casts_by_fly

What would you like to know? Not a sponsor here that I'm aware of. Obviously I like them. Lots of great rods in the lineup and at a reasonable range of price point. I think at the $250 price point the Cara is the best value on the market.

looking pretty great to me!

A spawned out 22” fish will be about 6 lb. A well fed summer fish at 20” is going to nip right up to 5 lb give or take a couple ounces. I figured a half pound per inch at that size.

because in this case there is going to be a big learning curve going from a basic 2d unit to any of these higher end units whether he stays with lowrance or changes brands. In that case you might as well consider all options and pick the best fit. it’s worth considering. Below are a couple shots showing the detail you can get from one.

How deep diving? I used to call all crank baits ‘deep divers’ when I was young. And there’s a big difference between a 20’ diver and a 10’ diver.

that's going to be going on 20 years old. Maybe more. Probably worth $25 if you can find someone to buy it.

that's probably about right for swim impact fats. But it will depend a little on which hooks you're using (brand and shape). I fish gamakatsu's and EWGs primaily for texas rigging them (weighted or unweighted). The hook gap isn't an important as the length. You don't want the bend of the hook to be too far back into the body where it starts to thin too much. First, it kills the action and second its putting a big hole through skinny plastic. Keitechs aren't the most durable anyway and that's really hard on them. rick

I posted these in my trip report on the bass reports, but thought I"d share these pics here too. 31" and 26" pike. Crappie 10-12". There were crappie for days on the fish finder. I could have sat and caught a bunch of them and might do just that later this summer for a fish fry. Shame the limit is only 10 here.

Hi All, I have some suspicions about what the answer might be, but does anyone know of a head to head comprehensive review of all of the FFS plastics? Every company seems to have between 1 and 10 options for them. I've got a couple that I'm using but I'm interested if anyone has done a big review of all of the options that are on the market with pros and cons. thanks, rick

anything from 1/8 up to about 1/2. For the most part, 1/8 and 1/4 are my main two for jigheads. If I have to go bigger to accomplish something, I'm probably not fishing a swimbait in that scenario. Weighted hooks are similar, but I use them less.

some of it has to do with how the fish is facing. I've seen small muskies that are turned sideways and its clear they are long skinny fish. But when they turn towards you they look like a round blob. In the picture above, the one on the left is the pike and its turned 3/4 away (or towards) the transducer. Side on, a 12" crappie and a 26" pike are quite different. But when you're staring at 12" crappie all day and then you see a much larger return you immediately think nice bass. Or at least I do. I can't tell you what all 5 dots are in that image, but I can tell you the bigger one on the left is a 26" pike. In the image further up the post, those are crappie. Settings also play into it a lot. If you increase the contrast the fish image shrinks a bit. The crappie up top are like that. That's pretty high contrast so you lose the fuzzyness aroudn the edges. On the bottom I had turned down contrast a bunch and you can see more 'flare' around the edges of the fish. Also, Garmin LVS34 is better than Mega live. So while I'm happy with these and they are usable, the LVS34 images are incredible.

I run humminbird (Helix 9 MSI G4N with Mega Live). My dad has lowrance (Elite Ti2 and an FS I think). I've played with his a bunch to dial in settings and what not. I've obviously used mine a ton. The side and down imaging on a Humminbird can't be beaten. Even on my Helix 7 with the tiny transducer it was fantastic, but with the 9 and the bigger transducer its just best in class. His lowrance units don't offer as much adjustment in settings. That means the straight out of the box 'auto' settings are pretty good and about 90% of as good as it gets for that unit. He likes 'set it and forget it' so it works for him. I use my electronics more and I'm constantly adjusting things depending on the lake and even what part of the lake (soft bottom, hard bottom, suspended sediment, etc) so that I have the best possible picture. If you're going to add live imaging, get a garmin. The LVS34 is better than mega live. And the side imaging is very good. You can also get a 9" touch screen unit for $800 or so. The Helix 9 is not touch screen and is $1000 or $1200 with a rebate that I think is still going. If you're not going to add live imaging and want the best console unit for side imaging then I would get the Helix 9 (or 10 or 12!).

This would be a specific scenario that it could work. These are crappie and if I were going to go target them I would use a slip bobber and jig. I found a dozen schools like this while crossing the lake. All about a foot or two off the bottom. If you had a school of bass like this that wasn't moving then it could work. A couple years ago Jacob Wheeler set a record for a MLF tournament with a similar looking school of bass that I'm sure this would have worked on. Then again, he was cranking them so if you can crank them, why would you even mess with a finicky slip bobber rig.

