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Most 3 year olds won't really like sitting still long enough to fish. So I'd just go with that Spiderman rod, since he'll probably lose or break it before he's old enough to show an interest in fishing. If he wants to go, take him one day. But don't expect anything. Don't push him into fishing. He'll never enjoy it if you do. And don't try to teach him any more than he wants to learn. He's probably more interested in spending time with you than anything else.

It just goes to show you, doesn't it? Replies vary from ML to MH. Obviously, rod selections are personal. I use a ML/F 6'10" Abu Garcia Veritas and Zata spinning reel for weightless T-rigs and wacky worms. It's a bit stiff for a ML, but not quite up to a full medium, and I find it the perfect balance of hook setting power and flex for casting distance. My other ML rods would be too whippy, but my other medium rods would be too stiff. I bet a St. Croix ML would also be about perfect as they tend to run a bit stronger as well.

Yeah, there's a corridor that runs from west Texas up through the Dakotas that is the windiest part of the country (outside of some mountain peaks). Central Oklahoma is the transition zone where the cold, dry artic air from the northwest gets funneled down by the Rockies and often meets the hot and humid air pushed up from the Gulf of Mexico in the southeast. There are a good number of bass pros from Oklahoma, and I'm betting its due to the fact that if you can do well here, you can do well anywhere.

To be fair, the PGA has lots of strict rules on what's allowed on a golf club. If the ball comes off the club head too fast at a given club head speed, they deem the club illegal. They also don't allow range finders.

I'm opposed to live sonar. And until it comes down in price to something I can convince my wife to let me have, that will remain my position.

You might be right. Common sense tells me you should be. I have never done a side-by-side comparison. I just don't feel the same difference in casting distance with braid when I change diameters that I feel with mono or fluoro. I remember when I was a kid and constantly losing my expensive (to me at that time) lures in the slop at the local pond. I tried loading my baitcaster up with 60# mono, thinking that would fix my problem, but I couldn't cast worth a darn with that stuff.

It depends. First, it depends on what kind of drag stack it is. If carbon fiber, then grease isn't needed. If it's felt, I would use oil instead. If it's that rubbery plastic stuff (I forgot what they call it exactly), then grease is required. But you CAN grease carbon fiber drag stacks, if you want. I find that if you rub them with just a smidgen of thick grease, like Cal's, and then wipe it off as best you can without chemicals, the drag will start up faster and smoother. You'll lose some of the max drag capacity, so it's a question of if you want smoothness or max drag. Either way, unless you make the mistake of coating it in too much grease, the difference will be minor. Though, once you've greased a carbon fiber drag washer, it's really hard to go back.

I frequently go over. In fact, I don't really even pay attention to the rod's ratings, as I don't often find them to be very accurate. You can tell what a rod can handle by how it casts. I'm not really worried about breaking a rod either. I've only broken a rod once on a cast. And that was with a lure that was well within its rating. And it was a brand-new rod, so I chalked it up to a manufacturing defect, because an identical rod that I replaced it with has held up great for many years now, casting much heavier lures. Though I will point out that if I'm casting a lure that's far beyond my rod's weight rating, I'll switch from a snap-cast to more of a lob. If you can feel that the rod isn't able to rebound on the cast due to the weight of the lure being too heavy, you'll get more distance with a lob than a snap-cast. And that's how I fish 2oz. A-rigs and glide baits on my heavy rod that's only rated to 1.5oz. And I've done snap-casts with those. It can handle it, easily. But it's more work on my end and about the same or even less distance.

If you heard it on YouTube, it has to be true. They won't let just anybody put videos up on that thing. It's for certified experts only. I heard that on YouTube. Though, my personal experience tells me that it doesn't really matter with braid. Braid is limp and come off the spool pretty easily. And the diameter difference between 65# and 10# isn't really all that much. Plus braid is so slippery, hence the knot issues, that I can't imagine it would get much drag from the line guides. Whatever distance you gain or lose, can't be more than a yard or two at the extremes.

Yeah. It'll take some soldering skills and minor electronics knowledge to do right, so I'd probably take it in to a pro if you're not pretty good with that stuff. But it's certainly possible in the right hands.

I target largemouth, but catch mostly spots. One weird thing here is that the largemouths, smallmouths, and spots all look just about the same. They're all about the same size and color. So it takes a bit of work to figure out the difference. You have to check their tongue and where the mouth ends, because the coloration and dorsal fin usually won't tell you much. And I find so many that blur the lines that I swear they're all regularly cross breeding. And with the lack of spawning habitats in our man-made lakes, that wouldn't surprise me.

I don't hate the Whopper Plopper. It's definitely caught me some fish. But the Heddon Torpedo catches more fish and in tougher conditions. It's about 4x's as versatile. I'll often start with a Torpedo to find out what kind of mood the fish are in, and then switch to something else that fits that mood better. The Torpedo works well with pauses, which the Whopper Plopper does not. It also works well with a medium pace, steady retrieve. The Whopper Plopper covers that small patch where you're not quite fishing at buzzbait speeds, but need something faster and louder than a Torpedo. But all things being equal, if the buzzbait bite is on, that's my choice. You can cover more water, faster, and it seems to draw fish in from further away. Plus, it handles a little bit of chop better.

I HATE using spinning reels. I have no accuracy with them. I can stop them okay, you just put your finger on the lip of the spool. But it's the holding and releasing the line with your finger that gets me. That being said, when casting something less than around 1/4 oz., it's hard to beat the distance you get with a spinning reel. And they handle light braided line (less than 30#'s) so much better. No digging in on the spool. It's like a wrench versus a ratchet. I hate using wrenches and always pull out a ratchet if I can. But sometimes a ratchet won't fit. Sometimes it's just better to use the right tool for the job, even if you hate that tool. So no, I don't see spinning reels going away. They're too easy for beginners to use, and too useful for seasoned pros to ignore.

