldn't tell you his name if I tried), but Doc Watson was a pro in every sense of the word. Incredibly detailed in his preparation and focus on what he was there to do. One of the things that really stuck with me (among many) was that his wife met us at the end of the dock and had a fresh polo shirt and vest with all of his sponsors patches on it so he would look sharp for the recorded interview at the weigh-in.

It was the highlight of the event for me. The couple were friends of my wife, and I didn't really know anyone there and afterwards, my wife thanked me for going in spite of not knowing anyone. I said it was OK, as it turned out that I had a great time. One of the other guests I happened to meet at this wedding reception was a local half-day boat skipper. He grabbed a small plate full of veggies, and said "follow me". That's what started the whole ordeal. We had such a good time doing it, and a small crowd was enjoying it as well. Soon, I spotted a school of more fish headed to the stern to join in. Some of those were buttermouth perch that were the biggest I had ever seen. So, we emptied a couple more veggie platters. Made me think that it might be possible to rent a room (part of the ship is a hotel), open the porthole window, and dangle some broccoli florets down with a pocket fisherman and fill a cooler with fish. Every time I see the Queen Mary, I think about those fish noshing on those veggies.

Close to a large population center in California Easy/cheap access Consistent numbers of eager bass Pick any two.

They are hardwired that way. The gettin is not always good, so when the gettin is good, they have to get to gettin!

Come to think of it I have seen a fish come out of the water to take a swipe at a low flying bird. If you have fished long enough, you've probably seen bass hit a lure at the instant it hits the water. My interpretation is that they saw something coming as it was so instant that they couldn't have reacted that fast. I have had them jump to eat a plastic worm that was dangling from a bush 6" above the water. I saw a photo years ago of a bass that was caught, and when the angler went to grab the lip of the bass, he discovered a baby copperhead inside of the bass' mouth. I saw a deckhand load up a 10 hook gagnion with pickle chips from the galley, and then fill it with bluefish in a very short time. I was part of a group that emptied a veggie platter piece by piece over the stern of the Queen Mary just to watch 5 to 8 lb calico and sand bass chow down on clumps of broccoli and cauliflower. I saw people at Lake Mead Marina buy bags of popcorn the size of a king size pillow and then empty them into the water to watch giant carp and stripers form a giant meatball going crazy devouring popcorn. I knew a guy that had a 10" largemouth in an aquarium. I saw him drop chunks of sand bass meat in and the bass inhaled as many chunks as he could to the point that he couldn't close his mouth and had a chunk only half way in. Then he went and stuck his face into a corner of the tank to keep the other fish from possibly stealing the meat hanging from his mouth. That stuff is a little weird. Most fish in general are opportunistic predators, and bass are no exception. Some are even omnivores. Bass eating crawdads seems totally normal.

I knew a guy that swore they used to fish for bass with baby chickens.

On one of my trips to fish in Texas back in the mid-90's, I got the chance to be be introduced to and chat at length with, a gentleman by the name of Earl Golding. Here is a short video about Mr. Golding's contribution to bass fishing.

I caught a pair of sweat socks jigging a slab in Lake Fork. First one, and then a while later, the other one.

I have an SLX 6'10" casting rod I use for jerkbaits, but don't really use it for finesse plastics, at least not yet. That said I recently picked up a Daiwa FGO721MXS spinning rod for my daughter (who has recently been going fishing with me) to have her own rig. I really like the action of this rod, and I may try to find one for myself. The tip is a little lighter than my two medium action spinning rods (a Kage KAG6101MFS, and a another locally sold medium spinning rod), but loads up nicely. I can't find it anymore on their website, so it may have been discontinued, but if you can find one, I would recommend it for the fishing you describe and within your stated budget. I think the Procyon is a nice rod too, and a local shop had the casting model Procyon on sale recently for $49 ?