casts_by_fly

I think I’m just bored of the opportunities I have access to right now and unenthused about my other options. I have a few acres here at the house, but I know how that plays out. There is a bit of state land around but I already see the guys parked up to set stands, cameras, corn, etc. It is going to be a busy season in the woods here in those areas and I don’t feel like fighting the people. The township land I hunt is similar, plus I can’t hunt it until Halloween. I haven’t had the time or inclination to go door knocking either. Since I have my fall bow license, I might go hang in a tree the first cold snap and see how things go. Maybe that will fire things up a bit. No commitments or promises though.

Two options- add some spool tension and turn the brakes down or lose all spool tension and add just enough brakes to control fluff. Depends a little on the way you like to cast, the types of rods you’re using, and the lures you’re throwing. If you’re using a fast recovery rate rod that is ‘jumpy’ and you’re also really zinging it quick then you’re going to want some brakes to control the initial fluff. If you’re throwing heavier, aerodynamic baits on a more moderate actioned rod with a softer stroke then you need the brakes a little less and some spool tension might be more comfortable to cast.

That’s a good catch. I missed the paired part when I read it. I would guess the same as you 1/2, 3/4, 5/6, 7/8. If that’s the case, then the pairs would be Guntersville/Lake martin, Tenn-Tombigbee/Arkansas river, Lake Murray/Santee Cooper, Pasquotank/Champlain. The last 2 pairs could really change depending on the flip. Santee Cooper in May isn’t a FFS hotspot, but Lake Murray would benefit from it. Similar logic for Pasquotank and Champlain.

Per the articles, it looks like they will use a coin flip. Exactly how isn’t described. I suspect they will line up the 8 lakes (hopefully not in chronological order) and they flip a coin yes or no and move to the next lake until they have 4 of either option. Then the St Lawrence gets its own flip. I suspect that they will line them up in chronological order, but they should randomize it.

hi gents, Hunting season approaches here and is open for something in a lot of areas of the country. Early bow season kicks off in 11 days here for us in my zone. And I haven't picked the bow up more than twice since Feb. I haven't bought my permit for later season (the fall season license comes with the sportsman's license I buy). I haven't dug out any equipment or clothes. I'm pretty sure that I'm not even going to hunt this fall as I have no interest or excitement for it this year. I might go hang in a tree for an evening sometime in October when it is chilly and I don't feel like pulling the boat out, but for the first time in maybe my hunting lifetime I have no enthusiasm to do it. Anyone else had the excitement wane and taken some time off?

Very nice. That will help when the snow comes rolling in too. The extra color darkness will absorb just a bit more heat to help melt on that shoulder days. And the blower should slide across that easier on that 'ugh' kinda of snow days.

As others have noted above, it doesn't matter until it does. I've had a few days where I could swap between different colors of the same plastic and they are all getting eaten equally (sometimes a lot of fish, sometimes picking one here and there on each). I did that on a recent trip with a neko trick worm- it was a day you had to work at it but fish were eating. Those are the days that I'll keep swapping around colors looking for one that they are hitting more than others. I caught fish on GP, black grape, red shad, and black and blue so the fairly full gamut of the normal colors. I should have chartreuse tipped one but didn't think of it. This is the same lake that 2 years ago the bass wanted a ned rig and on that one day the color did matter. It had to be GP with a chartreuse tip. I had a 5" senko with a dipped tip that wore through so I cut it to a ned rig and it was lights out. After the first half dozen bass the plastic was crumbling so I threw on a GP ned bait and they wouldn't touch it. After a stubborn 15 minutes I tipped that bait and was back on fish in 2 casts. IN that specific case, it was the early bluegill spawn and I think that yellow tipping was enough to turn them on. So some days it doesn't matter and you should throw what you have confidence in- until the fish erode that confidence and force you to swap. Mike Iaconelli did a youtube video 6-8 years ago about one of my local lakes. It was early spring, cold prespawn conditions. He was throwing a flatside crankbait and he gave his thoughts about color. For him, if he was getting short strikes or if fish were coming to the boat just barely hooked he would swap colors a little because that indicated to him that they liked, but didn't love the lure. As soon as he swapped that day the fish were choking the crankbait. That was a good lesson to learn and has stuck with me.

