QED

Cotton Cordell used to make silent lipless crank baits in their smoky joe color scheme. Still work great for me.

This is excellent advice. Except perhaps for top water hollow frog baits, it is best to develop an automatic, immediate hook set reaction to perceived fish bites. This requires practice.

My "do nothing" rig. Less than 7oz:

Drop shot rig with a very light, pencil sinker and a 4" senko or TRD in texas rig hook configuration. A wacky rigged senko with weedless hook will probably stay above the moss too. Spinnerbait run fast enought to just go above the bottom muck should also work.

So for around $30 in short shank treble hooks, I now have about 30 functionally good-as-new found lipless crankbaits. So if I lose one (or all!), who cares? ?

Can't reiterate this enough - with 500 form factor vanford or soare reels, which are perfect for this application, you will have a resulting setup that can weigh under 7 oz. Just amazing.

I have fenwick glass and graphite tennessee handled rods from 4'9" to 5'5" in hmg, hmx, and golden wing lines. They [mostly] have single foot ceramic guides and perform very well for UL spinning applications without being noodly/whippy. I like them better, but the CB version is iconic. BTW, I'm using 500 form factor reels from the vanford and soare lines, so the system weight is under 7 oz!

I have vanford, twin power, soare (JDM), and stella spinning reels in 500 or 1000 form factors. The vanfords are fine and are the lightest (except the soare is basically the same). The higher up the food chain you go, the smoother the operation. The stellas are built like swiss watches.

Never used one. Is there any inherent advantage?

My favorite rig:

Spinnerbait bending due to catching a large bass is a high class problem to have. I am more annoyed by spinnerbaits that don't run true at high speed, which is common. Specifically, I sometimes like to use a spinnerbait as a buzz bait such that it just creates a surface wake but stays underwater. Old school spinnerbaits seem to have had better design/QA in that regard.

I like using them in open water and adjacent riprap. My nearby lake has a lot of sunken weeds and moss so that lipless crank baits are a bad idea. Go figure...

I added new treble hooks to these found lures - just during the last two months. Don't think I'll need to buy lipless crankbaits again for quite a while...

The Daiwa Steez CT SV is a nice reel. What don't you like about the Shimanos? The Aldebaran BFS and MGL are insanely light reels and well worth the cost.

4" wacky rigged senko with weedless hook. I use the O-rings.

You should use the smallest snaps that meet or exceed your line test specs. VMC publishes the lb test specs for their duolock snaps. I use 00 black nickel snaps because I usually fish with 4 -6 lb test mono.

I returned it to the lake right after I snapped the photo and it swam away just fine.

This little ~2.5" fish hit a 4" wacky rigged green pumpkin senko. Its mouth was not nearly large enough to engulf the hook, but this persistent fish hung onto the stick bait. When it gets larger, I'm sure it will be a fierce fighter!

Rod is probably a Shimano GR-01553. I really like those cold forged ("colfor") aluminum reel seats. Buy it. BTW, I like the reference to the Wake Up Everybody lyrics, whether or not intentional.

Congratulations on a great find. I grew up in Stockton, and during my final quarter/semester in high school, I cut 43 of 44 school days to go fishing at the turning basin near downtown. I was admitted to an elite college just before then, so it didn't hurt my permanent record!

I agree with going the custom rod route. But the Shimano Poison Adrena 267ML is a pretty decent off-the-peg finesse rod. Works for me...

Thanks for the link - his slider book is available there for much less than at amazon. I was a huge fan of slider fishing when I was a teenager and still have a bunch of fenwick 4'9" tennessee handled rods, from the old fenwick fiberglass to HMG, HMX, and golden wing.

Catch of the day. Probably the only good thing about the CA drought.

Right hand when baitcasting and left when spinning. I cast left handed with baitcasting gear and right handed with spinning gear, so the free hand picks up the fish.

N95 masks are readily available right now which are helpful against the smoke particulates. Plus much more effective against covid 19 than the common surgical masks. Win-win solution. Wore one today to go fishing as the smoke here in Silicon Valley is pretty bad.