Pat Brown

Well it's been a while and there's been a few trips but by golly we been having fun! Mostly frog and weightless stick bait doing the heavy lifting right now! Had a solid trip out with Jake catching a good one and me missing a giant on the frog Complete with a rainbow on the car ride home Got some great night fishing in this weekend with a toad on the frog and some fat littler ones too! Stick bait also caught one! Been loving the scum frog trophy frog in that shad color for sure! Had some fun at the pond also with some nice gills and more frog fun: Missed another big one this morning on the frog sadly. I think I been snatching it away a bit too fast and need to give em a second to engulf that bait (basically I'm breaking my own rules of topwater fishing - thinking if I swing fast I'll hook the ones that aren't commiting - WRONG!). My success so far this season with topwater has all been contingent upon me letting them establish that they're going to take the bait down. Paying attention and being prepared when they strike is the other half but I'm *usually* good at that part. Here's hoping I find success this week! Been a minute since I got a giant. 😎😎😎🐸🐸🐸

Dang that's a big striper!!!! Nice smallies too!

I am a huge Siebert guy but I love my Outkast/Dirty Jigs and Bizzbaits jigs also! The Outkast Juice Jig is pretty killer and the Siebert grass jig is the bomb in addition to the no jack. I like those no jacks in super thick vegetation with braid.

I feel like I'm probably a 10 if I'm being honest. I pretty much only target bigger fish with how I fish in general and my success rate depends heavily on my level of commitment, preparation and how present and aware I am at the moment of the bite. Some days they bite like they mean it and I get away with being slack but usually if I'm not 100% committed to the cast she bites on I miss my shot for the trip. Not saying I don't catch good numbers sometimes or dinks. I do. And I skunk plenty. But I have plenty of action packed days and big fish biting to keep me plugging away at cracking The Code™

Awesome report! Glad you have a dock! I also find that a delayed hook set works best in spite of many people saying otherwise 😉😉😉

I'm pretty sure a Tokyo rig is just a pre-rigged really short leader metal drop shot. I just use drop shots.

Weightless plastics, dropshot, topwater, spinnerbait. Don't be afraid to fish baits in the muck - contrary to popular belief bass regularly eat things that root around in the muck.

I'm in this same boat and ones I'm considering are : https://www.tacklewarehouse.com/search-tackle.html?start=0&count=20&searchtext=Bb+rod (7'2 ) https://www.tacklewarehouse.com/Fitzgerald_Fishing_Bryan_Thrift_Series_Casting_Rods/descpage-FBTCR.html (7'2 MHMF 'Frog') https://www.tacklewarehouse.com/Falcon_Lowrider_Casting_Rods/descpage-FLC.html (HF 7'2) Leaning towards the Fitzgerald but I may go Falcon because my last frog rod lasted 3 years and was a falcon.

Beautiful scenery! I just dump stuff in latest catch pics because I'm lazy and it's practical! I enjoy your pics wherever they end up!

Fish also are more apt to snarf that lower hanging fruit quite literally.

The monkey is pleased with your efforts. 🙈🙈🙈 I got a ton of odds and ends recently but most notably I got some scum frogs from Midway USA to try out per @LrgmouthShad recommendation and they are fantastic. The Trophy and the Launch are both incredibly useful frogs and come in small and larger sizes with beautiful paint jobs. They get bit a lot and heck even I can catch a fish with them now and again! I really like the shad color and so do the bass!

I got nothing to add really but yesterday I lost a frog in a laydown from the bank and it fell into the water when I snapped my line. I tied on another Scum Frog and figured what the heck, better see if I can 'catch' my hollow belly frog that I snapped off and is now drifting out to the middle of the pond. First cast I realize this is gonna be tough but I'm lazy and persistent. Second cast I figure I better retie with treble hooks - this seems impossible - but laziness and convenience won the day and on my third cast, by some stroke of luck, I caught my frog - with a frog! That's about all I got at 4:45 am on the way out the door to the pond! My lucky scum frog IS tied on and WILL be getting tossed. Let's hope the luck hasn't rubbed off of it yet! 🤞🏼🤞🏼🤞🏼

This photo makes me laugh. We don't have pickerel or muskie or bowfin or gators at the ponds I fish. But I do find myself cussing under my breath at geese at least once a week 😂😂😂😂 They somehow manage to be loud and obnoxious and good at scaring fish away right when I'm about to make a perfect cast in a way that no other species can come close to.

Oh my goodness yes. Buzzbaits and Frogs get lots of modifications. Making the blades squeal more, adding holes, changing the angle of the bends on the blades, bending the hooks out on frogs, replacing frog skirts with worms and other such things, adding trailer hooks, adding trailers, subbing big blades onto small buzzbaits and small blades onto big buzzbaits, adding bends to the buzzbait wire to change the hook gap, changing skirts, coloring the frogs or buzzbaits with markers to more closely resemble forage etc etc etc etc.

I feel like Christian Laettner sinking the game winning buzzer beater shot in the 1992 NCAA men's basketball championship in which Duke narrowly beat Kentucky - pretty much every time a fish manages to make it to the boat/bank. 😂😂😂 'It wasn't pretty. But we got it done.' That's my motto in bass fishing.

Same here but is it a change in pressure or merely less sunlight and maybe a little more wind generated current that makes them active? I've had numerous occasions where I'm watching a fish study my lure and then a cloud rolls over the Sun momentarily and then that fish bites.

