T-Billy

Tie that sucker on a big stick with some braid, and pitch it into places you're afraid to pitch into. You'll get on 'em. Shallow wood as soon as the water climbs into the low 40's, clear up until it falls back into the low 40's.

Night time is the right time. All summer long.

I always try to get a bit of tension on the line so I can feel the fish before I swing. I miss way too many with a slack line hookset.

Those things SLAY the saugeye when they move shallow in the spring.

I knew this would happen. The 7'1" L arrived this evening. Beautiful rod. Fit and finish are very nice. Power is right on with my 7' ML SLX spinning that I've thrown a ned on for a couple years, and been pretty happy with. The feather paired up with my Curado BFS should be a great ned rod. I think it's a bit soft for light T rigs though. So... There's a 7'1" ML feather on the way. I'll pair it with a Curado 71 MGL. Looking forward to gett'n into some early season smallies with this pair.

Dare ya go showin off dat fancy book lernin agin. ? I like your numbers, they seem to reflect my experience here in OH closer than the chart in the OP. 21 was a heck of a year for me. I fished from early March through mid December and put in roughly 800hrs. I caught one 6#, one 5+, seven 4+, and more than a dozen over 3#. It's gonna be a tough year for me to top.

I don't know how an accurate chart could possibly be made for a single lake, let alone the country. Too many variables.

Silly human.... You can resist me for awhile, but we both know you will buy another rod, and a new reel for it. Why torture yourself? Just go ahead and buy it. You know you want to.

Congratulations!!!

I too stick with a cheap knife for EDC. Mine get used to cut all sorts of stuff, get used as a screwdriver, pry bar etc. One hand opening is mandatory. Cheap pocket knives are the way to go IMO. It's amazing how good a knife you can get for under $20 these days.

Nice. That senko mold will pay for itself many times over.

No. Just logged in and didn't get any message, and my card was one that got compromised in that mess. I did change my password though. I would call TW and report that if I was in your shoes.

What do you call a man from Tennessee rolling in a pile of leaves?...... Russell. ? That jokes so bad, he should ban me just for that. As usual I'm late to the party, but congrats/condolences anyway @TnRiver46. If only I knew how to photoshop a T hat onto Cartman.....

I don't know what the fishing pressure is like in your area, but if your lakes are highly pressured you might consider putting in the time to figure them out on those muddy lakes in the summer. The handful of small lakes (1k -2k acres) in my neck of the woods are HIGHLY pressured. One of them is awesome in the spring and good in the fall, but I and most others struggled there in the summer. Over the past couple summers I forced myself to spend time there learning it. The effort is paying off. I consistently catch good numbers of quality fish there in the summer now, and I have plenty of elbow room. It's by far the least pressured water around after the spawn because most struggle there, and is now the only lake I fish on Sat and Sun unless I'm night fishing.

Beaver style baits either T rigged or as a jig trailer, tubes, and finesse swimmers for me mostly. The TRD Bug, (a tiny elaztech beaver) on a 1/16 or 1/8 jighead is a powerful tool in cold water. It's usually what I start with when the waters in the high 30's - low 40's and often stays in my hand all day. It's one little bait that catches bigguns. 38" musky was a handfull on 6# mono. 4lb 4oz smallie spit up a bunch of tiny 1' - 1.5" crawdads on the deck. Big baits for big fish ain't always the winning formula.

Sure the pro's influence my fishing and gear purchases to some extent, but not to the extent that I value the opinions of unsponsored folks who I know to be good sticks. Also depends on who the pro is. I fish nothing like KVD, so his opinion on gear doesn't grab my attention like the opinions of say Hack or Tharp who fish more my style. Speaking of Tharp, it was his sales pitch that got me to buy a Guntersville Special last summer after I broke my Sierra 765 and couldn't get a replacement right away. I now have most of the Tharp lineup plus a Cobb and a Lancer. Awesome rods that perform well above their price point. Thanks Randall, now I gotta figure out what to do with all those Abu's and Dobyns that are collecting dust. Probably hang onto them. I still like 'em for moving baits, but the ARKs smoke 'em for bottom contact.

I do. Ultra Molds 3.5" Sweet Craw mold.

Happens on a regular basis. LM in the bottom pic was 19". I found it floating belly up barely alive last spring. Mauled by a musky.

The most fish catchinest lure of all time. ? Seriously though, I gotta go with the Sweet Craw T rigged on a flippin hook. Ice out to ice over, it's a killer. I gotta be able to change weight though.

I agree much of the year, but when the waters cold a TRD bug on a 1/16 or 1/8 jig head is a powerful tool that catches fish of all sizes. I can't keep the musky off it in the early spring. It's also the best bed bait I've ever thrown.

I do. Ultra Molds produces the molds. I have two more on the way for a total of six. I go through a pile of 'em pitching them on flippin hooks. Generally one or two fish per bait.

Punching mats is out. It just doesn't seem to be a very productive technique on my local lakes. I spent a bunch of time punching this year, and while I caught a few, it was never the best way to catch 'em on any given day. It did pay off in a big way however. While weed mats alone didn't produce well, wood that's choked out with weeds sure did. I caught a lot of quality bass fishing laydowns that were so weed choked that I would have just made a few casts with a frog and moved on in the past. Picking them apart with that heavy T rig was my #1 pattern during the dog days, and it continued to produce well late into the fall, even after the weeds were dead. The pattern didn't fall apart until the weeds ( Milfoil and Hydrilla) broke up. Soo... Punching mats is out, but punching laydowns is in, in a big way.

Best LM and SM both came on a T rigged Sweet Craw. 6# LM SM was a couple crawdads shy of 4#. It also produced a 5lb 4oz LM and several 4+. Caught my biggest channel cat of the year on it too. 11#+ And biggest flathead. 13# + Had a couple WAY bigger than this one kick my butt and wrap me up in the timber. And musky. 46" Also had a saugeye 30"+ come off at boat side on it. That was a heartbreaker. That bait flat out gets bit. It's the 3.5" version. Good for both numbers and size. Best year ever, and the Sweet Craw put a big percentage of my fish in the boat.

Good goobly gooks @bulldog1935, where'd ya get that beast of a handle on the SD?

Not to fear, I have a dream catcher made of Sufix 832 and Trilene XT.