Chris Catignani

Smallmouth hitting acorns is....ugh...hate to say it....nuts. There is also the possibility that acorns just happen to be falling on their favorite spot.

You can consider Alien Pros Tennis racket tape. Amazon.com : ALIEN PROS Tennis Racket Grip Tape (6 Grips) - Precut and Dry Feel Tennis Grip - Tennis Overgrip Grip Tape Tennis Racket - Wrap Your Racquet for High Performance (6 Grips, Black) : Sports & Outdoors The up side is that you could just remove it and your back to a split grip. Like @MickD says...its an easy thing to replace. But being 8'8" its a beast to ship.

I been using the boxes for the last 20 years. Like @PhishLI says about the salt and hooks...no bueno.

Thats a frog without the skirt (I think)

Wait...there's a winter hole they all go to?

Mine too...

Those smallies are good medicine...glad youre back at it.

Welcome...

I use the bottom of a coffee cup sometimes...but this is my main tool.

I like a reel with a lower gear ratio...I'll also change out the spool bearings and add a carbon drag washer.

Do this....make some short pitching casts. Does it cut? Then longer, longer and longer. I have seen where (usually) the tip will have a chip or crack and it will fray the line...and the line just eventually breaks. I have also seen where the line can loop around a guide and break. I have also seen where there was a loose tip...the tip would spin on the blank and break...and the tip never would come off.

I will easily go 2 hours or more to Dale Hollow, Guntersville, Chickamauga.

The things I really worry about are other boaters...or other drivers of the boat I'm in. I do have a hot-foot installed. If I get tossed, the motor will cut back to low throttle. I was once thrown out of my "suicide boat" (stick steering) when the back end hit the dock.

Hemingway would certainly call this "loose construction".

"Nervously I checked the drag...it was good. Then, like Humphry Bogart, I lit my last joint to ease my nerves. Launched a cast that rocketed forward like an ICBM...only to land in the top of that over hanging sycamore tree."

A couple points about mono: 1: Sometimes on a river, when you get in current and get hung up, you just need to break it off...there may not be an option. 2: I had this discussion with Denny Brauer about mono. He like to flip with it because he can see the line jump on a strike...not so much with braid. He was also complaining about braid cutting into the wood. (this was along time ago...and he may have a different opinion now).

I still kinda like Stren Original clear blue.

I can be at Old Hickory, Percy Priest, Cheatham and Cumberland River all in about thirty minutes or less. The Cumberland River is technically Cheatham, but the upper part that runs through Nashville is like a totally different fishery. I can be at Kentucky Lake, Barkley Lake, Center Hill, Tims Ford, Woods, Normandy and Cordell Hull in 60 - 90 minutes.

I love the prep...but sometimes I decide which lake to go to pulling out of the driveway.

...and a medium rod tapers faster than slow and slower than fast.

...or a spinner bait. The key ingredient here was the shad...this same "trapping" process happens on points, shoals, ripraps. @Blue Raider Bob If you type an "@" you will get a userlist and you can reference that person like ^ above.

"...when all the sticks in the water are floating vertical, it can be a tough bite." This is right up there with the "cows are standing." as a fishing barometer. But, this random fact was verified on the internet. See post #2 by Skinny (senior member) at Fishin.com