Jig trailers are more about creating a profile than anything else. Sometimes action matters, you just have to play around to see what fish are in the mood for but usually it seems like other stuff matters more. I have caught fish on jigs with no trailer, worms, senkos, spunk shads, chunks, craws, beavers, wedge tails, paddle tails, brush hawgs, lizards, grubs and all other manner of used Texas rig critters 😉😉😉

I have two. One that sowed the seeds and one that eventually sealed the deal. I remember it so vividly. It was the summer of my freshman year of high school. I was feeling Cool. I was feeling like a real man. I knew this year was going to be different visiting my family up in Michigan at the tip of the thumb and fishing on Lake Huron. I knew this year I was going to get to do some night fish with my dad. He was telling me about it while we were at Walmart buying this year's supply of Rapala jointed minnows and Shad Raps and getting lots of 8 lb. Stren Mono for our Quantum Spinning Rod combos. My Uncle had a 20-ft Jon boat with a little outboard motor in the back and a trolling motor in the front. We would often troll around in the bays and catch a little smallmouth here or there or a sheep's head and sometimes in years past, the men were really nice and would hand me the pole and let me reel it in. This year was going to be different. I had my own rod and I was being instructed on where and what to do in the boat and how to help with landing fish and what to say and what not to do. It was all very exciting. A lot of trust was being put on me to behave right and help the fishing trip go well. It felt good. We got up there. Maybe first week of July and it was perfect weather. The smallmouth were spawning on the rocks and we had reports that there were some big ones in the bays that we were fishing. We decided to get everything loaded up for some real full moon night fishing which I had never done at that point in my life. Especially not for a bass. I remember how eerie it felt knowing that we were going to be out in the darkness looking for fish with hooks in a boat with rocks beneath us. But I was very excited by the prospect. I tied on a swivel clasp (which my dad told me would prevent 'line twist') and a 'Hot n tot' - which I liked the name of - and it looked like a crawfish - which I imagined was exactly what they would be eating under that big bright moon. We got out into the bay as the moon rose in the sky. Bugs were everywhere. We started puttering out there to the drop off and started making casts with our baits. Motor off. No talking. Just casting and retrieving and the sounds of bullfrogs and bugs. I did the best I could and made a really big cast as far from the boat as I could towards the 'drop off' - I had been told that big smallmouth liked to ambush things 'where it goes from deep to shallow'....couldnt hurt right? Before this moment in my life, I had caught smaller fish before on crankbaits and I knew the feeling of the bait thumping. As the Hot n Tot' bumped the rocks and began to find purchase in the shallower shelf beyond the apex of my cast, I reeled it down faster until it began to thump and bump HARD into the bottom. Somewhere in there I felt something that wasn't me THUMP my hot n Tot' very heavily and then I felt my bait disappear. At this point in time I was unaware that this could happen and was not sure what to do. I told my dad I had a bite but could no longer feel the fish and I believed it had gotten away. That's when I SAW it jump. The fish was much closer to the boat than I thought it was going to be. And MUCH bigger. It launched itself into the moonlight, a site for me and my uncle and my dad who were now shouting and grabbing for the net. The spectacle of the moment enveloped me. Time stood still. Next thing I know I'm reeling like my life depends on it and I can hear click click click like a machine gun. Is that my drag!?!? Could it be my fish!?!? What seemed like an eternity later, but was probably only a matter of seconds. The biggest smallmouth of the whole summer that we caught was in the boat. My first and only 4 lb class fish up north. I remember the turbulence of it and the joy and satisfaction I felt holding it. I remember not knowing if it was big or not, but I remember after a night of fishing and seeing what my dad and my uncle caught on the stringer back at the house I realized what an accomplishment it was. I spent a lot of time on that family vacation casting and reeling and catching fish but nothing really compared to the intoxicating feeling that that evening provided me. I think that evening did two things. It sowed the seeds for a lifelong passion for bass fishing, but more importantly it sowed the seeds for me to become a big fish hunter. Alone at night or in the wee hours of the morning stalking my prey in the darkness. Looking for that one big bite. Hoping to see that beautiful giant thing launch itself into the moonlight just for me. That's what I am in it for probably more than anything else. And this fish set that in motion. The other one? Well that'd be my first big largemouth - story I've told a few times here and may retell in this thread another time! 😉😉😉😉

Daggum stud. 😎😎😎😎👍🏼👍🏼👍🏼👍🏼 Well done sir enjoy!

I don't think I've ever seen barometric pressure directly affect fish, but I think the reason that we talk about it is because it is a indicator of some sort of front moving in which usually is good for fishing. Do fish feel changes in barometric pressure and react to them? Probably? Does it dramatically increase or decrease catch rates of largemouth bass on artificial lures? Maybe Sometimes? Do I have bad days with cloud cover and falling pressure? Yes. Gotta be other factors at play IMHO. Solely thinking about barometric pressure doesn't seem to catch me many fish. Now: low pressure system accompanying a cool rain in the fall after a week of stagnant heat? Better get out the poncho and the rain boots!

12 lb power pro? That stuff is like ultrafine razor sharp frog hair!

Try 6 lb stren if you haven't already!

Yeah basically the hard bottom spots anywhere. I have found them on points, bluffs, flats, humps, around docks, at the boat launches, in pads, in reeds, on rip rap, on logs, on stumps, on old train tracks, on sand, near drains, near streams and I find them spawning north, south, east and west on every pond and lake I fish - I mean seriously - where do bass not spawn is what I'm starting to wonder!!!! I am turning into a person who is of the mind that in the spring, if you throw a bait up shallow and it gets bitten nearly immediately, you're almost always agitating a fish guarding a bed or an area where babies/eggs are nearby being protected.

Strike King Pad Perch and Scum Frog Launch Frog.

Yeah - glad he was caught. Sad for our sport and the way this reflects on bass anglers to the general population. This is where absurd laws and regulations begin.