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Yeah, it's an 'ole wives tale. It was a thing a very long time ago when steel belted radials first came out. But they fixed that issue several decades ago. So it's nothing to worry about these days. But, having said that, there are directional tires that you're not supposed to reverse. Typically found on high performance tires and they'll have arrows indicating such. It's due to the direction of the tread, not the internal structure of the tire itself. But I highly doubt you'd have them on a trailer. It's like the 'ole wives tale of not to put a car battery directly on the ground. It too was a thing a very long time ago. But they fixed that several decades ago when they started putting batteries in plastic casings, and it's now okay to put a car battery directly on the ground.

I agree. That sounds like a bad cell. It's odd that it would fail because you got it wet. They're usually sealed up pretty tight, which also makes working on them almost impossible. So you probably just need to buy a new one. If it was an expensive, name brand one, you might contact the manufacturer and see if they'll warranty it.

I don't much care. Sure, I like some better than others, but don't have a strong enough preference to warrant the time and expense of switching. I think my favorite handle are the ones on my Abu Zata combos. They have a good shape to them, and the smooth rubber seems to get grippier when wet. And the worst handles are the tiny round, hard plastic ones on my pair of ancient Abu 5000D's. But even those don't bother me enough to want to replace them.

T-rig Spinnerbait Crankbait Even though I'm not actually limited to three, that's 90% of what I fish with.

Now that I have a kayak I don't have or need rules. But back when I had my boats and could take other people along, I didn't have set rules. But I did expect everyone who came along to do whatever I told them. Mostly just simple stuff like wear your PFD when moving, no drinking and driving (you can drink, but if you do you can't drive), sit where I tell you to sit (for balance when moving), don't litter, etc... It was rarely ever an issue. If I brought other people along, the point was to have fun, and I knew that. But I do remember one guy who came along once who just refused to do what I said and kept telling me "Nah man. It's cool, it's cool.", and then did whatever he wanted. He angered me so much I eventually threatened to beat him up, which I didn't feel good about, but I was sick and tired of him not respecting me and my stuff. That broke him and he complied after that. It kind of ruined the trip for everyone, but I blame him for that. And that was the last time I ever hung out with him. Not specifically because of that. He moved to Brazil not too long after. But I certainly didn't miss him. He was a single child of rich parents who never really had a job, so he never learned how to obey. Nice guy. Just a bit feral.

I don't much care about reel ratio. I can speed up or slow down my retrieve to the get the bait to move at the speed I want pretty easily. I don't need to rely on the reel for that. I will say that I prefer a higher ratio reel for fishing some stuff like buzz baits. A higher ratio reel tends to wear me out less if I'm going to be fishing them for a long time. Same thing with certain deep diving crankbaits that pull really hard. But in the opposite direction, preferring lower ratio reels to get more torque. But outside of the most extreme situations, I don't think it matters much to me. Even for frogs or fishing in heavy slop, I use my rod's leverage to bring the fish in, and just use the reel to take up the slack line. But to answer your question, lower ratio = more torque. Higher ratio = more speed. If I'm in a situation where I need one or the other, I'll choose a reel based on that. But for 95% of the fishing I do, I really only care about the rod and the line. The ratio of the reel is a non-factor.

Anything without an exposed hook might work. That includes a swim worm, fluke or soft swimbait with the right kind of hook. Might as well try a chatterbait or jig. Sometimes I can get them cleanly (enough) through. Other times not. Or find a crankbait that runs at the right depth to stay over the tops of the weeds. Maybe a squarebill. Maybe a wakebait. It's kind of hard to say anything for sure, as each weed pile can be different. Some are so thick you can't hardly get anything through. And that's usually okay, because if they get thick enough, there won't be many fish in them. And sometimes the weeds harden off a bit after a few months, so stuff that gets caught up in April or May might come cleanly through by July. There are definitely things to try, but to know anything for sure, you just have to try it yourself. I like fishing thick braided line (30#+) in these situations, just to make sure I get my lure back if I make a bad decision.

