WRB-2.0

Smallies are less susceptible to over inflated air ladders then LMB, don,t fizz them unless they can't keep upright! I am not a fan of fizzing, it definitely harms the bass and is the reason I will not intentionally target basses deeper than 40'. Tom

If your structure spoons have treble hooks you may want to consider using a crankbait rod. 10# FC may be a little light for structure spoons, 14 # will save you a lot of lures and not miss any strikes. My experience with structure spoons is with bass feeding on threadfin shad schools. Watch for birds feeding on shad, like grebes and use your sonar to locate the shad school size and depth. Your spoon should be about the same size and color as the baitfish. I would start with a 3/4 oz chrome or white cripple hearing or Kastmaster and change the hook to #2 chrome Owner treble hook with white or chartreuse chicken feathers. You can make a lob cast the distance the equals the depth of the bait fish or a few feet deeper, engage the reel and let the spoon fall on controlled slack until it stops (set the hook) or is straight down. When the spoon is straight down you can jig it up about 3' and let it fall down through the bait fish a few times, then repete the lob cast etc, etc. A variation is make the same lob cast and let the spoon free fall to the depth of the bait fish and jig the spoon back through the suspended bait fish, this takes a lot of practice, but you cover more water. The hook set is a lift and reel motion, keeping the line tight all the time to help prevent the bass from shaking off. If you are tournament fishing and putting the bass in a livewell, learn to fizz the bass, if they are deeper than 35'. Good luck Tom

The only difference is the sie, salt water reels re lager. A cheap reel is a cheap reel because of the materials it is made from, the finish, and all the internal components. Aluminum is highly sacrafical metal when subjected to salt water. Reels made from composite engineering plastic and use stainless steel components work best in salt water. Take a look at Okuma reels, good for the price and good materials. You try to spray the reel with WD-40 after you rinse it with fresh water, may help in the future. Tom

Temperature extremes can cause soft plastics to take a set and hard baits to split on mold seams. The big issue is both mono and FC line degrades quickly in temps above 105 degrees, that sounds hot but in a closed space in the sun the temps can get over 140 degrees on a hot summer day. I would also be concerned with extended hours road vibration has on rods and reels, you need to cushion them. The tournament pros must keep gear in both their boats and vehicles, at the end of the season they remove everything and store the stuff in a safe place. Tom

The reasons I prefer Top Brass Pro-Jp weights are; brass is a harder metal that prevents the line hole in the weight from being pounded closed, the line slides easier through the weight and makes loader clicking sounds hit rocks and contacting a tempered glass bead. Mojo weights are a western design, originally a elongated split **** weight that was crimped onto the line, then became popular for slip shotting, used as a sliding weight with a pegged glass bead used for a stopper. Lead Mojo's date back to the late 70's, brass Pro-Jo's back to the early 90's. Tom

Crawdads are there unless the bass have eaten them all! There should also be bluegill or green sunfish and this years Juvenal bass. The trout plant is interesting and if this small lake has a few big bass, then a #5, 68 Huddleston Delux swimbait bait becomes a choice, but you need a swimbait rod. Go with shad color and cinnamon blue neon soft plastics and shad lipless cranks and top water. Night black grape blue neon should work. Tom PS; if they are planting trout, the core water temps must be near 60 degrees. I went to AZ State in the early 60's and don't recall Tempe Town lake.

You are in the metro Phoenix area? 224 acres isn't an estimate, this must be full pol size and being an impoundment it has a dam. Does this small lake have any points that you can fish from? This lake is small enough for the resident bass to roam and follow prey fish, the prey fish are key to your success; what are they? Crawdads should be in the rocky area and the dam. Being a man made lake, the original river bed should still be there and a old topo map would be valuable to determine where it is located. You can reach the deeper channel area from the dam, so that is a good area and any points that drop into the river bed are good areas. During the hotter time periods fish at night or very early mornings or late afternoons when the bass should be more active. My suggestions are; finesse C-rig (slip shot), fat Ika, lipless crank and a top,water like a Sammy. This selection can be fished with one outfit and cover the entire water column. Choice of soft plastics depends on the prey the bass are feeding on. Tom