I sold mine through facebook marketplace and I think I got what it was worth. The number of people interested will be smaller, but list it and work the angles.

I’m with some of the others. Sure it is later season and the fish are doing different things, but we talk about pressure and educating bass here all the time. I have a firm belief that when you fish the same fish and same lakes all the time with the same lures that the turn off to them. There are studies that support it and I’ve seen it with my own eyes on the lake my dad loves. The fish were fresh stocked a couple years ago so basically unpressured like you had. And then you fish a set of things that they love (in his case a bladed jig) and they love it. And then they don’t. So you rotate through the similar things that trigger the fish in the same way until you find what they will eat. Plastics always work. Other baits rotate through. You become a victim of your own success, i.e. you become the pressure you’re trying to avoid. Knowing you and what you fish, you have fished a lot of underspins, craws (lately), ploppers. Going to the subtle or brash versions of those would be squarebills, speedworms, frogs, buzzbaits, grubs, spinnerbaits, and some others. I bet a Ned rig would work well for your waters and you like to fish a spinning rod also.

I finished the bulk of my lawn work for the year today. I started Thursday and did a bit here at there. The dog yard needed an overseed in the heavy traffic areas that they tore up last winter. I was going to manually rake all of the patches and hard dirt to scarify it, but there was a lot so I was going to rent a scarifier. But the rental cost was 2/3 the price of what I could buy so I just bought an inexpensive one that will last a couple years. It saved a TON of time and work so I used it elsewhere too. I got down seed, topsoil, and straw in the dog yard. Then out front I’ve been trying to get a patch under the trees to grow grass for a while now. It is pretty much full shade in the summer so I’ve lifted the canopy by trimming all branches less than 20’ above the ground. I did some clearing, scarify, seed, and straw with a deep shade blend. Hopefully I can get it to take and not just be hard dirt that washes away with rain. Lastly, I did the pool yard today also. I needed a patch seeding where the dogs get out of the pool and make a swamp. There were a couple small patches as well. Moreso, while the grass looked good from afar, when you dug into it the turf needed some better stem density. So while my grass guys have been cutting it around 2.5” this year, I dug the manual reel mower out and cut it down to 1” which scalped down into the crowns in a lot of it. That will let the seed get down into the soil more easily. So it got patch seeding and then a good overseed with some topsoil and leveling with what I had left in the truck. In two weeks the existing grass should be back to its 2.5” range and the new seed should be about 1” long. it should look pretty good then and awesome by the end of the month. A good soaking rain would be nice for all of it, but the sprinklers will have to do for now. So the seed is in the ground. Now I just have to have some patience and let it grow. I’ll need to feed all of it in a couple weeks and then a month later. I’ve got preemergent down in the areas not being seeded. All the sprinkler heads are adjusted and repaired. So all in now it is just let it grow and enjoy it.

I have a mix of both and will be going to more waterproof boxes. In the kayak I jut planned that everything would be wet if it rained that day. I had non waterproof boxes inside a tackle bag that would keep a decent amount of water out, but not all. So when I got home, all 5 boxes came out of the bag and aired. Now on the boat, my tackle storage compartment isn’t sealed so when it rains water gets into it. Since my boxes are horizontal, water can seep into them so I’m in the same place as the kayak except I also have to dry out the compartment. I also have 3x as many boxes as when in the kayak so it’s a bit of a pain to lay them out on the deck to dry out. All my boxes have a zerust plate in them and I never put wet lures back in the box so a tiny bit of moisture from pulling a lure out while it is raining a little isn’t bad. But waterproof boxes will keep lures dry in the boxes I don’t use that day whether it rains or not.

