MGF

Are you catching fish? I ask because in addition to the suggestions already made you might experiment with weight and/or how you're working the tube. This time of year in the river I'm often "cracking" or even "stroking" the tube so it's off the bottom quite a bit...you gotta love it they have a name for everything these days. Earlier in the spring when the water is colder and I'm dragging or just letting it roll with the current I tend to t-rig.

I'm not sure that's what was going on. They hit near the bottom. I'd guess between 4 and 8 ft. The water is a little dirty from the rain we've had with maybe a foot and a half vis and there is some patchy weed growth.

We don't have an August "no bite". The problems now is the high/dirty water and the hordes of tubers. Saturday I finished fishing before the floaters hit the river. The water was high enough that I decided to just motor back up the where I had put in instead of going down river and getting the other car. The floaters were so thick that I almost couldn't get up river. They literally just block the river. You could almost walk across the river stepping from one tube to the next. Sunday I put in down river and just motored up to fish. I was done and out before any floaters got to me. I never saw another soul on the river but the parking lot was full when I loaded the boat.

I haven't fished a tournament in many years but it changed my fishing. I had always focused on early morning and evening and rarely fished at all in the middle of the day. When I did I caught fish but thought it was some sort of freak occurrence. Then I started fishing tournaments and it seemed late when we started and early when we quit and the majority of the fishing was during the worst time of day...I thought. But we saw some good action...and I don't shy away from middle of the day fishing anymore. In fact just yesterday I was off work and visited a local public pond. It was a last minute decision and I didn't get there until almost 10 am. In a little more than an hour I caught 7 LMB and a couple of them were pretty good size for that little pond. I caught the two largest and most of the fish on the sunny bank without any real obvious cover or source of shade. The area where I caught the most and biggest is the same area where I always catch the most and biggest. The fish didn't move the short distance to get to the shady bank. I can cast more than half way across the pond in that direction. I know it's just a pond but I found it interesting anyway.

We have the opposite issue this year. We've had a bunch of rain lately and the water is way up. In the spring when the water is supposed to be high it was way low. Go figure.

I wish I could say. Unfortunately I don't think my predictions about the fishing based on weather have been very accurate. Maybe it's me but the longer I do this the more confused I seem to get.

Might be something to the saying..."All things in moderation". When I first started fishing my river I was usually throwing a Rapala floating minnow on an "ultralight" rod and 6# test mono. I caught a lot of fish and it was great fun except that I lost a large percentage of the bigger fish. If there was a snag around (it's a river-lol) they'd get into it and it was over. I moved up to a medium weight rod and usually slightly heavier line and all is well. I use some heavier tackle because of the bait being thrown or the environment. Unfortunately, I'm catching the same fish so the fight isn't as much fun. My largest brown bass last year was 21.5". It was spring so the water was still cool and I was throwing a 3/8 oz jig on a medium or medium heavy BC outfit. The fight was nothing to wrote home about. I almost felt cheated. Some years back I caught a 45" musky on appropriately heavy tackle. The fish felt stout when I set the hook but, after that, I just dragged the fish into the net. I have more fun looking at the pictures than I did catching the fish. A couple weeks back I hit it just right on the river. In a short time I caught a pile of bass between 14 and 18 inches. Those aggressive fish on a medium spinning rod was a LOT of fun. I guess there's no choice but to match tackle to bait and environment but feisty fish on tackle that doesn't over power them by too much is the most fun.

Disclaimer...90% of my fishing is on a river. I'm another one who doesn't fish at night. I don't really like to do anything at night. Many times I have gone out night fishing or night hunting and I just don't like it for a lot of reasons...from bugs to not being able to see. LOL My fishing is the best in midsummer. The river is usually a shallow one way trip by midsummer so you fish a spot when you get to it. I can't say whether it's because of the time of day or that I just get to the good spots at noon but noon seems to be the magic hour. Shallow river brown bass can be in a real feeding frenzy in fast water during the middle of the day. The water is high for this time of year and my son and I got out pretty early on Sunday. The high water let me motor up river so I started on one of the better stretches. Like always it was slow and picked up later in the day. I'm usually fishing with my wife and we rarely get on the water before 8 or 9 am but we catch plenty of fish.

They're typically used when fishing a drop shot where the weight is below the hook.

Hey on a side note I see your bringing a kayak. I just started looking into them so I'm no expert but I remember reading that the sit insides fill with water and aren't much good once they flip. The recommendation was to not venture any further from shore than you're prepared to swim. Just a thought.

I say..."when in Rome..." I would get some local info. Maybe from the resort or a local tackle shop. I would give strong consideration to what they recommend for the whatever species seems dominant...might be a great walleye or trout lake. The "when in Rome thing. LOL Sans local advice I might tend towards "multi specie" presentations and see where the action is.