The rear compartments get very littl movement even in rough water and cushion by spare clothing and towels stored in the same compartment. I store my electronics in this compartment when trailering the boat and when I remove the sonar units to mount them on the boat, I place my phone, wallet, keys in a padded bag in the same compartment. This way I always know where everything is stored, safe dry and cushioned. Tom

The heavier weight does let you move faster and keep the weight on the bottom and is a good reason to use it. C-rigs allow the soft plastic to appear and feel weightless and appeals to bass at times, usually moving at a slower pace. Tom

I don't like the traditional Carolina rig with the heavy egg sinkers and swivel. Instead use a slip shot rig or finesse C-rig depending on what you call it. Prefer the brass Pro-Jo (mojo) style cylinder shape weight, faceted glass bead pegged to the line for a weight stopper, no swivel. Depending on the wind 1/8 to 1/4 oz weight to depth of 25', 3/8 to 1/2 oz to depths 25 to 40', line 6# to 14 # FC. Clear deep rocky structure lakes with sparse vegetation, so don't need braid to rip through weeds. Salamander style weights work good in broken rock areas. The combination of brass and glass makes a clicking sound that bass like. The concept that a heavy weight digging into the bottom and kicking up mud like a crawdad doesn't make any sense, all the heavy weight does for me is get snagged easily. I am fishing from a boat and don't need a heavy weight to make longer cast. Tom

Heating the jig head spring may severely damage the line if tied to the jig at the time your are rigging it. You could use a Wormizer tool that heats up a wire that could pre drill the worm heads or make up a tool with a spring, heat that and pre drill the worms before putting them on the jig head spring. The straight wire with the end bent goes back to mid 80's and pre dates springs, worked back then and should work on the harder plastics. 2 bass per Robowrm, about 20 cents a bass.....better than fishing for hours with 1 worm and no bass. Tom

Tinkering with bass lures is a big part of bass fishing, so give it try. You thread on the grub body so the head is up against the skirt and the hook is fully exposed, the trailer as straight as possible. Tandem bladed spinner baits attract active bass with the blades and bass often target the blades, not the spinnerbait head , skirt or trailer. I have had better action with tandem bladed spinner baits with skinny body trailers that look like the bait fish (shad) the bass in my area feed on, when targeting spinnerbaits. The larger trailers like paddle tail 5" or 6" swimbaits used as a spinnerbait trailer may work, however for me they work better on a Scounger or chatter bait, too may missed strikes with the larger trailers on the tandem spinnerbaits. Tom

We sometimes forget that both Rick Clunn and KVD won more tournaments fishing spinnerbaits than crankbaits! You should read whatever both those 2 pros have to say about spinnerbait blades. Clunn was the first to use heavier wedge shape blades and KVD was a fan of Indiana blades, there is so much to learn about spinnerbaits. Tom

2 blades = double the water displacement and flash with less water resistance, everything else being equal. Double tandem willow blades are a good example, the spinning bait can be retrieved faster, stay higher in the water column with less water resistance and put our a lot flash, plus the blades more resemble baitfish. A single blade can be retrieved slower than a double blades, put off less flash and sometimes a slower moving spinner bait is what appeals to bass. I use both styles. Tom

Bait casting reels are traditional for bass fishing for over a century. The reasons are; control of the line and lure during the cast and ease of casting. The modern spinning reels have come a long way in regards to handling larger size line, plus the super braids are smaller in diameter allowing the use of smaller lighter weight spinning reels. Drags and line twist have always been a problem with spinning reels, today's have excellent drags and line twist can be reduced by the use of superb raids. I know 1 bass pro who made his living using a spinning reel; Gary Yamamoto. Today nearly every top bass pro has at least 1 spinning outfit for finesse presentations, spinning reels excel casting light weight lures. Tom

The draw may be an original Guido bug, the worm could be a Mann's Jelly worm, "Mann's" if is molded into to egg sac. The grub looks familiar with the bumpy tail? They all could be knock off home made with commercial molds. Tom

