Hogs_n_Logs

Evergreen shower blows. 110 obviously. DRT Tiny Klash. Chad Shad. Any of the good bladed jigs. Tons of JDM plastics. JDM spinnerbaits. Theres plenty of standard priced lures that work great, lots of premium stuff works exceptionally, and theres some cheapo stuff that works pretty good. I'll pay whatever the price for the stuff I know works, every time. Well designed, quality lures work because you can use them more effectively, efficiently and consistently for the given technique you are doing, that means they not only catch more fish this way, they're just more enjoyable to fish. There is nothing worse than fighting with a sub-par lure on the water especially when you know theres an equivalent that works much better. I am not a rich man, but for the amount of time I'm on the water and the enjoyment I get out of pursuing large bass, its stupid to try and save what amounts to a few hundred bucks a year by putting effort into pinching pennies on cheap stuff that works anywhere from "pretty good" to "useless", when I know what works exceptionally well.

Without knowing any other information, try deeper. On smaller private lakes/ponds I find thats were all the big ones go in the summer and if youre in FL they'll prob be there unless spawn or pre-spawn, although they'll occasionally cruise shallow they rarely live shallow. In warm sunny weather big ones like HEAVY shade or depth, especially if youre in a BOW with no current, and on small private lakes the heavy shallow shade cover is an obvious target for anyone that fishes the pond and likely gets hammered. Find deep areas, if possible with a fish finder, to look for good contours or even structure, and use some plastic rigged a way you can fish effectively down there depending on the bottom composition(c-rig, drop shot etc)

Like many here I'm going to suggest something out of the saltwater world. The smaller Pencil plugs for tuna/jacks are about 5.5" long, i think about 1.5 ounces and do a subsurface walk better/easier than any inshore style salt walking minnow I've tried (mirrolure etc). Admittedly I havent tried them for bass yet cause i was always borrowing the lures and the hook rings and line tie are waay overkill but the moment I first used one on a yellowtail jack trip my immediate thought was these would kill for bass if you threw some 1/0 Owner st-36s on there. They are dead simple to walk and they dart extremely wide.

Manslaughter is a heavy charge and its appropriate here after seeing the footage. Video is brutal, he hits the boat broadside dead center at over 60mph WOT and on a zoomed-in view you can see one of the deceased being speared by the bow. Completely clear sunny conditions, no fog, open water. He was almost certainly looking at his graphs or phone, he certainly wasn't paying attention to his surroundings. Hopefully a wake up call for bass anglers in general, you see a lot of guys being way too casual with how they drive their boats. I'm not a huge stickler when it comes to safety stuff and like to have fun in my motorized vehicles, but was shocked when I saw how a lot of bass boat guys operate their rigs when i started getting more into that world.

How can you judge a rod by simply holding it at the store? Like others said, you dont need a expensive rod to fish, but if you tried one out for a day you'd get it. I've fished my fair share of rods from $20 ugly stiks to $700+ World Shaulas and Poison Ultimas. Not sure if you golf, but think of it as switching from a random set of cheap 80s era clubs with persimmon woods and tiny chunk irons to a custom fitted set of modern clubs. I can get a round in with either, but I hit better farther with more control all with ease with the latter, not only is it more effective its more enjoyable. A dialed in setup matched to your application with a quality rod(not necessarily NRX price, but a well designed taper with a quality blank) your setup basically becomes an extension of your body, kind of hard to explain but it gets to a point where you dont even really think about your rod when fishing it because its so seamless and smooth to operate in all aspects of fishing (casting, retrieve/sensitivity, hookset/fighting the fish). I'd add that given the choice I'd get a spendy rod with a mid tier reel than the opposite every time, which is what I do.

