AnonymousSoreMouther

I've only been gone a few years, but it has to be 635 right? I avoided that road like it was the plague. DFW traffic for the most part really isn't THAT bad, considering the size of population.

Dobyns has some rods on sale. 794 swimbait rod for $150 is a good deal, even for Dobyns. https://dobynsrods.com/specials/

Like so? https://www.flatlandscustomtackle.com/store/p173/Open_Eye_Jigs.html

Looks like a take on a buzzin' frog. I can only seem to find stock images, but I don't think it's meant to be fished on a frog hook. Anyone seen one of these rigged up? I could see this being cool.

Update. The rod was starting to bounce around the country again. I opted to spend $20 with USPS on "Package Intercept". I've used this before to direct packages to my local Post Office instead of home or office for pickup when I'm out of town. It automatically upgrades the shipment to Priority Mail, and I thought this might do the trick. It did. As soon as I made this change, the package was immediately re-routed to my post office, and I got it (2) days later. It's a good solution for others if they find themselves in this situation. It did cost me an additional $20, but it got the rod to me, and after 3 weeks of watching it travel back and forth across these United States, I think it was worth it. Rod tube was bent, but best I can tell there was no damage to the rod.

I’m with you. I don’t like throwing around super heavy baits in search of bass. But I do own and fish a smaller rig. I experienced it a bit before deciding on a setup. I intentionally limited myself in several ways. My swimbait rod will not comfortably throw baits over 3oz, which is good because neither will I. I mostly use it for 1-2oz baits, and while I’m not interested in throwing it all day, I do like having a rod to toss some of the 6-7” soft swimbaits around. I usually have a Daingerous, Magdraft or weighted swimbait tied on. I also I’m not super keen on rods that start to approach fly fishing length because I own a kayak and they’re just cumbersome to have around. So I went with a rod below the 8’ length everyone seems keen on, but it works for what I’m doing. And lastly, I don’t enjoy large baitcasting reels. I found a 200 size reel that works well enough for my purposes and isn’t too large. Shorter rod, smaller reel, lure weight limit. These helped me not hate Swimbait fishing. If I lived in California, I would invest in multiple rigs and simply deal with the things about those setups I don’t like. It’s REALLY fun when larger fish are eating those monstrosities. And honestly, you can get used to anything if it produces.

I think @venom made a great point with the model number of the previous generation, since that price point matches their pre-discounted price elsewhere online. Likeliest scenario. Still a great price for a $170 retail rod.

Sounds like you’re just looking for a deeper diving 2” squarebill, which are plentiful. There’s no rule against throwing something that is rated to dive deeper than the depth of the water you’re fishing. I do this to ensure contact with bottom and/or structure deflection. I would pickup a few balsas rated between 7-10’ dives, and then work my reel speed and rod tip to keep it where I wanted in the water column, deflecting off the tops of rocks frequently without diving into cracks, ideally.

$270 - 275 to my door for my last (2) Zillions from Digitaka.

I’m sure Sierra is great. I meant no disrespect to them as a retailer. This particular listing just doesn’t add up. My guess would be a formatting error in their data upload caused an issue.

I’m not sure if this is bougie enough for what you’re looking for (no judgement, I too fish several top tier setups) but my primary frog rod is a Dobyns DC 736C. Everything you need in a frog rod, and it’s also a fantastic flipping and pitching rod for when you need to invade the muck. It’s considered to be one of the better sticks they produce for good reason. It never leaves me wanting for anything more.

Definitely curious what shows up. The Elite Bass heavy cranking rod retails for $300. This rod is marked down from $169.95 on their site. Also, the cork in the pictures doesn’t match the Elite Bass series from the pictures I see online. I’d probably reach out and confirm before they ship. More of a hassle for everyone if they ship you the wrong SKU. They definitely paid more than $70 on their end for a current production $300 rod, so they’d be choosing to lose money to sell at this price.

When pattern searching, I cover water. Once I’ve discovered what the fish are relating to at that time, I’ll move around to similar topography/cover until that patterns dries up. As an example, if I’m finding fish on secondary points in shallower coves, I’ll keep fishing those areas until the pattern stops working. Then it’s off to pattern search again. Unless I’m hunting big girls. At which point, I’ll stick to an area I believe in much longer, and fish much slower. I’m okay with getting only a few quality bites when I’m hunting weight. I probably spend more time doing this than I should. I’ve forgotten more 3lb bass catches than I remember, but I can probably give you a solid recounting of most fish I’ve landed over 6lb. That’s seems to be the breaking point for me when they have those shoulders we all love, and what I consider to be a big bass. For a shot at a quality fish, I’m definitely willing to pick apart water.

It definitely only turns on when the driver is close, or the delivery window opens. I do think you have to have an account, and then signup for the services, which I believe are free . For UPS it’s called “My Choice”, and for FedEx it’s called “Delivery Manager”. USPS has something called “Informed Delivery”, which will show you incoming packages and mail with a delivery window, but does not give you the map functionality. I utilize these apps all the time but as previously mentioned, the map functionality is somewhat hit or miss depending on the incoming packages.

I use Grand Max almost exclusively. It is much more prevalent in the fly world, but I use it for everything. I’ve not found another leader that performs as well, though I haven’t tried them all. That poon migration around the tip of Florida is a fun time! There isn’t much in life that gets the blood pumping more than watching a 100+ lb missile wrecking your lure.

FedEx and UPS have similar functions with the map once the driver gets close. But they only work on certain packages, and I can’t figure out why some show the map and some don’t. I have multiple packages arriving in the same delivery, and 1 of them will have that feature with the others don’t.