I'm for it. I know it won't make a difference in people's behavior. But at least you can now say they should have known better. Though, I think the real problem isn't that people don't know the rules. It's that people just don't seem to care about people that they don't know.

My guess is it's due to the heat. When the water gets warm like this, the bass go deeper and become more lethargic. They still eat. They just don't like to exert as much energy chasing down food, especially in the daytime. If the weather where you are is anything like the weather here, we're about a month ahead of schedule. Right now it's near the end of June, but nature is acting like we're near the end of July. It seems like everything has been happening three to four weeks before normal this year. Even the flowers seem to agree.

I'm often surprised at how much work maintaining balance is. I'll sometimes go fishing in my kayak on a windy day and by the time I'm done, I'm completely worn out. Not from paddling, because I have a trolling motor. But from fighting the wind and waves and keeping myself balanced through all of that. It's those tiny, stabilizer muscles all throughout my hips and core that we don't normally use much in daily life that really get a workout.

They make several different EWG style hooks, and some have the hook sit above the eye, so they hook up a little better. You can pretty much get a hook in just about any design you want these days. About the only time I use a true EWG, with the hook point inline with the eye, is if I'm fishing something like a reed bed or water willow bed. I've caught some nice bass in them over the years, and a Texas rigged EWG is about the only thing I've managed to pull through there consistently. I miss a lot of strikes, but I catch more bass than if I just avoided it or spent more time breaking off and retying other hooks.

The next two weeks, every day is supposed to be between 99-103°, except for one day of 96°. And we're still more than a month out from what is normally the hottest part of the year, which is a little scary. On the bright side, my grass should go dormant soon. So I should be doing a lot less mowing this year!

I often pair June bug plastics with black and blue jigs. They work pretty well around here in our dark, red, stained water. While I think color is important, it's not THAT important. To me, there are only two colors. Natural and high contrast. In clear water, natural colors seem to work better. In muddy waters, high contrast colors seem to work better. June bug is just a dark color that provides a good silhouette against the sky, or a good shadow on the bottom. It works about the same as any other dark color, though I do think the sparkly flakes might help over a straight black sometimes. Though there are exceptions to every rule, and sometimes the fish prefer exactly what they're not supposed to according to theory. The fish are the experts on what they want, not the books, forums, or YouTubes. So listen to the fish.

Yeah, it's a little different. But give it time and you'll adjust. I think the main thing for me was giving the fish time to swallow the bait first before setting the hook. It might be due to the increased sensitivity, so small nibbles feel stronger with braid. I usually wait until I can feel the weight of the fish, or the lack of weight of the lure, before setting the hook, versus feeling a tug or tap. It's kind of hard to explain, but you'll get it down after a while. I also horse the fish in more, as braid seems to allow them to throw the lure easier. So if you can wench them in before they get a chance to really fight back, that helps with losing fish after you've hooked them. Also, sometimes it helps to have a softer rod with braid. Either go down a half step in power or down a half step in speed can help when making the transition. It allows the rod to flex a bit more to compensate for the lack of flex in the line. I now have to adjust when switching to mono since I haven't used it much in the last 2 years. I have to remember to set the hook harder to accommodate the line stretch, especially on a long cast. Really swing for the fences!

It depends on the lake and time of year. But I'm limited to six rods. So I usually like to have one of each in ML, M, MH, and H, all fast action and all 7' or there abouts (one is 6'10"). The other two spots are kind of open, but usually another M or MH with a moderate action or a second ML or MH with fast action so I don't have to swap lures as often. The only real constraint with a kayak when it comes to rods, in my opinion, is limiting yourself to six. So I need rods that can can cover multiple presentations. That's not usually an issue. I'm usually fishing with a rod that is less than ideal, but still good enough to get the job done without too much hassle. You get used to it.