I already use it in fishing but more to organize information and a data retrieval/compilation tool. AI is incredible right now and getting better but it will not really do actual "thinking" for you, ie if tell it to make a gameplan without yourself making queries from your own previous knowledge and expertise you will likely not be succesful. Of course analyzing changing variables on the water is more than half of fishing too. In all applications its best to use AI how a military general or executive would use a human assistant. They wouldnt entrust this hypothetical assistant to guide in making decisions, come up with proposals, integral planning, or for important advice, AI is not good at these things and the only people that think that it is are usually frankly dumb. But you would ask it to(and its excellent at) compiling massive amounts of information and variables in an organized manner, taking dication or shorthand that is later organized into a report, scaffold the boilerplate of a project for you to later fine tune, create models to test ideas with etc etc and it can do all these things that take humans hours or days in seconds. Similarly good software engineers arent really using AI to literally do their job, they are basically using them as a replacement for a team of junior developers, the developers using AI to literally do their job will soon simply be replaced with it. The reason its incredible is this kind of service was previously only available to executives, high ranking officials, nobility etc.

Japanese fishing magazine did one a few years back, Kagiya is a Jackal tournament pro, Yoshida is a bank fishing specialist, not sure about Kawashima

BPS has way better selection than my locals but still manages to infuriate me by ALWAYS being out of or very low stock of very common essentials that are clearly big sellers. Why do they only stock 1 hanger of the most popular sizes of EWGs, Owner beasts, 1/8oz bullet weights, seaguar 8-20lb flouro, magdrafts, bladed jigs etc. You're telling me online retailers can keep stock of these 24/365 but BPS cant. Makes me not want to shop there because I end up having to order online anyway. Maybe just my specific shop.

Was the issue you couldn't find fish or you found some and you couldnt get them to bite?

IMO all the reputable brands hooks have good to great penetration and materials nowadays, so the primary way to choose hooks is shape and design. In that respect I have never like VMC hook shapes and designs, any I've bought end up collecting dust cause they are just off. While the redlines look to have some shapes that are actually good(with others that are usual VMC), looking at the price of these hooks I see no reason to get them over others, especially when you can get hooks with excellent design for half the price or less. In regards to the Infini, its an excellent hook(probably my most used hook overall) but be aware that it has an enormous gap and the point is not angled slightly inward like most EWGs, so if you like to use narrower plastics it is basically impossible to line up the bait correctly. But paired with thicker baits its designed to be used with, its the best EWG there is, it will hook your fish almost no matter what. I've gotten some of the weirdest hook placements since starting to use this hook because it just hooks them even if you screw up the hookset technique or timing badly.

I'm pretty sure almost everything is more than strike king

Fishing for bass in Japan completely changed my perspective on things. The biggest thing, bass 100% are highly susceptible to fishing pressure; lures, retrieves, sounds, boats, sonar, any kind of non-natural presence and they do so very quickly the more prevalent the pressure. The only way I could consistently catch fish "easily" was finding weird, highly inaccessible backwater ponds connected to rivers on google maps, basically trudging through 8ft tall brush. Even then, half the time I would arrive only to find clear signs of people having previously trudged through the brush or even a couple anglers there already. If youre fishing popular reservoirs there, you have to be 100% on your game in every aspect of angling or you are skunking. You can see dozens of fish by sight or livescope it wont matter. The fish there also act very weird, they are generally lethargic, and typically don't strike very fast or hard besides at Biwa. My takeaway, bass are extremely maleable based on their enviroment, which makes sense considering their enormous range and habitat.

I dont think a looser drag wouldve saved you, especially now that you say you were on a kayak which is another source of "cushion" between you and the fish. If your kayak has a skeg, foot paddling system, or deep scrapes or burs on the hull from use, the line might've gotten compromised if when the fish dove under the thing the line made contact with one of those. I'm not trying to go on and on about the drag to try and school you or anyone else, and not to say you shouldn't loosen your drag if you want, with straight braid its easier on the reel and you'll lose less fish from thrown hooks. Its just that if you understand how fishing line(all the types) works you can almost eliminate break offs due to line failure entirely by being aware specifically what to look out for and do before and during the fight you'll not lose those big fish when the moment comes! If you rely on a loose drag and an identical or similar situation arose in the future you'd probably still lose the fish!

