KSanford33

This has been my complaint all year. But they inevitably catch fish. Well, I caught this little fella on a Ned rig today on a heavily fished lake. This little guy happily swam away too, albeit after he bit my finger while I was unhooking him.

I love catching anything in the esox family (pickerel, pike, and muskie). I just caught one today on a Ned rig that I’m going to post about on here. Your trip sounds amazing! I’m definitely a little jealous.

If you were to apply your Guaranteed Way to Catch Bass to a river, would you change anything, or just pick a random bank and work your way down it? Thank you sir.

This!

This is an excellent answer, thanks Tom. Do you think this holds true no matter where the tournament is? As Roland Martin says, from Connecticut to California? Thanks Tom.

100% agree. The online tournaments are the best way to start out. And on the Fishing Chaos app you can usually find a free one. TourneyX not so much.

Just as an update, you guys were right. 83” won it. My biggest takeaway was that you have ~8 hours; focus on catching the biggest 5 you can.

I came across a situation today that I couldn’t figure out. I was fishing on the Mohawk River in NY and there were literally miles of emergent weeds (in this case water chestnut). I know to look for irregularities like downed limbs, random pockets, etc., but what other factors come into play when you’re dealing with such a vast area to break down?

Do these hold bass similar to lily pads? They’re really tough to punch through, but if you find a small hole you can get in.

I’m very similar to you in that I’m much more successful with finesse fishing than power fishing. I’ve heard a bunch of people echo your sentiments about catching larger fish on a Ned rig, but I still don’t have that experience. I went out for a couple hours this morning and caught nothing but rock bass and crappie on it. My last tournament (which also happened to be my first) I got skunked except for a bunch of yellow perch. My goal for this one is to show up on the leaderboard. I don’t care if I’m dead last as long as I can say I actually caught some bass. That was the thought process behind aiming for a bunch of dinks rather than throwing a 9” swimbait or something.

Thanks guys. I thought that might be the case.

I know no one really ever targets these fish, but I'm fishing in a kayak tournament tomorrow (just a local thing) and since kayak tournaments are measured in inches, not in pounds, I thought if I could quickly get a limit of barely keepers, I could then spend the rest of my time trying to add kickers. Does this sound like a good gameplan? Any suggestions on how to go about it?

Thanks Sean, that may be perfect. The issue I'm having is the TRD Craw is small enough that I'm getting rock bass, crappie, perch, you name it. I'm really trying to target 12-14" fish with this mid-size craw. I feel like the bait profile of a 4" craw like the Yamamoto is a little too big for them.

So I have a Z-Man TRD craw, and a Yamamoto cowboy, so I'm looking for something in the middle as far as size goes. Any recommendations?

Absolutely, they wouldn’t dart and glide the way they do if the plastic wasn’t as rigid. If I can see the bait it’s awesome, but I don’t get a ton of them strictly on feel.

I grew up fishing Slug-Go’s and they’re amazing. My only gripe with them is the plastic is fairly stiff, so in my experience bass don’t hold them as long as Senko’s or Flukes.

That’s an excellent answer. Thanks. This is a great answer as well. Like the old saying goes, to the mechanic with only a hammer, every problem looks like a nail.

Are there any benefits or situations where you would use one over the other?

I equate fishing lures to tools in a toolbox. And while it's nice to have all sorts of different tools, there's only so many places where a cape chisel is the best tool for the job. That being said, what fishing lures are your must have 'tools'?

I apologize if there’s a previous thread that covers this. I searched but couldn’t find one. I went out this morning caught six bass all between 15-17” within three hours. Definitely a great morning. But then I wanted to transition towards targeting larger bass. How would I go about doing this? To give some additional info, I caught all my fish on a weedless frog in lily pads. The lake I was fishing has a lot of lily pads, some submerged weedbeds, and not much else. There’s a decent population of pike as well.

Hey Steven, Welcome! I’m from NY as well.

I do what I call the +1 technique: I pick up everything I have, plus one thing someone else has left behind. Unless, like others have said, the fishing is slow, then I wander around picking other stuff up too. There's a pond at a local park near my house that I fish at if I just have the urge to rinse off some lures. It boggles my mind the amount of litter I find there. I understand that it's a public park, but here's the thing: There's trash cans all around the pond!!! I pick up random handfuls of litter as I work my way around the pond and throw them in the trash. I don't like to speak ill of anyone, but I can't imagine the lack of self-respect you have to have in order to not take your trash 100ft in one direction to throw it out.

This is legit funny and actually an excellent idea. I'm just like you; I can tell you my girlfriend's phone number from 1997, but I hardly ever remember names.

Tough life man… ? I try to pike frequently, but with mixed results.

I know I’m in the minority on this, but I like pickerel. Yes, you most definitely need to have some kind of leader, but I’m in northeast NY; there’s a bunch of fish that require leaders. My goal every time I go on the water is to catch fish, so if I spend an afternoon catching a bunch of snot rockets, that’s a day well spent.