WRB-2.0

My favorite smaller dog walking lure is Owner Cultiva Zip ‘n Ziggy baby bass color. 1/3rd oz 3 1/5” long, deadly lure. Tom

Kids have a way of trying new lures if you let them. My tackle was open to my son since he was pre teen. If I had in the box it was there to use. Tommy would be bored of dragging a split shot worm and would re rig something completely inappropriate for the area we were fishing imo. Tommy caught some big fish doing silly things. He once tied on a Shurmy Shad aluminum spoon design for near surface bass feeding on shad and dropped straight down in 50’ of water and started catching big 2 lb slab crappie, 1 pushing 3 lbs! You never know unless you give it try. Tom

Looking at the positive the pond has 4 bass and 1 of the 4 is the opposite sex a spawn may occur successfully. Put aeration fountain in the existing pond before the hot weather returns. Tom

Setting at water level in a kayak high sticking is easy if you raise the rod tip straight up hook setting. 1. Set the drag using a dead weight like 3 pint bottles of water in a plastic bag to = 3 lbs and lift the bag of battles off the floor using rigged rod/reel/line combo. 3 power rod 3 lbs is close to max drag, 4 power use 4 lbs. Never try to lift dead weight with the rod tip above 45 degrees, 90 degrees being straight or “high stick”. Tom

There are 2 crucial organs that hooks can kill bass; through the rough of the mouth into the brain and into the base of the tongue where a artery is located. Gill raker injury are not always factual, yes some bleeding whappens but gills are tough. Hook into the brain is fatal and if a hook penetrates a tongue artery the bass bleeds out. Both brain and tongue injuries require deep hook penetration regardless if the hook is barbed or not. Tom

Gamakatsu and Owner hooks have small barbs and helps to penetrate easier yet stay put. Barbless hooks penetrate deeper into the hook bend and more organ damage may occur at times. Large high barbs are harder to penetrate passed the barb and creates a bigger hole. Me I want the sharpe hooks with minimum size barbs and the reason I prefer Gamakatsu and Owner hooks. I use pork rind often for jig trailers and learned to push the hook bend against the pork hole to allow the barb to slide out easily. Same technique works for fish and any other tissue. Tom

Simple paper back book written by Don Iovino years ago is still excellent regarding thermocline bass fishing called Finesse Bass Fishing and the Sonar Connection. Tom

All I can add is study river currents and learn how to read moving water. The river water doesn’t move like lake water it has faster columns of water moving against slower moving water creating seams the fish use to position themselves. The easiest to see are eddies where the water is swirling counter clockwise caused by hitting underwater structure like boulders and abrupt changes in bottom contours and above the surface objects like wing dams or lay downs etc. Smallmouths bass like current seams and Largemouth avoid faster moving water preferring slow moving water in protected current areas. Lots to learn about current. Same lures tend to work for River bass and lake bass, location and positioning is very different. All fish want to face into moving water regardless how fast or slow the current is. Tom

Did I hear OldSchool....Double Z Custom Baits make the floating hand pour Craw Worm?? Tom

Einstein Doing the same over and over and over again expecting a different result is the definition of insanity could apply to bass angler repeating the same fishing history expecting a different result. Naiveté is expecting the same results. One of my many quirks is the ability to recall in detail nearly every spot I caught a giant bass during my lifetime. Lots of History and yes I revisit those spots whenever the same conditions are present if possible and hope for repeated good results that rarely happen. Yes, I fish history and try to create new history every outing. Bass fishing is trail and error. Tom

Shore pounders tend to approach a visible casting target the same direction and casting angle as 99% of the anglers before them and expect the bass to strike their lure when they didn’t all the others. Wishful thinking imo. The bass in shallow water are alerted to you as you approach and either leave or shut down and wait for you to leave. Why not let the target area a chance to settle and reload before leaving and stirring up another spot. Try approaching close to shore as if walking the bank and cast the opposite direction everyone else is doing, then work the area from different angles. Outside structure bass are use to boat traffic coming and going as few ever stop to fish. Approach off shore structure as if you know bass are there, quietly. If it’s windy target the wind end 1st by drifting back to it, active bass are usually located on the wind blown areas. Like a shore target work the structure from different angles in lieu leaving. Tom

I started my son with a custom 4’ spinning rod and trigger spin reel that he could operate one handed when he was 4 years old. My advice is take kids out in good warm weather when you know the fishing is good. Pre fish to get a good idea what is going on before going out with anyone new to fishing so it’s a fun and successful short outing. Kids attention span isn’y very long, plan on less then 2 hours. The rig I like to use for smaller size bass is the split shot rig on trout spinning outfit that most dads already have. When My was 6 years he joined Indian Guides via a school program. So we joined a tribe with 5 other dads/kids and went to camp outs with the local Nation. My 1st outing with the Tribe/Nation was at Lake Cachuma a lake I knew well. Offered to teach the Tribe kids to bass fish using their dads spinning tackle from shore new the camping area. 6 kids 6 to 7 years old learning to cast and slowly dragging a split shot rig with 3” Smoke S&P Reapers. Each kid caught bass successfully within an hour. My son was already skilled and was my helper showing one kid at a time how to fish as I was doing. Next Nation camp out was at Lake Casitas another lake I knew well. Created a monster, several tribes wanted to learn to bass fish. Decided to 1st teach the dads how to rig and use a split shot, much more difficult then the kids who listened! Too many kids with not enough supervision as the dads didn’t have the patients or skills to let the kids fish, instead they were too involved visiting to watch their own kid. Lesson learned. Be patient and don’t try more then 2 kids or 1 adult at a time. At the end of 3 years we had dozens of new bass anglers fishing at our lake camp outs. Tom