I prefer to wear sunscreen but it can be a mess and a pain to put on and reapply as needed. So I'll often just wear the long sleeved UV hoodie and gloves instead. They're definitely not as cool as bare skin with sunscreen, but they're a lot cooler than normal clothing, and they're not that far off from bare skin. They're designed to absorb sweat and evaporate it quickly to help keep you cooler. In a still environment, you probably won't notice much of a difference. But if the breeze is blowing, you'll notice they do block a little bit of the breeze. I also don't like how you can't wash them with fabric softener. That'll ruin the UV protecting effects. That's not a huge deal, but it does mean I often have to wash them separate from my other shirts and stuff. Also, if they get oil or petroleum jelly on them (like deodorant), they really don't like to come clean, and you'll have a stain that looks like a wet spot on them for a long time. Washing them in warm water helps to remove that, but doesn't do a perfect job. So you have to be careful with that.

Our highs will hit 100° this weekend. I won't be going fishing. Not because of the heat. But because I have to put up a new fence. The heat will make that extra, special fun, I'm sure.

I think the Eagle line of fish finders is the new replacement for the old Hook line. As I understand it, the only real difference between the Eagle and latest Hook Reveal is the Eagle comes with an IPS screen, which should be a little brighter in the sun. Other than that, they pretty much seem to be the same thing. But I haven't used an Eagle yet, so there could differences that I'm not aware of.

It seems like every year I form a different go-to. I don't know why, but it seem like one year the bass will really get after on thing, and then the next year, completely ignore it. You might think they "learned" something from the past year, but there's no way everyone else on the lake is throwing the same thing I am. I don't really follow trends. And there's no way I've shown more than 10% of the bass in these lakes my lure collection. So I don't know what's causing it, but it's real. I still haven't found this year's lure.

I'd drink the lake water. Pretty much all of our lakes are man-made water reservoirs, so if you drink water from the tap, you're drinking lake water. And I know someone will say that they filter it and treat the water that comes out of your tap, so that's different. But I also know that when the water turns over in the fall, our tap water smells and tastes terrible. And I know our state government. I know they don't care about water quality (my brother used to work for the Department of Environmental Quality and has plenty of horror stories in his short time there), so I highly doubt those filters or chemical treatments are much more than cheap decoration so they can say they did something. I used to get yearly water reports in the mail detailing how our tap water tested out. It always failed horribly on dozens of categories. To fix it, they stopped mailing out the reports! So yeah, I'll drink the lake water. You just have to chew it a little longer than the tap water.

You've got two good options, and one bad one, as far as I'm concerned. The two good options are fish inside the weeds with anything you can pull cleanly through. This includes topwaters and anything that'll run shallow enough not to get down into the weeds. Don't forget T-rigs and jigs as well as your chatterbait. And soft swimbaits with the hook buried. Or try a lipless and just rip it through. Option two is fish something like a crankbait or maybe umbrella rig just outside the weed line. I'd use a heavy braid for this, as you'll likely get hung up a lot and need to rip it free. The idea is to draw out the bass hiding in along the edge of the weed line. The bad option, in my opinion, would be to specifically target the suspended fish you see on your sonar just outside the weeds. In my experience, these fish are sleeping and unless you're casting a net, you're not gonna catch them. I'll catch one every once in a long while, but my time is usually better spent elsewhere.

Interesting... Thanks for the review!

The EverStart battery is made by Excide. The Duracell is made by East Penn. You can tell by the shape of the box. They don't say where the EverStart was made, but Excide has plants in India, Sri Lanka, Singapore, and the UK. East Penn makes batteries in Pennsylvania and Iowa. So I'd go with the Duracell, especially since the prices are similar.

You have changed my mind! Those are some incredible fish! Every time I've been fishing in the ocean, all I ever catch are bass, catfish, and drums. And not even big ones, either!

Definitely baitcaster. They tend to be simpler, stronger, smoother, and just better made reels. However, having said that, pretty much any decent spinning reel is fully capable of reeling in a bass. So I wouldn't have any worries. Maybe a 30lbs striped bass would change my mind. Maybe. A 100lbs paddlefish, flathead or blue catfish, or one of those 200+ lbs alligator gars definitely would. But I've never caught anything like that. So nothing I've caught in the lakes near me have ever given me a reason to want to avoid a spinning reel.