Yes. I rig it a few different ways. I use a texas rig, internal tube head with an exposed hook, internal with an ewg (stupid tube) and lately I've been fishing them just threaded on to a ball head...head and hook exposed. I generally use between 1/16 and 1/4 oz with 1/8 oz being the most common in our shallow river.

We do our deer in steaks, chops and roasts. Somehow my wife turns it into some of the best food in the world. She uses some for stew meat but...

I agree. In the context of rivers, I use both extensively. For whatever reason there are days when one definitely works better than the other. I tend to think of the tube for cracking and stroking to trigger fish. There are times I might drag it or let it roll with the current but it isn't my first choice for that. The ned (or weedless alternative) is weighted so that it just barely bumps the bottom as it moves down river with the current. Paired with the buoyant plastic it really looks good rolling and bobbing with the current. I use a lot of different presentations in the river but I really have a hard time coming up with other methods that produce the numbers that a ned does.

Snuck up on me I guess. Sorry I missed it.

When I was a kid we ate all the fish we caught. LMB and SMB were by far the favorites. These days I release 99.9% of the bass I catch just for conservation reasons. Once in a while I'll treat myself to a fish that is badly hooked. We have a slot limit on the river so I'll make a couple meals/year out of fish smaller than 12". I also have a new private quarry that I have permission to fish. There seem to be a million dinks in there so I took a meal out of there. Some years back when I fist mostly stopped eating bass I temporarily lost my motivation to catch them. My wife and I did some crappie fishing. Let me tell you crappies get an awful lot of pressure around here. I caught plenty but they're almost all dinks. No fun in catching dink crappies. Apparently our DNR thinks that 9" is a decent crappie but they're in the business of selling licenses. 9" is a DINK. That was the end of my crappie fishing...at least around here. Once or twice/year my wife makes me take her out for some bluegills. We have a couple of places where we can get a few that are half way decent sized...not good but not terrible. So the bass are my favorite to catch and my favorite to eat...I just refrain (usually). The last buck I shot (I hunt with longbow or recurve) was a large bodied deer but only had 2 or 3 points on one side and the other side was busted off. He had a busted lower leg that was just hanging by a piece of skin but otherwise mostly healed. He came through chasing two does at about a 100 miles/hour...on three legs. For some reason he stopped in a lane where I had a shot so I took him. That's kind of what predators do.

I should probably go check the specs on my rods before I post but...my two most used BC outfits are labeled "medium". A typical bait I'd tie on would be a 3/8 oz jig with a trailer like a rage bug or a 3.8 (ish) paddle tail. That's just about right for skipping which is what I'm often doing with that jig. I throw a 3/8 oz bladed jig on those same rods. A 1/4 oz jig is too light for comfortable casting and a 1/2 Oz with trailer is like throwing a boat anchor.

I still do a lot of fishing without maps or electronics but most of that fishing is on shallow rivers or weedy lakes. I spent a good portion of my childhood laying over the bow calling out weeds to my dad driving the boat. We also used to bump the anchor around a lot. The anchor will tell you how deep and what kind of bottom. There are a lot of offshore spots you just aren't going to find without map and/or electronics. Heck there's a lot of things that I probably won't find with the electronics that I have...no side scan or 360 scan and I sure don't have any livescope. But...you can find a lot of fish using what you see above water and the methods already mentioned.

The only weedless hooks I've tried are the VMC weedless wacky hooks. I don't think I ever hooked a fish on them. A 5" stick bait doesn't leave room for the wire to open.

If I had a place around where I could regularly catch 8" perch I'd probably just keep the perch. LOL Lots of bass are caught on shiners or crawdads. I often used to tip my jigs with a live leech and I've caught an awful lot of bass and walleyes on night crawlers. I can generally do as well or better on artificials and live bait is such a giant pain.

I don't know that it's any harder or more stressful than than other ways we find to make a living. What I do know is that just because you love the sport/activity does NOT mean that you will love the business. I made a business out of a hobby/passion once and it almost ruined my life. There a lot more to the business of fishing than just fishing.

I can't say regarding maxscent but it seems easier to hook fish deep using presentations that may be worked on a slack or semi slack line...like a ned or wacky. Especially with current or wind sometimes a fish can have the bait for quit a while before the angler knows it.

What I've seen is that, all else being equal, some people deep hook more than others.

As far as I know it's ok. I think I missed the last one somehow.

I always have a bunch of stones, files and diamond sharpeners around. I just make sure there's a couple of some sort of sharpeners in my bag and I can sharpen just about anything.