Hi gents, Due to a new job and lots more time in the gym, I've not been able to get out 2-3 times a week like I have for the past 3 years. So, I'm getting 1 days a week and making the most of it. I managed to get out saturday morning and with the time of year I decided I wanted to catch smallies. One of my locals has a secret smallie population and its where I caught the 4-03# 2 years ago in March. This lake is largely a silty bottom, flat bowl of a lake that gets weeded in pretty heavily. It means the two places on the lake which are sandy and rocky are the only two spots worth fishing for smallies. This time of year they are up on the shallow flats to spawn and when you hit it right they will slam topwaters. Well I was a week or two too late. The water was already up to 64-65 and only the smaller males were around. Managed 5 with the best one just under 15". All great fun for the first two hours of the morning until they shut off on top. Can't beat a great sunrise. This lake also has a good largemouth population so I decided to beat the bank. If the smallies are done, the largemouth must be inching up ready. Alas, I never saw a single largemouth bed so they weren't quite there yet. I had one follow a jackhammer back to the boat but not take it. But, I thought I had a PB largemouth about 3 casts in. When he rolled on the surface, it was clearly not a largemouth rather a 31" northern. Might be a PB northern for me, certainly the biggest I've caught in recent memory. I got tired of cast and crank and the wind was too much to really slow down and pick apart cover so I dropped the FFS in the water and glued the spinning rod to my hand. Crossing the lake I found a school on SI and was pretty sure they were crappie. Yup. Could have sat there and caught dozens if I wanted. Kept crossing and found a dozen similar schools. I knew there were a lot of crappie in the lake, but never thought they would be roaming open water with no cover. I went back to one of the rocky areas figuring that if the smallies had backed off the flats they'd be on the deeper side of the drop (the lake only goes to 12'). Now I understand what the pro's mean when they say that isolated large crappie are the easiest fish to confuse for a bass on FFS. Same thing last weekend. Crappie in the 12-15" bracket look like bass on FFS. Apparently so do pike. After catching a couple crappie to prove the point, I thought for sure I had zero'd in on bass. Larger profile on the screen, behaving differently while lightly cruising around. I put a mini fluke on a jighead in front of it and set the hook. Halfway back to the boat the line breaks. I thought I must have tied a crappy knot and had my drag set too light for the 6 lb mono leader I was using. Second cast and I'm hooked up to a good one again. I thought for sure it was a good bass until it rolled on the surface. 26" pike. I can't complain about catching a bunch of fish and really being able to dial in FFS. I just need those fish to be bass from now on.

I see where you going with it and I think it some specific circumstances it would work. However, for the most part no. The thing with chasing fish on FFS is that they are moving and changing depth also. You'd need to use a slip bobber setup with a movable stopper. But then you'd be adjusting the stopper every third cast. Too much fiddling around to deal with in a tournament unless you have a school of fish that isn't moving around and it locked into a depth. Even then, a regular jighead minnow rig can be bumped along at a given depth pretty slowly if you're going with a lighter jig head. If you're fishing a heavier jighead, its probably because its deeper in which case you're able to get up closer on the fish in the first place.

I went with these: When I built my kayak cart I put a set so that the rods can sit horizontally, parallel to the kayak. I alternated directions so that the reels don't overlap. Its snug, but with low profile baticasters all six fit. You can run them horizontal, vertical, or I even considered hanging them from rafters since my basement is concrete walls also, $20 a set.

Oh my. ..

Very nice! Congrats.

if I could only have one it would probably be 1/2 oz and Kent craw would be a consideration (straight pumpkin would too). You can always fish a heavier jig slower but not vice versa. Then again, I carry both weights in Kent and green pumpkin so there’s that…

Lots of good advice and you're catching fish so there's that. My only advice would be to fish it, but not wear out your welcome. A great farm pond is a wonderful thing. Growing up my dad had a dozen or so ponds around that he'd gotten permission to over the years. Some good, some great. two different ones produced bass over 9 lb which is pretty big for western PA. One of them it would be no problem to catch 50 bass in a light saturday morning, all 10-15", maybe one here or there bigger. It was pretty awesome. Moving to NJ, (1) I don't have the same network and (2) the ponds that are here that I've been able to fish are pretty crap. I miss having a great pond to pop into when you have a couple hours and don't want to get the boat out. So make really nice with the owners and cultivate that relationship. And if you need some help figuring it out, I'm sure I can swing a work trip to KY.

you could just back the truck up the hill and toss it out of the bed. Just sayin…

3” and 4” depending on the baitfish around. And honestly I’ve swapped to spunk shad now.

Gave it a quick trim. In 48 hours it grew about 3/8-1/2”. Considering I’m cutting it at 1” that implies I have to cut it almost daily or every 36 hours to maintain the 1/3rd rule. But it’s looking pretty good. The little holes from the dogs last year all have seedlings growing and should be mostly full in another month. The thick parts are nice and thick now. You can see the whitening in places still here. In a week it will be gone. I’m not doing anything major this year either. Just get it all growing and thick and full now.

Hmm. I thought that there were two ports on a helix to use as Ethernet. I guess I’m wrong on that.

very nice. I'll grab a snap of my pool yard grass later this morning after I give it a trim. The overseed has started to fill in and the grass that was there is looking pretty good aside from a couple spots I 'burned'. Note for future grass growers. Have good tools and USE good tools. I have a great 4 gallon electric backpack sprayer with a fan tip. I decided I didn't want to use it for 1000 sqft and 1 gallon of spraying. Instead I used my little 1 gallon can with a hand pump and spray tip from a cleaning products trigger bottle. The result was inconsistent spray of mesotrione (an herbicide which works as preemergent and is safe for seeding). Mesotrione is generally pretty safe and is safe for most cool season grasses (its hard on fine fescue) when applied at the standard rate. But when you have an inconsistent sprayer you double or even triple up how much gets on any individual leaf/plant. The result is 'bleaching' of the grass blades and there is nothing you can do but let it grow out. The best of my grass has just about grown out of it now, but I still have streaks in places where I sprayed a little heavier. Not critical, but 100% avoidable.