Warm water periods early summer to late fall T-rigged 8” to 13” soft plates worms and Senko's. Year around Jig ‘n Pig,Jig ‘n soft plastic Craw, 5” to 8” Swimbaits, Scrounger w/Sluggo, Deep diving crank baits , Drop Shot, Slip Shot finesse worms...basically soup to nuts. Tom PS, if you see a follower it will return.

All you have to do Fish our local high pressured lakes to understand to importance and nuances of soft plastics with various flakes colors in catching bass and being skunked. Tom

It’s very difficult to define what is normal and what is a disorder unless the disorder become extreme. We all have our quirks to some degree but it isn’t a disability impacting our lives. Enjoy life it’s a precious gift if only occasionally. Thank you for sharing. Tom

I like the Daiwa Tatula TW SV 70 but...the spool is too Narrow! Daiwa is introducing a new Tatula with Steez drive train this year. Shimano SLX MGL 70 is perfect for light weight lures loaded with Sunline Armilo 11#/.011D line on a Medium fast rod of your choice. 5” Senko weighs 3/8oz. Tom

With Merc’s you can adjust the side to side movement by tightening the (1 1/8”) hex nuts where the cable steering goes thought the engine mount bracket. Tom

With Shimano casting reels I start off with brakes every other on (3 on 3 off). Braid can be a ***** to cast and backlashes are a beast to pick out. A trick that works good is pull off 50 - 60 yards of braid then 1 wrap Teflon plumbers tape to hold the underneath braid tight too prevent back lashing. Not a fan of braid for long casting. Tom

Currently straight 12# Tatsu FC on Tatula reel and custom ALX 6’10” 5 power Fast rod. Tom

There is very little water resistance to “spin” the rear blade on a good swivel. The water resistance comes from rotating the front blade on a clevis around the spinner bait wire. Lift comes from blade shape and cup; willow low, Indiana medium and Colorado high. 3/4 oz in 8’ of water requires a faster retrieve speed with smaller size blades with low lift, slower speed with larger blades. To “feel” blades give the rod a lift to speed up the speed blades to increase resistance. Bass react to whatever appeals to them,not necessarily your cadence. Singe blade works best on the fall, tends to roll sideways on a retrieve. Listen to Catt! Tom

For me it was a 3/8 oz with double Indiana's ran about 8’ on a “normal” retrieve speed. Tom

Water temperature is 1 factor to consider but we should add the 2nd factor DO Dissolved Oxygen levels. The DO levels drop as water temperature increases over 90 f degrees to unlivable levels unless green aquatic vegetation is replenishing DO via photosynthesis, the process of creating oxygen during sunlight periods. Bass need a minimum of 3 mg/L to survive. Bass move under or in weed mates for both shade for DO during warm water periods. Wind helps to add DO and cooler deeper water is comfortable. Tom

The windiest lake that I have ever fished is Isabella in central California. Isabella has a wind warning beacon light to clear off all the boats on the lake when high winds are coming. The 2nd is lake Castaic and you can’t launch when high winds are predicted. Castaic is V shape lake with 2 arms; ski arm and fish arm. Wind out of the NE are known as Santa Anna’s with 50-70 mph down the fish arm. On shore winds are from the NW and prevailing winds but also can be over 30 mph sustained blowing directly onto the launch ramp with 2’+ white caps, gets difficult recovering your boat. Most of our lakes are fairly sheltered except during Santa Anna’s winds, safety 1st so stay off the water. The plains states are all windy most of the time so you either adapt to wind or stay home. Tom

Logically a lure coming from behind a bass blind spot can spook it. Just a consideration. My 1st experience with natural lake current was Lake of The Woods, Sabaskong bay at Split rock. The current through Split rock is the passage all the water goes through from the main lake and is wind driven. Sabaskong bay is about 20 miles long and the depth changes up to 2’ lime a tide when the wind is blowing. That is a lot of current like a River. Wind can have a major affect on how and where bass position. Tom

Back in 2005 I sold my 19’5” tournament glass bass boat with 200+ hp OB because I moved to a home with a 19’6” depth garage and wanted a boat to fit without issues with folding tongue trailer.. What I bought was a Trident SF175 single console w/115 hp Optimax because the rod storage held 15 combos up to 8’ long. Tackle storage was amazing. Top speed around 55 mph with comfortable ride. This boat is an entry level bass boat but upgrading the TM, sonar units was more then I thought it could be. This isn’t a big lake boat but road good over 2’ white caps and handle good in the wind fishing. Enjoyed this boat for 15 years before selling it. No longer have a boat, getting old is not fun?