DSG is doing their B3G3 thing. Looks like Yamamoto, Z-Man, Strike King right now

Cool to hear about bass fishing in Spain. It never occurred to me to even look into it. Spain is my favorite European country to spend time in. I love the people, food, and lifestyle. I would live there if the possibility presented itself. What do you miss most about Spain, now that you're living in Colombia? What do you like in Columbia that you didn't have in Spain?

Well it looks like it’s retracing its steps back towards me.

Depends on the cast/cover. But if there’s an unobstructed path for it to reach the bottom, it‘s headed there. Then I pick it up off the bottom with the rod tip and reel and a few quick bursts, followed by a short pause (bites occur in this window often for me), and then begin my retrieval/presentation. My theory on this is that it gets bit at this time by fish that came to investigate it on the initial fall, but didn’t commit. They interpret the quick upper motion with the skirt flare and then drifting back down as injured baitfish trying to get away from them to survive, and instinct/reaction takes over for them to feed. But an ichthyologist I am not, so don’t take that as gospel. Another reason to let sink on the initial fall is that many jig bites, bladed or not, occur on the initial fall if the lure hits the water softly enough, and an active feeding fish are close by. My suggestion would be to find a spot of clearer water, toss on your polarized lenses, and cast it around a bit. See what you can do to make it behave like forage. Bang it into shallow cover and watch how it behaves. Now smack that cover again and see what happens when you pause right after contact, then begin your retrieve. Then once more where you speed up after contact and then pause. Then do something I haven’t described here because it intuitively seems right based on the behavior you’re now learning the lure to possess. Now leave your clear water pocket and go find submerged structure (preferably grass for a bladed jig) to experiment with the actions you now know you lure possesses, and what the fish are into that day. And my last piece of advice is to lock the rod in your hand. There is no substitute for experience. The more you fish it, the better you’ll become at fishing it. Learning how to learn is the trick to anything in life. The rest is just time invested.

Which reel specifically? I just looked at my order history on the site, and clicked through to see current prices. Quick check of the last (2) Zillions and they’re $2 cheaper today than when I purchased them months ago. I wonder if Daiwa had a price increase on specific lines? Conversion rates play a part here as well.

When I worked in the industry, I was shocked where this equipment actually went. I would bet that 50% or better of high end equipment goes to folks who have means, but no knowledge. They just want the “best” because they purchase the best of everything. I had guys that would buy an entire high end rod series in every configuration offered, setup with the nicest reels. Then they’d come to fish; and it would become painfully obvious they had far more money than fishing experience. Guiding was the same way. About half of the guys just wanted a picture of a trophy fish for their office, and didn’t care how they got it. There’s many a dentist office wall sporting a picture of the dentist holding a trophy fish I caught and handed him by request. Boring clients if you ask me. I always preferred the guy who saved his pennies to go out for one day and learn patterns of our water with a guide, then fished it on his own the rest of the week. That dude was always a good time, and felt more like fishing with a buddy than a client. And as a bonus, that guy could generally cast well, and execute what you showed him. Some of those guys got invites to join us to fish in our free time, while we couldn’t get away from Dr. Dumb fast enough. Those guys always purchased mid level equipment that offered the best value for the money, because they were well informed consumers of their hobby. I’m sure Tackle Warehouse does quite well on selling high end gear. Ignorance and wealth are not mutually exclusive.

Update on the shipment. I called USPS and they took a bunch of my info and will get back to me. Next I called the shipper to discuss. Apparently I’m not their only customer with this issue. They’re trying to figure out with USPS why a large amount of shipments are exhibiting the same behavior. They’re escalating on their end to management to discuss re-shipping my order via FedEx and will get back to me. I guess whatever the issue USPS was having, they’ve somewhat resolved it, because I have another rod coming via Ground Advantage and it’s out for delivery from my local post office. Doesn’t do anything for the rod stuck in San Antonio for the last week and half, but at least it’s shouldn’t have to deal with this twice. This whole thing wreaks of bean counters making decisions. “We can add six figures to our bottom line by switching shipping methods”. You can, sir. You can absolutely do that. And now that you have a large amount of product bouncing all over the country and not getting to your customers, was it worth it? How many packages are you going to have to send again? How long will it take to settle with USPS for all this missing product? There’s always a way to cut cost and add a bit extra to the bottom line. But NEVER customer facing. Consumer experience must trump everything else in today’s market. Otherwise, you’re risking market share to your competitors. I miss the good ole days when a company’s CEO was the guy who designed or knew the product best, and they figured out how to run a business because they had to. Now, if you have an MBA and can operate a spreadsheet, you can run companies that offer products you neither use, nor understand. It’s all just numbers on a balance sheet. What do you care if it takes a month for your customer to get an order if it means your bonus grows by a point? I think after this experience I may take the advice of others above and only buy rods locally. This is a hassle.

None of them are perfect. I’ve had bad experiences with USPS, UPS, and FedEx. Reliability seems to vary greatly by region. For my business, I ship across the country constantly. My experience has been: FedEx - cheaper for heavier items (applies to me). I’ve had 2 issues with them over the last 4-5 years. Both involved forklifts and neither was fun to resolve. But we’re talking 2 shipments among hundreds, so it’s a pretty high success rate. They also make the estimated delivery time most consistently for me. UPS - can’t seem to deliver on time, but they’re easier to deal with when there are issues. Their insurance claims process is the easiest by a LONG shot. But have had MANY priority overnight packages show up late. USPS - Priority and Express or bust. Every other service they offer is asking for trouble. For smaller packages, I’ll use Priority Mail.

734 definitely does a lot. For chatterbaits, same as @LGDFW . 736CB Glass.