With pricey JDM baits you're paying for quality control and consistency in addition to paint, that includes the ones made in china. Its very easy to make or acquire ABS molds, shoot plastic into them and pay slave wages for people to assemble them, its hard to set up a system that ensures every one you ship works great out of the box. Especially with suspending jerkbaits.

Someone feel free to tell me why I'm wrong but I dont think theres any way a locked down drag was the problem in this situation. Undamaged braid is ridiculously hard to snap off, 20lb will slip a fully cranked drag on a brand new standard size bass reel, it would roast a 20y/o pinnacles gears before the line breaks. Your line was compromised/damaged in some way, it got pin-point tension on some kind of underwater obstruction, or your knot failed. As for your actual question I've personally found 8 strand to be better than 4 in every way. Namely it casts much better and is less likely to get "caught" on stuff.

In highly pressured waters they're getting conditioned to the minnow rolling for sure. Every FFS master on the pro tours are extremely cognizant of boat positioning and maximizing distance from the fish. Can't say that has to do with the sonar pings, T-motor sound/prop, boat etc but likely a combination of all. Bass do not have conscious thought but like every fish have extremely good raw instincts and are condition-able, meaning that fish of high genetic quality(most of the big ones) will get conditioned to pretty much anything. In regard to the show you mention, its notable that most guys that are particularly ineffective on the pro tours with FFS, despite nominally performing near identical techniques with similar lures, made their bones being excellent at implementing "blind" techniques were you aren't analyzing first hand a fishs reaction to a presentation(cranking, flipping heavy cover, dragging bottom, general power fishing). Their style of fishing is centered around quickly and effectively creating patterns and strategies without being able to see first hand how fish are reacting to a bait. Compare that to guys like Taku or Kyoya, who are FFS gurus despite getting on it mid/late way through their careers, but have always been sight fishing experts on highly pressured fish from coming up in Japan. Seth Feider mentioned in an interview he was fishing the exact same area as Kyoya in a derby that was absolutely loaded with fish, but he could not buy a bite, were as Kyoya would only make a cast every 10mins but always catch one. There are similar anecdotes from mediocre scopers about guys like Mckinney and Fothergill.

Guys in Japan are catching big ones dragging/dead sticking big hard swimbaits/gill baits on the bottom with 1-2 ounces of weight added. Sometimes with ridiculous retrieve times measured in the minutes, the big fish seem to ignore/reject the lure initially but will often eventually come around and eat it.

You can narrow it down to one creature if you are conscious of what you are trying to do in a given situation. Personally I like to have one that has little water resistance and will bomb straight down, and one that has more water resistance and has a more angled slower fall. I think its a trap to classify your selections based on genre of bait. A zoom brush hog and a nories escape twin look very similar and are in the same sub-genre of creature baits, but their rate and angle of fall is completely different. Conversely some hawg style baits effectively do an identical thing to some beaver baits, which creates redundancy. Focus on what the bait is doing through the water column(rigging etc being equal) instead. If the bronco bug and cleanup craw fill the two niches I mentioned above(i've never used so idk), I think thats a good starting point.

Fishing clear weedy water is one place I can speak pretty confidently in and my thoughts are the specific color doesn't really matter as long as its not too flashy/reflective. IE I've never had good luck with pearl white soft plastics or bright reds with gold flake, spinnerbaits or bladed jigs with unpainted blades, metallic or bone color cranks/jerks etc. I am usually very skeptical about the anecdotal effects of stuff like this but Ive had enough time on the water in those conditions were I can confidently say I specifically just do not get bit when fishing those in generally clear water, were as Ive never noticed a difference between colors like solid jet black or near translucent pumpkins/watermelons. The waters I fish generally do not have shiny scaled fish like shad though.

