AlabamaSpothunter

Black Friday Sale 2024 MEGABASS Baits – JAPAN FISHING TACKLE They're in Japan fwiw.

So after dozens of reels, I finally had a reel that needed service/repair I couldn't perform, thus I had to mail it off earlier today to site sponsor Delaware Valley Tackle. My luck it's a JDM reel. When looking over the services webpage on their site, it lists a number of enhancement options like upgrading bearing, and better drag washers, and then this option..."Includes a basic reel service plus polishing of critical surfaces and Boca Bearing Soak Treatment. $39.99" I have no idea what these things do outside of the upgraded bearing and really don't know if those bearing would be better than the ones that already come in the high-end reel models. The reel in question is a 19 Certate 3000CXH which until it started acting up was nothing short of spectacular. I'm wondering if a reel of this caliber could benefit from any of these things listed above? If you have experience on this subject, I'd love to hear your thoughts.

When I grow I up, I'm going to buy tackle like @NorthernBasser 🤣 The only man in history who could be a drop shipper for Tackle Warehouse 😁 eta: those DBombs in black are dynamite.....I'll be buying lots of those next summer. Those things are big fish candy if there ever was.

I've bought quite a bit of that Sunline Super FC line, and sadly I don't recommend at all! My local store has been blowing that stuff out since March. I've tried it in 16 and 20lb. Seems very susceptible to shock and has terrible memory.

Carbs actually give me energy. If I have to output lots of energy, give me a big bowl of pasta. I think it's just over consumption of food that makes me tired. It doesn't matter if it's carbs or proteins, just about everybody gets lazy after eating too much.

I've had some downright magical days using the Damiki Axe Blade in low 50s, high 40s water temps. Damiki Axe Blade Tail Spinners | Tackle Warehouse I have a Dera Coup and a few others, but the Axe Blade is leaps and bounds better.

Yeah I've never seen #8s in the G Finesse. They'll work fine and again dimensionally they are very close in size. It's just the weight that is quite different. Ultimately you just need to get several different hook options, and maybe a different set of split rings or two, and then start testing the baits in a sink. The #8 Round Bends and #6 G Finesse options are two great places to start. This is something you just have to experiment with.

I tend to work the 110 Jr faster so I'm not as concerned having the heavier G Finesse hooks, plus I love the durability and strength of them. On the 110jr +1, I use the Gamakatsu #8 Round Bends like Tactical Bassin recommends. I actually really like the OEM hooks, and in a perfect world I could back even more down on my drags and preserve the hooks. I just have to use a little more drag than a finesse treble calls for because I've lost a number of baits/fish around brushpiles and laydowns. The reason this is obviously so important is because of weight and how it translates to the suspension of the bait. With that said, it's pretty surprising to see how random Vision 110 baits suspend straight out of the box. Some will sink, some will float, and occasionally you'll find one that suspends. Ultimately if you really go down the rabbit hole, you have to constantly adjust split rings, hooks, and play with wire/suspend dots/strips to get the baits to suspend properly across the wide spectrum of water temps anglers encounter. Imho, no other technique is more of an artform than jerkbaiting outside of maybe glides. It's the ultimate angler input bait. From creating its action on retrieve, to perfectly calibrating the baits, to finding the perfect rod/reel/line for them, they require lots of time and tweaking in my experience. A slack line jerkbait eat on a perfectly suspended and paused bait is about as high level of Bass fishing as it gets in my book.

The 110 Jr lineup are easily my favorite jerkbaits made, but it drives me mad that MB won't sell the replacements separately. They were nice enough to send me some replacements, but I go through hooks on these baits faster than any other. I've never found a perfect replacement hook, and I've tried lots. For your question specifically, the #6 in the Aaron Martens G Finesse Gamakatsu Aaron Martens TGW Nano G-Finesse Treble Hook | Tackle Warehouse is the closest you can get within that lineup to the OEM hooks, but they weigh more. They are significantly more robust though, and dimensionally about the same size. The Gamakatsu #8 Round Bend is closer but even still they are a bit heavier than OEM while being a little bit smaller dimensionally speaking. It sucks, I just want OEM replacement hooks....shouldn't be that hard since MB already sells replacement hooks for their 110 sized baits.

Same with the Geese, Ducks, Swans, and other various birds. Those suckers do some NASTY business on the water 😄

Wait until the CA sheriff's office learns that fish pee in the water 🤣

The SPRO sale above has some great deals on their braid which gets very good reviews. They have some finesse braid that I'm pondering buying that is normally $35 for $10. War Eagle, maybe next year we get back on track.

You hit a homerun Tim when you married that woman......she's a real one no doubt, fishing for a bite or two in freezing conditions is the hallmark of real angler.

I'd assume you're looking for flat sided cranks. Rapala OG Tiny 4 and SPRO Little Jon 50 both meet your needs and are proven winners. The Little Jons come in silent and rattles. I can't recall if my Tiny 4s are silent, but they're quiet either way I don't fish loud cranks that often. 6th Sense Crush 75x does as well, and there's just something magical about that bait when it comes to generating big fish bites. The 75x has a really quiet rattle. The rattle on this bait and a DT10 is exactly what I want in terms of noise so maybe somebody else can give better advice on really loud baits. So many great squarebills, but those three cover a huge swath of category. The Tiny 4 is more finessey, while the Crush 75x is a real power fishing squarebill just in a flat side almost silent package. The Little Jon 50 is a banger of a bait as it's a tiny little package that weighs 1/2oz and has a weight transfer system to boot.....exceptionally well casting crank!

