Olebiker

Good mornin', home boy. How's the fishing on Taylorsville Lake these days? I went up there to fish a crappie tournament with my nephews back in April and got soaked and frozen. Reminded me of one of the reasons I left Kentucky. 8-) Dick Durbin Tallahassee (originally from Sunfish, KY)

What size hook are you using? I wouldn't go any smaller than 4/0. I really *** you getting to fish Kentucky Lake. I almost took a job in Murray, KY one time just to be close to the lake.

I sure hope they work. I just bought a yellow one and a black one to use in the lily pads Saturday morning (or Friday morning if I call in sick.) I fished a white Zoom Horny Toad in the pads last week and did OK but I wanted something that would float so I thought I would give these a shot.

I was fishing in Lake Iamonia just north of Tallahassee last weekend and caught a couple of crappies. They had a distinct yellow cast to them. I assume that this came from the tannin-stained water. I wonder if the tannin affects the taste in any way. I am thinking about going back this weekend and catching a mess (how many is a "mess"?) of them but I don't want to go to the trouble of fileting them is they aren't going to taste good. Dick Durbin Tallahassee

Texposed, because I get a better hook set than with a regular Texas rig. If fishing is tough, the cover permits it, or I have torn up the senko I have on and am too lazy to get another one out of the box, I will wacky rig. I will also wacky rig if I am taking a kid out. I can take a kid to an area by the dam, hand him a rod with a Zebco 33 and wacky rigged senko and know that he will catch a few fish.

My favorite fishing hole, Lake Monkey Business, has been producing 5 or 6 bass each time I go out. I went after work yesterday and couldn't buy a fish, even on a Senko, in an area where I knew there were fish to be had. I reached back into my bag of tricks for something I hadn't used in years. I tied on a 1/8 oz jig head and stuck the last 4 inches of a culy tail worm (think Culprit) on it. I just swam that through the deeper water in front of the dam and caught fish that way. I don't know why I quit using that setup. I remember catching as many as twenty fish a day on it at Taylorsville Lake in Kentucky.

Doug who? You know, I am having second thoughts about my admonition to leave the grass carp alone. I do most of my bass fishing in a fifteen acre reservoir in my neighborhood. When I first moved in there was a good population of lily pads in the lake that provided cover for bass. The big bass population was strong. The geniuses on the fish and wildlife committee in our subdivision, bowing to pressure from lakefront property owners, bought grass carp and put in the lake. Now, there is no aquatic vegetation to speak of and the bass population is suffering for it. Dick Durbin Tallahassee

Someone paid good money to put that fish in there to control the weeds. They are sterile and don't reproduce, so please don't bother them.

About two months ago, the doorbell rang around midnight at one of my co-worker's house. He opened the door to the sight of two Marine officers standing at his door. His son, Lance Corporal Julian Woodall, had had been killed by an IED in Iraq. I don't believe I was as torn up about my sister's or my Dad's death as I was about this young man that I had never met. Dick Durbin Tallahassee

Jenny, Last year I was on a bicycle ride from Calvary, GA to Climax, GA. We passed a pasture full of cows all lying down and I commented to my buddy, Carl, that my Dad always said that if the cows were lying down the fish weren't biting. "Yeah," Carl said. "My Daddy said the same thing. If we were going fishing and the cows were lying down, we would get out and throw rocks at 'em to get 'em up so the fish would start biting."

Thank goodness we starved off the farm a long time ago. I don't miss going to the barn to milk one little bit. We had the prettiest herd of Guernsey's you ever saw. The only thing I am running now is two head of grandchildren and one old cat. I'm pleased to see that someone knows where the term "cracker" came from and realizes it isn't an insult.

As a dyed in the wool cracker it pains me to say this, but I learn more from that Yankee Al Lindner than all the other TV fishermen combined. He teaches more about presentation, rigging, and boat control than anyone else. He does all this while promoting his sponsors' products in a way that doesn't make you feel like you are watching an infomercial. The only problem is those subtitles that the local station has to use so that we Southerners can understand him. Infidel hit it right on the head in his evaluation of the other shows. I get so tickled when I turn on Bill Dance and see that he is obviously catching his big fish in a phosphate pit where none of us can ever hope to fish. Having seen some of the products Roland Martin has endorsed, he has about as much credibility as Ron Popiel. Dick Durbin Tallahassee

As my daughters would say, "At the butt crack of dawn." I don't know that I catch any more fish early in the day, but I love being on the lake at dawn.

Most of the pros I have ever met are genuinely nice people. Denny Brauer is no exception. Shaw Grigsby, Larry Nixon, Jimmy Houston... All were very outgoing and generous with their time. Roland Martin, on the other hand....

Yeah, and I still have a garage full of Boogie Bags and Helicopter Lures.

The boat change is going to be one of the best things to happen to BASS, it competitors, and the bass boat industry. Back in the early seventies, when I was studying marketing at the University of Louisville, I wrote a paper about BASS doing away with tournaments in the middle of the Summer. At the time, Ray Scott said that it was because it was just too hard on the fishermen to be out there in the heat. I felt that he missed a good public relations opportunity since the real reason seems to have been that the survival rate of released fish during those hot weather tournaments was poor.

I use Lightning Rods and Trilene just about all the time.

I still have the first Rapala Original Floater I bought in 1964 for $2.35. That was a whole bunch of money in those days. I bet I caught 250 bass on that one lure before I finally put it away. I plan to mount it in a shadowbox of some sort and hang it on the wall in my cave. In the years since, I have bought and lost dozens of Rapalas. I don't know why that one never got broken off. This year I have started using an X-Rap to target cruising fish following the schools of shad. As light as it is, I can cast it a mile so I don't have to get too close to the schools of baitfish and spook them.

Hot durn, you Yankees got ya' some nice bass there. Sorry about the big one, but those are nothing to complain about.

Looks like a bowfin, otherwise known as a mudfish or grinnel.

Hey, I have that same Dremel tool kit. ;D

Man, I don't know when the last time I went bass fishing without having a Senko on at least one rod. I started catching fish on them the first time I tried one.