BassinBrett

Hit the Mississippi today and caught a few little smallmouth. I think that will be my last trip of 2024.

I fish Lake Minnetonka frequently in the summer and it is a grass lake. There are very few place with any rock. This summer was unusual because I caught just as many smallmouth in the grass as LMB. The previous 7 years fishing Minnetonka I had only caught to other smallmouth. On Mille lacs lake I have never seen a LMB. Mille lacs is almost all rock.

I use them and they work. I like the 130 size the most. They have a lot of side to side flash.

I have used OSP Buzzin Crank and Daibuzzin and they are good. I just tried the strike king wake shad yesterday. It worked well.

I fished the Mississippi River today for about 3 hours. 2024 bass fishing is not over yet!

This site has a bunch. I have not tried them so not sure how good the paint job is. fare price is the paint is good. https://www.fulkscustomcranks.com/shopping-cart?appSectionParams={"origin"%3A"current-cart-service"}

I am going to spend 5 days fishing for smallmouth in Sturgeon Bay, WI in May. Then the rest of the year I am going to fish the Mississippi and St croix rivers in my new kayak. completely off topic but I am also going to Colorado for 2 weeks and I hope to catch some trout.

I just upgraded the kayak to a Coosa X from Jackson. So I will be rebuilding everything this winter. Fist thing is to make a transducer mount for under hull transducer pocket. Then a new kayak crate.

CRB Micro Guide Bands are what I use for size 4 guides. They work really well near the tip top. https://mudhole.com/products/crb-micro-guide-bands?srsltid=AfmBOopT4KwXS520kZMrd3F4YJTU_hTU2BkEP9WXTRGDi50vT0AXdUW5

I have 2 Curado BFS reel and I have used 6 pound mono for top waters on one and 8 pound floro on the other for everything else. I have also used 10 pound braid to leader too. The 8 pound floor did not cast well with lures under 1/4 once. I will be trying 6 floor this winter on the Mississippi. I might try some 6 to 8 pound braid too.

Hey Shadow, good find. I just put in an order too after see this thread. thanks

Fished Mille Lacs yesterday and only caught. Fished near shore and shallow reefs and saw nothing. Saw some fish on side scan in 15 to 25 of water. The only fish I caught was on a Rapala DT16 near bottom. The water temperature was 57 I the morning and 59 to 60 in the afternoon.

I have a pair of Gamakatsu Micro Split Ring Plier that work really well on tiny JDM split rings. https://www.tacklewarehouse.com/Gamakatsu_Micro_Split_Ring_Plier/descpage-GMSRP.html

I have built 3 so far and have another blank wait to be built. I like them so far. I think you are looking at the SB 683-1(X-Ray LMX) blank. It is a nice blank and I have 2 of them. They make a nice top water rod for smaller poppers and walk the dog lures. 3/8 oz is the sweet stop for this blank.

I just started building rods and have used size 4 and 5.5 guides. What size and smaller is a micro guide? Is a 5.5 Fuji alconite considered a micro? The only down side to micro guide is for winter fishing. The smaller guide seem to freeze up faster.