Imho the best thing you can do for a new shooter is take them to an indoor gun range that rents out various handguns. Even if they don't have the exact model you want, she'll have a much better understanding of what she needs in a gun after shooting 3-4 different calibers, and various different type of handgun designs. G43 (9mm) with Federal HST ammo and a high quality/well vetted holster would be a great starting point. Bottom line though, once you guys settle on a gun, make it a priority for her to put 500-1000rds through the gun, if you can sign her up for a shooting class, all the better. Shooting sub/compact handguns with typical self defense calibers and loads is not particularly easy.

That's amazing Katie, and what makes it especially great is I know you appreciated and respected every one of those fish and catches!

Owner Zo Wire treble hooks are absolute game changers! Few things have made as much of a difference in terms of landing fish for me as switching out OEM hooks on baits like a Rapala DT10 or Damiki Vault to STX 38s. I'm talking dramatic differences. The design and bend combined with an unmatched sharpness makes the STX 38 the perfect treble hook in my book.

It's no different than bending a paper clip back and forth, eventually metal fatigue takes it's toll and the metal will break. Obviously a paper clip will succumb faster than a typical treble hook. I'm not sure I understand why you'd want to upsize the hook size rather than switching out to a superior design and metal in the same size hook as before. It doesn't make much sense to put oversized hooks on a bait when you can just find an alternative hook design and material that will give you the benefits of a stronger hook without having bulky oversized hooks that may affect the action and amount of bites you get with said bait. Owner Zo Wire STX 38s in the same size as the OEM hooks would be my recommendation. They're still relatively finessey yet way more robust than traditional OEM hooks, and I've yet to find a stickier treble hook than them as well.

@Fishlegs Thanks friend! Katie, not much of a story but she sure was a blast to catch on the pixie wand. Some fish are just destined to be caught no matter how much the angler screws up, and the opposite seems true as well. She ran under the boat and then jumped on the other side of the boat before I knew it, couldn't believe she stayed hooked up. I feel like big LMB are akin to bucking broncs or bulls. Every Bass seems to buck differently, they truly do have their own personalities. That might be my favorite quality about LMB. They really do seem like individualistic critters.

Magnificent and scary looking fish Dwight! Fish like that remind me why every day I don't wake up as a Bluegill is a good day 😆 Finally got an Elephant to eat my favorite little peanut bait, the Flashback Mini.

Only on the Coosa chain of impoundments, and I don't think it has very much or anything to do with Alabama Bass in particular. They laid out the data from a very extensive multi year study. These lakes get absolutely hammered by derbies. The study finds that larger, older females are disproportionately negatively affected. The mortality figures were quite alarming to me when reading them. I fully support this proposal, and I think the biggest impact it would have would actually be on larger female LMB. we funded a three-year research project to examine the impact of bass tournaments and mortality of Largemouth Bass and Alabama Bass on Neely Henry Reservoir near Gadsden. Research findings estimate that a total of 45% of bass weighed in during tournaments suffered pre- and/or post-release mortality, with mortality rates potentially ranging from 50 – 80% during hot weather. Additionally, females are disproportionally selected by tournament anglers because they are heavier than males, and because the maximum size of males is generally limited to about 18-inches (≈3 pounds). Research indicates that tournament participants weighed in 50% more females than males, with this disparity being greatest among bass older than Age-6, where nearly 70% of all bass weighed in during tournaments were females. Female survival is essential to the continuation of the fishery, yet female bass suffer higher rates of tournament mortality. The Coosa River reservoirs are small, and more vulnerable to the effects of tournament mortality. They cannot support the tournament pressure that larger reservoirs receive. Research also indicates that recreational anglers’ harvest is responsible for a negligible amount of the total annual mortality, and that regulations related to recreational angling would not result in noticeable improvements in the quality of these fisheries. In an effort to eventually restore the trophy Alabama Bass fishery in the Coosa River reservoirs, a tournament-only slot limit is being considered in order to significantly improve bass size structure over time. Research suggests that a 14-inch to 20-inch protective slot limit for all black bass during any tournaments utilizing live weigh-ins on all six (6) Coosa River Reservoirs (Weiss, Neely Henry, Logan Martin, Lay, Mitchell, and Jordan) is a sound management step to address concerns related to the resource and to lead to higher quality angling opportunities in the future. This consideration of a protective slot limit for tournaments is intended to conserve and improve the resource for future angling, to include higher quality tournament experiences.

For me it's in order to allow the fish to get it deeper and delay my response, as a side bonus it doesn't rip the bait to quickly away from cover.....both points have been covered above. All I know is that a glass composite rod (Alpha Angler Chatterbound) made all the difference in the world for me. For whatever reason, hooking fish on a full sized chatterbait is one of the toughest baits for me. The glass rod corrected most of that for me.

I actually just watched a really fascinating video on this subject Besides the above story I told, I've had two really close incidents with lightning in the past. I managed to get one on video where lightning struck a metal fence about 5yds from me.......beyond terrifying.

Easily the 70s-90s. Look at when so many of the state records were caught. Forget about technology, the most important thing imho is when did the most trophy Bass fishing opportunities exist. They stopped impounding new reservoirs for the most part in this country, and it's no coincidence that many of the state's best days for catching exceptional record sized Bass are in the past. Those days of the new lake effects are long gone outside of the reservoirs that go through droughts and then re fill like the west Texas lakes. Look at the number of 15-20lb Bass caught in the 70s-90s vs. 2000s-2020s. Texas is the best trophy Bass fishing in the U.S., and I believe they have caught two fish over 17lbs in the last several years at the very best big Bass factory in the country. That was a good weekend on a number of the Cali lakes in the 80s and 90s.

Yes both the SV TW and HD TW models. Totally different reels, equally as smooth.