thediscochef

He's a pretty solid one. Only casts to get information about the bite, once he gets some feedback it's all about changing out the customers setups for what's getting bit. He'll hand you his favorite combo while his ties yours. I enjoy watching him fish because I learn from it. The (different) guy I caught my PB with basically only got me to the spot, I chose my bait, I chose my depth line, I tied all my own stuff. I would have never caught that fish if I'd been doing what he was doing. The last time we went out he caught three over 5, neither myself nor my buddy had a single bite. That was a long 8 hours and we haven't been back out with him since. Just felt like he phoned it in that day. I'm not usually the one paying, typically just a +1 in the back of the boat. This would have had me asking to go back to the ramp right away. Is he casting with spun gold and an umbrella rig of vision 110s? Should almost always be using big game mono or tritanium IMO, that's maybe 8 bucks for 1000yd of the big game or 14 for 1100yd of tritanium. Should be built into the guide rate and never mentioned

I had my suspicions lol

I love vegetables I also love anti-vegetables (pizza/fried chicken) I got real into sous vide cooking for a while, so much that can be done with that. It shines in some areas and isn't so great in others, like any tool or methodology. For vegetables I like to run it at 185f for 4 hours and do mashed potatoes and corn on the cob in the same run. Always comes out perfect. Especially if you can sear the corn in something when it comes out (I recommend the hot butter left in the pan after searing steaks)

Sometimes there is such a thing as too much bait in a given space. Not for the fish obviously. You get enough forage in one spot and sometimes you just can't throw anything that looks like an easy enough meal

Got out to Sam Rayburn for the first time today. What a day. Not much in the way of bass, I caught 5 or 6 little super dinks like this. That said, I caught one at every park I went to. I went to every part of the lake except the deep middle where the rivers meet. There are bass all over this lake. I lost some better fish but that's OK. Some days are like that, those are just the test runs for when one finally sticks. At one of my stops in the morning, I met an older gentleman named High Fin. I ran into him again at a different park like eight hours later. Apparently he lives super close so he went and got his boat and we did a little night fishing. We didn't stick any but we got bit and I made a new friend and got to see a glimpse of Rayburn's might. Sometimes it ain't all about the fishin. I'll say this. If I lived as close to rayburn as I do to roberts, I wouldn't fish anywhere else and I would be hard pressed to drive away from it. There are points and timbers and creeks and structures ALL OVER. The entire lake looks fishy. And it's HUGE. 111,000 acres of surface area as of today. That's about 5.25x the surface area I normally fish at Roberts. I had a burger made of brisket and bacon. Not WITH, but OF bacon and brisket. What an incredible place. I have to come back very soon.

I know people that hire a guide to learn, others that just wanna go fish, others that go to catch. What they all expect of the person with the boat is usually different. The best guides will do their best to give both people their desired experience within reason. There isn't necessarily a right or a wrong when it comes to a guide fishing on your trip - it's situational. I've had guides that would fish to locate and see what's biting what, but when they get bit they shake the fish off and put the rod down. I've also been on an eight hour trip where the guide caught three nice fish and didn't stop fishing despite nobody else getting bit. More often than not, expectations will often be met at the same level of their communication

he's fishing special waters for special fish and putting in a lot of hours to do it. He isn't lying about putting in 15-16 hour days on the regular when he's away from guiding. If it were that easy everyone would be doing it I think I'm just as impressed by @A-Jay on the regular if we're being real about it, if he had the sort of time JJ does he'd be showing out about the same or better

I spend a lot of time doing this these days. 4 bands and filling in with a fifth. Of the four, the main one is the Shane Hamilton Band. We will be at Lewisville Western Days opening the festival for Ashley McBryde. Been playing since I was 8. I modified this bass with new electronics and hardware. I play through a super bassman which (in combo with a 4x10 cab) weighs about 130lbs and is 300 watts all tube. 6 kt88s in the chassis, there is simply no replacement for that tone. I also build PCs and figure out how to make old hardware work with newer stuff. That's all coming to an end with Win11 though. I have an unhealthy number of Linux laptops lol

My dad, my uncle, and my grandmother all died of covid. I held my dad's cold, pale hand as he died gasping for breath in the ICU. That image and feeling will always be burned into my mind. Inheriting his fishing gear is why I am here to begin with. I had shingles about five years ago. It was extremely unpleasant. I had covid and rocky mountain spotted fever at the same time last year and it got a little too touch-and-go for my liking. I don't want to think about what it would have been like without the antiviral pill and a few shots, strong chance I would be chillin with my dad and my grandparents right now. Honestly I think @gimruis has the right approach here. These decisions are best made with your doctor's input. It's also important to find a provider that you have some level of rapport and trust with. If they aren't listening to you, they aren't the right one. My dad was a D.O. I can understand the historical reasons for distrust, but they do go through a significant amount of schooling and hard work to get where they are. Are they perfect in hindsight? No, but would you be cumulatively any better in your own hindsight? Almost certainly not. I've been waiting for the novavax to come out, I prefer the traditional vaccine purely because I feel better the next day.