What kind of boat are you pushing with that? Honestly, I've never used a 40#, but on my Minn Kota 30#, it did the opposite. Big jumps from 1-4, but the difference between 4 and 5 was minimal. Though my kayak is kind of hull limited at around 6mph. So that makes a bit of sense. A leisure paddle pace will get me to 4mph pretty easily, but those last 2mph take some serious effort. If your boat is fairly light and doesn't have much drag in the water, I could see it doing this. Basically, at each step on the TM, you effectively double the power sent to the TM. So usually 5 is 100%, 4 is 50%, 3 is 25%, 2 is 12% and 1 is 6%, or thereabouts. Speed gains are usually logarithmic to prop speed, meaning the faster you go, the more drag you create, and the more power needed to go even faster. But if your boat isn't creating much drag, then I could see how you would experience this, as the difference in raw power between speeds 4 and 5 is more than the difference between speeds 1 and 4.

Nope. I pour a worm from a mold I made using a masonry drill bit as the model. Bass love it. I've tried a few realistic craw imitators, and none seem to work as well as a most creature baits. And it's hard to find a swimbait that catches more fish than a Keitech Impact. And the Zoom Super Fluke is my most productive soft jerkbait. Plus the number of fish I've caught on grubs and tubes tells me that shape can't matter THAT much. Basically, in my experience, bass prefer soft plastics that don't look realistic. Now I'll admit my experience isn't enough to call it a rule. But I believe it's enough to suggest that in some cases, realistic shapes don't matter. In fact, I'd argue that realistic motion matters more. And to imitate realistic motions, sometimes you have to use unrealistic shapes.

There you go! I bought a roll of Gorilla Tape for something else a few years back and I've been using that. It lasts about 6 months before I start to wear through it. I do about 4 layers. I tried some Flextape, but it doesn't stick as well.

Yup. Personally, I like mine on the left side, up close to me. I also have 5" screen, which is plenty big at that distance. I might could upgrade to a 7", but I really wouldn't want to go above that unless I had to. But everyone's different.

Winter, by far. I might catch one bass from January to February, if I'm lucky. Spring is second. Around here it's hard to find days where you can safely get on the water in spring. It's either too windy or severe storms. It'd be different if I didn't have to work weekdays, as there are good days in the spring, but it's luck of the draw if they fall on a weekend. Two years ago, I didn't have one decent day from late February until the third week of May that I could get out on a lake. Summer is tough, but nowhere near as tough as winter. I can usually catch at least one bass each time I go out, even if I do have to brave 100°+ temperatures.

I've fished from my kayak in those conditions many times. Though, I'll say, it's not usually much fun. Boat control and casting become very hard. But, if you're desperate for fishing, it can be done. My absolute cutoff is 25mph winds with 40mph gusts. Though usually I cut it off around 25mph gusts, because then it's just too much work, and I fish for fun. A lot will depend on the lake itself and the area around it. If it's clear around the lake (no big trees or hills) and nothing to break the wind, and the lake runs lengthwise in the direction of the wind, then it'll probably get pretty gnarly. If it's protected somewhat from the wind, it might not be so bad. Either way, I'd try to use a ramp where you're not fighting the open wind, especially if it's a crosswind. I've had to trailer boats in 40mph crosswinds before, and it's not fun.

But did you see the titanium shaft? And the Dyneema Super Cord? Yeah, they cheaped out by not giving it a jewel encrusted prop, but it's got everything else you could want.

I agree. I too wish they showed more footage of them looking for fish. And I wish they showed why they chose an area, what changes they made to their presentation, and lots of casts and retrieves that didn't involve hooking a fish. They say you learn more through failures, and I believe you can learn a lot through other people's failures as well. Sure, they'll talk a lot about that stuff sometimes, but they don't usually show it. And hypotheticals aren't nearly as informative as examples. Honestly, I think 98% of instructional YouTube videos aren't meant to serve as learning tools, but rather as entertainment. And I get that. A lot of people would rather fish vicariously through someone than go fish themselves. True instructional videos are boring, and boring videos don't get views. That's why school was so boring. But for people who actually want a deep dive into a topic, a long, boring video is what we need. I would MUCH rather watch a seasoned pro not catch fish for four hours straight to see their process to get on fish than watch 10 minutes of hooksets and fish holding, while guys talk about their sponsors.

What exactly are we cleaning? Naphtha is safe for most paint and plastics, but not all. It also dries fast and doesn't leave a residue. Acetone is stronger and works faster, but will eat paint and a lot of plastics. Dawn is safe for everything and does a good job of cleaning oil and grease. But it's slower, requires more elbow grease, and doesn't penetrate as well as the other solvents. So basically I use Naphtha for most stuff, Dawn for the large, plastic parts, and acetone for the bearings, unless they have plastic on them.

If I can snell a hook, I will. Otherwise, I use the FishNFool for braid. It's just a uni with a double loop through the eye.

I prefer 6-10# mono. 12# tops. If I need more strength than that, I'm just going to step up to braid.

I gained 0.6 mph (3.1-3.7 mph) on my trolling motor just by switching from a lead acid to lithium. Under the right conditions, I can even crack 4 mph. That, and the kayak is easier to balance, I only needed half the size of the battery (because I can use up to 90% instead of 50%), and it's easier to load/unload (12lbs vs. 65lbs). A hidden perk is that the lithium batteries output between 13.6-12.0 volts, instead of 12.6-11.3 volts. And they maintain the higher voltage longer. So not only does it remove weight, but it increases the speed of the trolling motor, and maintains the speed longer.