Every year i set a goal to try 1-3 new to me things (or things I’ve put down for a while). And then usually one of those things sees significant action the following year and makes the regular rotation. A couple years ago I did the ‘all plastics’ outing because I wasn’t really fishing plastics that much and certainly not good with them. The next year a Texas rigged beaver was my #1 producer. I did similar exercises with ned/finesse setups, bigger swim baits, and this year a Neko rig. I’ll usually do it on a lake that I know pretty well so that I’m not finding fish as much as fishing the new lure in a way it was meant to be fished and seeing if it works for me (both my mentality on the water and the fish). Somethings stick. Some don’t. I tried to incorporate jerkbaits into my routine but I think I’ve caught 1 fish on them in the past 3 years. They will make a revival next year probably when I’ll put some real effort into fishing them. Lipless are another that I haven’t fished as much as I should. I might do a jigs only day at some point to refresh my fishing of them.

I can't speak to the expride. But my dad has (and I have used) the 6'10" and 7'2" MH with the same lure specs you're looking at (his are both fast action) in the curado and the ratings are true to life. With a 1/2 oz hardbait they load up and fling just fine. A 3/8 is starting to push the limits just a little but both have enough tip to get it done. Absent any other feedback, I would think that the 7'6" is probably going to be just fine for those total bait weights.

Bass thumb isn't a poblem. Scratches like walking through a briar patch aren't either. It's more for an actual wound that isn't yet scabbed over.

ooh, a Terry's Chocolate orange

If you don't ingest it and you don't have major cuts on your skin, then you're almost certainly fine.

The past couple years have seen the main waverunner companies turning their standard rigs into fishing specific rigs. It looks like they have finally gotten a redesign specific for fishing into the market. They are saltwater intended. Simrad tells you that right away as does the riptide (white) motor. I bet they will be popular with saltwater guys who don't fish that far out. Much cheaper than a proper boat, easier to store (garage), less maintenence. That said, why not for freshwater too? I'm sure they will work for someone in freshwater.

Definitely shooting blanks those days. The fish of course.

Why- because it's a good place to stop and do the thing they want to do right now. In your case, that's eat. They can hide in the grass or drop down over to the deeper part of the hump and just wait for baitfish to funnel to them. Where- all over. Bass roam. That might be the biggest thing that FFS has demonstrated. Bass roam until they find a spot that interests them. They stay there until they are no longer interested. So the bass in your lake are constantly roaming until they find your hump- which is REALLY interesting to a lot of the fish for the reasons above. The reloading happens all the time all over the lake (and all lakes really) but it's the stopping that's important.

I get blooms here and my dad gets them in western PA at times. If the water is sediment clear but bloomed then treat it largely like sediment cloudiness. Black and blue or your favorite black variation on one end and whites on the other end. Both have the highest visibility (but for different reasons). As noted above, when the bloom first hits the fish will shut down and the fishing will be tough. I find the same for when a storm rolls through and the visibility goes from 6' to < 1'. That first day after is tough as the fish get really tight to cover. Then as it clears a little and as they get used to that lack of clarity they will turn back on.

I'll change the lures I fish and I will chose the lakes for the day based on what I expect clarity to be, but it doesn't change my depth aside from the super clear lakes give you more leeway on a jig and minnow setup if you're chasing fish. They can see it from further away so you don't have to be quite as on top of them, at the same time if the water is that clear then you need to stay way back from them.

When just about all I was fishing was moving baits, I used to care more about fronts, weather conditions, etc. Grey days, windy, gross, pre-frontal and during the front were what I was looking for. Those were my best days really and it makes sense- those are the times when the fish are chasing, exploring away from cover a little more (lower light), often looking up, etc. Then you realize that the fish have to eat. All the time and especially in summer when their metabolisms are in full swing. Watch the tournament pros and see that days when I’d think were tough days they were just banging fish. You come to realize that more days than not fish can be caught. You just have to adjust where you are on the lake, where in the water column you’re fishing, and the size/profile/speed of your bait but there are fish eating somewhere.

I'm one of those guys. I love supernatural. It is perfect for my preferences and how I fish.

Jason Christie just did a video on burning spinnerbaits on his youtube channel and it is worth watching. he is fishing smallmouth, clear water. He talks about his logic for bait and rod selection, conditions, etc.

Looks pretty great to me. Did you put down grass seed or is that the natural grasses and plants?