I haven't had anything useful come from AI other than entertaining images of a half man half fish on top of the eiffel tower. It's kind of a useless technology that none of us asked for, but is being foisted upon the general public. I don't like it at all

Got out early but the fish missed the alarm clock. Didn't really start getting bit until later in the morning, had a gift of surprise low clouds and that always changes the equation. 5 bass around the same size as each other plus a bonus gar. The bass mostly ate a megabass walking bait, the gars wanted the tiny pop-r. Slowly easing out of summer.

I always get fooled by the fake seasons. It's still summer here. Water is still 80+ degrees. That said, there are fish scattered everywhere shallow and deep. Just not a lot willing to bite for me yet. The high school tournament brought in a 10lb bass this weekend but I understand it was a deep water catch. I got this little guy on a spook today after getting back from a movie set in central Texas. I didn't get out to the spot till close to 10 so it's a miracle I even stuck the one super dink. Had some gar miss me which is fine. I can finally get out super early again tomorrow so that's what I'm gonna do

Echoing the others here. I'm never gonna judge someone for ending the suffering of a living being that was already terminal. You did right as far as I'm concerned. My first solo catch was a catfish on a treble. I didn't have pliers with me so I killed it and took it home and did my best to filet it. I did a terrible job but these instances are how we learn and grow Now, if we're gut hooking bass constantly, you need to set the hook much sooner. I get the feeling that if you're making this post in the way that you did, it's probably a rare occurrence

Yall ever ponder the opposite of KFC? Like would evil colonial standers be all "Albuquerque Boiled Turkey: Toe Suckin' Bad"

I would trade the entirety of AI if we could go back to how Google was 10 years ago

In the public lake I mostly fish, there are no secrets, there are no secret spots. If you can throw it at bass, they've probably seen it by now. Stealth, persistence, and presentation have been my best assets to that. I have noticed that when I fish less pressured waters my catch rates are 2x or more than they are at my usual public lake. One private pond around memorial day I got 16 in one day and could barely eek out 5 at the public lake the same week. It's important for me to adjust expectations for the water I'm fishing to avoid unnecessary frustration

Probably in the 500-1k territory

Fish didn't get the memo, I barely avoided a skunk. I think following @Pat Brown's advice would have helped some, I had one good looking follower and three small missed blowups. Wind shifted earlier than forecast and blew everything out of my cove, the north wind seems to have been the key. I should have gone across the lake but that's a 30 minute drive

A guy reminded me to throw the dang senko if I see bait being pushed after the sun is too high for them to hit the walker anymore. That landed me two extra fish today. He was the only other guy catching, we traded some info. He fishes rayburn and Toledo mostly. Good dude. Obviously catches em. It's already 64 degrees out as of 10pm, it will be 55 or so at waters edge in the morning so I will be out there throwing at em. Tuesday morning will be the same. I have a clear plan, four specific lures and combos ready to go. Hopefully I get some catching done.

I'm just here to say that Ugly Stik could make a "S--- Stik" and I think that would actually sell decently

Night fishing season is over for me. Spooky season arrived at approximately 4am this morning as the thermometer finally read a number that started with a 5. My beloved fall topwater cove is now active. Caught 6 in about 2 hours, in front of three kayaks and about four other shore anglers who all showed up after me. Nothing over about two pounds, but it's good to know that pattern is setting up. Man it feels good to be back in my button up

Went fishing twice yesterday, caught 5 total. Not great but better than it's been going. I mostly fished in the rain, I'm gonna need to regrease a few reels this week. Started off with a super dink Lm on a wacky rig. Then two spotted bass on a choppo 120. That night I had two decent LM one on a red eye shad and one on a chatterbait. They're all mixed up with the abrupt arrival of fall around 8pm Monday but it's nice to pick some off

My favorite ones are polarized purple mirror/smoke Grey prescription from zenni. I like purple and I can see the fishes in the water

that's more or less what JS did with us when we went last year. He put us on fish just fine, I just sucked that day. he's responsible for my newer habit of carrying a texas rig everywhere I go