JackstrawIII

Monos ability to remain on the surface of the water is its best quality for one reason: it will only sink as your lure pulls it down. When the line stops sinking, it means that your lure is on the bottom. This is very helpful information. Braid will do the same. The sinking nature of fluoro is its blessing and its curse. On the plus side, your bait sinks faster. On the negative side, the entire line will sink meaning it can be hard to tell when your bait is done sinking.

Very cool. I camp up on the St. Lawrence in that area, but never fished Black Lake. Glad you had a good time.

Sounds like an awesome lake! To answer the question, yes, absolutely. I get bored fishing the same bait for more than an hour… even if I’m catching fish.

I’m in upstate NY… sorry to hear about your trouble getting here, but glad the fish treated you well. Where were you fishing?

1/0 Owner Flashy Swimmer. Weighs 1/8oz.

This.

Wow. Throw some of those bad boys up on the Flea Market page. I have a few more rods than reels, but it’s close.

All my Tatula SV reels are left handed and I’ve never had this problem. Send yours in for warranty repair.

That’s what was going to say. This is the rod I use for all moving baits after trying many other rods. This one is perfect. For the reel, SLX in the best version he can afford.

You're only going to catch big, healthy fish in a place with an abundance of forage... which is exactly what allows the fish to get big and healthy. It seems counterproductive, but I much prefer fishing in bodies of water with healthy forage populations, because I know the bass will be healthy and active. It's quite possible that your struggles with this pond are more due to the size of the pond (lure-educated bass) than the amount of forage. That would be my assumption, knowing very little of the situation. My advice in forage rich environments is similar to what the others have said, be different. Fish something that looks like the natural forage, but fish it slower or faster, more erratically so it looks injured, deeper or shallower, etc. You gotta stick out from the crowd somehow.

Stubbornness is my biggest fishing weakness... but this is such good advice.

Where: smallmouth bass live in lakes, rivers, and streams... but, as been said, they do not live in ALL lakes, rivers, and streams. Most states will have an environmental agency which lists the types of fish live in each significant body of water, and that's a good place to start, but your local bait and tackle shops will know better. Gear (rods, line, etc): use the same gear as largemouth fishing. The gear is more technique specific than fish specific. For example, a dropshot rod for LMB and SMB is the same. Structure: SMB generally tend to hang out in deeper water than LMB, at least in NY where I fish. They also are more inclined to relate to rock and hard structure than weeds. Look for chunk rock and boulders in deeper water. Certain times of year (spawn, fall) they come shallower. I caught the monster in the photo below out of a weed bed in 8' of water like 3 days ago, but that won't happen once the post-spawn is over in my area. Lures: generally, guys will use slightly smaller baits when smallmouth fishing, but I'm not sure that's needed. In general, they'll hit most LMB baits, but I would focus on baits that imitate craws and minnows. I've had the most success with standard stuff like jigs, swimbaits, dropshots, ned rigs, etc.

Nope. Two weeks is nothing. I've had baits rigged wayyyy longer than that without losing effectiveness.

Welcome to the forums. With that budget and list of rods, you can't really go wrong. My only thought to contribute is that, if NJ is anything like NY, you might want to go up to a M action rod instead of ML. At least that is my preference. I like a bit more power when considering the amount of vegetation and structure that fills our lakes.

My longest bass in NY is 22.5", so about an inch shorter than his... but you're right, mine was nowhere near as heavy. The girth on his fish is startling. Soooo thick.

You're going to have a tough time throwing a frog on a ML... the idea of using the same rod for a wide variety of uses has merit, but it also has limits.

I'm a huge fan of the FG knot and use it on most of my setups to attach braid mainline to a leader (mono or fluoro). With that said, it would not be a good option to splice together two lines of the same type. Good luck with your tinkering!

This is the answer.

The wacky rig was a major confidence bait for me when I first got into bass fishing like 5-6 years ago. But I haven't fished it in a couple years... I should probably bring it back into my repertoire. Thanks for the reminder. Ironically, the biggest bass I ever caught was fishing a wacky rig in heavy cover, because at the time I didn't know any better. I caught a lot of weeds on my wacky rig back then, but also some really big fish.

All of the smallies where I live (NY) have red eyes.

Double-uni knot works great to fix wind knots in light weight braid, which is the only line I ever get wind knots in. What type and weight of line are you having issues with?

Honestly, I agree. I've been surprised by the tone of responses on this thread, especially when you consider how incredibly kind and helpful the members of this forum are in general. Interesting that we're so willing to help people we've never met online, but less inclined to help someone face to face. Not saying you guys are wrong, I'm just surprised.

I like the Pfleuger Supreme at that price point. I have many of them and they've always been really solid.

8 pound leader is plenty. I don't like braid under 15 lb. I think it becomes too thin and prone to knotting. I've used 10, but much prefer 15.

You dragging it on the bottom or hopping it up and letting it sink?