As I recall the Fat Cat runs about 3' deep, a shallow runner. Tom

Pure wife's tail, bass eyes are fixed and do not rotate. Bass focus sight by moving the lens in and out, no iris to open or close. Bass eat Crawdads year around, when feeding primarily on Crawdads you may see redness on the lip teeth, parts in the throat. You may feel hard lumps in the stomach and if you put the bass in a livewell, you may find Crawdads parts or baitfish the bass regurgitated due to stress. Tom

Where are rocks, dried brown brush and jet skiers? Tom

The original Rebel Rocket Shad was a tail spinner similar to Mann's Little Goerge that were on the market about the same time. The Strike King Rocket Shad is a single spin spinner bait with a light wire frog style double hook, the skirt is tied on. The hook that comes with is a poor quality hook and can be replaced with a split ring and treble hook or a light wire open double hook like 303 Gamakatsu. Super glue the skitt wrap before fishing. Tom

The Kurita WR bass was caught on a live bluegill. Kurita is sponsored by Roman lures and the mother was featured in a few articles.

I have boiled it down to this; moon phase and gravity pull. If you simply watch where the moon is positioned for maximum and minimum gravity pull ans watch the activity of lake side animals, active up and about or nowhere to be seen and sleeping will tell you if predator fish like bass are active or not. Moon phase during the spawn cycle; pre spawn and spawn, maximum gravity turns on nearly every animal, including bass. I like the moon at the horizon and over head. There isn't any way tp predict weather, it is what it is! I prefer light wind and light rain and that doesn't occur very often where I fish. Tom

Bass and crappie anglers have been putting secret habitate in public lakes for decades, usually with mixed results. The reasons are complex, the main reasons artifical habitate fails are poor choice of location and too little cover to attract enough prey to attract predators like bass. Example is adding brush piles or Xmas trees off docks to attract crappie; the dock is the main cover, the added brush or Xmas tree becomes secondary cover seasonally, usually pre-spawn thru post spawn, about 2 months at best. Add the same habitate on an isolated flat or break and the added cover may attract a few bass on occasion, primarily during the spawn, if the cover is in a protected spawning area and the lake has very little natural cover. Getting together with a club and coordinating a habitate construction project with the local fishery people will have a greater impact, but not a secret. My advice is learn how to use your sonar unit to find natural honey holes that will produce bass every year....they are located away from the shoreline where over 90% of the bass anglers never look! Tom

In forums where questions are asked about swimbaits the answers should consider where the angler fishes who initiated the question. Water temperature has a lot to due with how LMB react to lures. In CA southern 1/3rd of the sate the swimbait fishing is dominated by lakes with Florida strain LMB that have a water temperature limit of 45 degrees, 50 degree water is considered very cold! 50 degrsss water the bass really never slow down their metabolism that much, they seek 70 degree water during the summer, that is why you see them suspended. The Lunker Punker may appeal more to active bass and a slower mover jointed surface wake type swimbait may look like a easy meal. Triple Trout can be worked at various speeds to trigger strikes, Matt's new StrongBass is a slow to medium surface or subsurface swimmer that should appeal to the easy meal bass. When to use which type; if the bass are active or you suspect several bass are in the area, the more aggressive lure presentation usually works better than a slow swimmer. If the lake you fish has NLMB and the water is colder than 44 degrees, a swimbait may not trigger any strikes, unless fished slow and deep, where the bass are located. Tom

The catfish you mentioned are all predators that eat the same live prey as bass. The fact catfish use their sense of smell more than eye sight are attracted to odors more than bass. If the big cats are active feeding where you are fishing, then expect them to react to a lure that looks and smells like prey. I have caught some big cats on jigs with pork trailers that have ansise oil and garlic scent, the biggest was. A 37 lb channel cat that still haunts mme....I was convinced it was a world record bass! Caught channel and blue cats on spoons and crankbaits with no scent, when cats are active they hit bass lures! Tom