Dont like: - 90% of non-JDM spinnerbaits especially war eagle. To clarify, I like spinnerbaits, but most on the market are garbage. Why are the blades so big? Why is the wire the thickness of a clothes hanger, its going to bend out anyway! - Ned rig. My fishing buddy loves these and does catch fish, but I dont find these do anything much better that various other soft plastic rigs/jigs cannot do simultaneously. - Yum dingers. I'm not a senko purist but these baits are absolute trash, and if you want a lower salt/cheaper stick bait there are much better options. - bladed jig mini-max. This one is not so bad, but the hook keeper is terrible, hook is way too short even for small trailers. - VMC hooks. Plenty sharp and not bad quality but every model I tried has the unique ability to be just not the right shape to work well as other brands. - Small baits. I never see catch rates go up by downsizing to the 2-3 inch range unless we are talking juvenile bass and 13 inch dinks. I also dont fish water with shad so YMMV Like: - Graphite rods for cranks/moving baits. Glass definitely helps keep fish pinned EASIER, but I've never had a problem doing this on carbon rods. A graphite rod with a good tip and mid bend backbone can be used for jerks, cranks, and topwaters of a variety of weights, which cant be said of glass. - Braid to flouro leader. Use it on everything besides hardbait rod described above. There are some slight downsides but its worth it not to deal with line memory. - Ryugi Hooks. The opposite of VMC, every hook they make is the ideal shape for its respective genre. - BPS Stick-o. Quality varies by color but its equal to the best senko clones and the cheapest. - Jackall soft plastics. Cheapest JDM quality soft baits and all their designs are killer.

I've never been to the Sabine, but from tournament coverage its by far the most similar US bass water I've seen to the urban and semi urban rivers and waterways surrounding the Tokyo area that guys like Taku and Fujita grew up fishing. Particularly the Tone river and its ditches and tribs in Chiba and Saitama, which is Takus home turf. Some might be surprised to know that one of Takus signature techniques in those waters is punching floating debris accumulations with downsized jigs!

That was Taku Ito, on the OSP dice which is the most well known. On further inspection of tourney photos, for this derb Kyoya seems to be switching between the Hideup Koike(the original "dice" type bait) and the Jackall bait I mentioned. If guys can get over the shape I think the dice genre will be almost as big as the senko, much more so than poop baits. You know those times when bite is slow but the fish SHOULD be biting a senko/straight worm/neko but just come to look and maybe nibble, these just get inhaled, and their action on the twitch is unlike anything else to this point.

Fujita with 50lb braid and 28lb leader spinning apparently, hes not messing around lol. From the photos I've seen, looks like hes mostly using the Jackall dice-type bait that came out fairly recently. Theres a photo of him throwing a DRT tiny klash too, which i've never seen him use before.

I didnt see Cox footage at all but Livesay did this exact thing, it was in the middle of his big flurry on day 2 I believe. Not sure if you guys are mixing up names/footage or they both did it but yea, pretty bad. I think a good compromise is on-boat marshall weighing on the first 2 days, weights are reported 1-2 times in intervals, then the final weight announcement of the day on stage. On the final day, traditional live weigh-ins with guys that made the final cut. This way, when the field is gigantic you dont have hundreds of fish being hauled around all day, and some suspense is retained from not doing completely live weights. On the final day, there are less competitors so less fish being impacted, and you get the entertainment value when determining the winner.

Yea this nails it, if you have a photography boat on you in particular those dudes take super high rez images and theres no hiding it. A tell tale sign for these Top lures articles is obviously stuff like when a dude shows a jerkbait from their sponsor that is pristine, some cranks dont show much hook rash but every jerkbait will after even 10mins of casting. Surprisingly, at least one of Fothergills jerkbait catches looked like it was actually on the Strike King KVD whatever jerkbait based on an on the water photo. This interview was great and really shows that FFS requires skill, and why even when everyone has it people outcatch one another. There seems to be heavy overlap between the most vehement FFS haters and those who don't really think about fishing analytically beyond choosing a lure and hoping something bites. Does Kyoya have a rep as a secretive bait guy? Most on the water footage i see of him lines up right with what he says he used, both here and from when he was in Japan.