new pb went 4.45 caught on a tube @ 930 in the morning. Had been a slow bite, saw some shad skipping and threw my tube in behind them. I thought I hooked a tree when I set the hook and the she jumped and bout had a coronary. Anchored my limit of 8.33 and big bass. Can't wait to break 5lbs now!!!

I have been in a dropshot frenzy for the last few weeks.  I have been catching more and bigger fish now then I have all year.  On friday morning I hit a local pond and immediately hooked up with a little pounder.  

In an hour or so I managed 1 more around that size and two more right around 2lbs, with this being the nicest one.  

I got two more dinks and decided that since the larger fish both came very tight to the wall, I would re-fish the spot I started but a bit slower and closer to the wall.  

 

That paid off and I almost immediately I hooked into this fella;

A three pound bass is pretty good for this place and this was likely the best bass I have ever pulled out of it.  Or it was the best, as maybe 10min later I got this one;

This is maybe a pound heavier than anything I have regularly caught here.  At this point I don't know if I will ever put the dropshot rod down.  

 

All of my bass came on a 6" Marten's Madness Roboworm on a 1/0 Gamay Finesse Cover hook.  Incredibly, I got my first five fish on a single worm.

I had never seen on so worn, I usually loose one every fish when with other hooks.  

Keeping it simple on a cool, post-front day. Pond hopping with a couple baits stuffed in a pocket, along with just 1 outfit. A lot better quality than I expected given the conditions. A brief warmup starts tomorrow before the next front moves in.

 

 

 

 

Well I'm starting to get the hang of my new Lew's American Hero baitcaster. Still have some getting used to considering I've never used or owned one before. Was hoping I'd have a bass pic to post catching it on it. Not today. However I do have a first to post. My girlfriend and I went to Buhlow Lake this evening and using my Lew's spinning rod and a 1/4oz black and blue Strike King swim jig with one of my new black and blue Arkie crawfish jig trailers I caught this little fella marking my first ever jig bass. One of these days I'm gonna be able to post a pic of a big un regardless of what I catch it on. Hoping tomorrow is that day as my girlfriend and I are going to Valentine Lake in Gardner, Louisiana. Gotta get some more practice in on my new baitcaster too. ?

8 hours ago, MichaelCopeland said:

Well I'm starting to get the hang of my new Lew's American Hero baitcaster.

Ah yes, I remember when i went through "Getting used to my bait caster"

My advice: You want to have your bait caster tuned and keep it that way very important!

You can do this if you fallow the tips below.

 

1.Adjusting your spool tension knob to match the lure you will be using.

Remember, Not every lure weights the same so you you will be adjusting your spool tension every time you switch out a lure till it's tuned right.

Personally, I like to have mine set to slowly drop or not drop at all.

By doing this i can cast out and as soon as my lure hits the water/ground it won't bird's nest and the spool stops itself.

 

2.Adjusting your breaks, In your case you want it on the highest setting as you are starting out.

But you may adjust your breaks later if you want but that's up to you.

Personally, I like to keep mine on the highest and still do today, I like it this way but your mileage may vary.

 

3.When start out using your baitcaster you won't be able to cast out very far and you'll feel like you don't know how to fish but if you stick with it and don't give up you'll find yourself sooner or later making those longer and accurate cast.

 

I used to not be able to cast out very far and now i can cast out as far and accurate just as good as my friend using spinning setup.

 

 

Thanks for the advice. I believe I have it pretty well tuned in for my chatter bait. I went to the smaller pond by the house a little while ago and only got one little backlash that's because my lure caught hold of a tall weed as I casted. Took only a second or two to undo. Distance is good enough for me right now just the accuracy thing is a bit harder to get down. I'm not backing down though. I'm gonna learn how to use it as good or better than my spinning gear.

Baitcaster is officially broke in, catching a bass with it that is! Haven't been to Valentine Lake yet today. Family things come up and delayed it for a bit. So I went to the smaller pond by my house only taking my Lew's spinning rod and my new Lew's baitcaster. 3/8oz white Z-Man chatter bait with a sprayed grass Reaction Innovations sweet beaver tied on to baitcaster and a 1/4oz black and blue Strike King swim jig with an black and blue Arkie crawfish jig trailer tied onto my spinning rod. I was alternating between the two to see what the bass wanted. No bites on the jig and got one bite on the chatter bait. So I tossed it out there more. Finally got a solid bite on it and brought in this little fella marking my first ever baitcaster bass. It looks like a turtle or something took a bite out of him down towards the tail. Not sure though. Kinda sucks all my firsts are little ones but at least I caught them. Been getting a lot of firsts here lately, thanks to this site and all you awesome folks on here. So glad I joined this site. Thanks a million everyone! ?

It looks like your doing great if i do say so myself!

@Angealy thank you sir! Baitcaster strikes again! My girlfriend and I went to Valentine Lake for almost 2 hours and not even a bite. Very disappointing. So we left and stopped at Sonic to get a shake and headed to Buhlow Lake. Wasn't much happening there and it was a little too hot for my girlfriend but I noticed a spot that I like to fish from had become vacant. So we drove down to it and my girlfriend stayed in the car in the shade. Even though the spot I was going to was fairly shaded too, she didn't feel like walking over to it from the road. I told her I wouldn't be long unless some bass catching was going on. I only took my baitcaster with me with the white chatter bait/sprayed grass sweet beaver trailer tied on. No tackle bag or anything else. About my fifth or sixth cast got a hold of this about a pound or so bass. Continued to cast a few more times to see if anything else was biting but the trailer didn't want to stay on. That happened earlier also after catching the little guy I posted a few hours ago. Sucks those things only last for one catch using as a trailer. Is there something I can do to keep the trailer put so as to stop this from happening? Anyways, third day learning a baitcaster I seem to have it dialed in pretty good for a 3/8oz chatter bait with a sweet beaver trailer, didn't have any backlashes or birdnests. That makes me happy and I caught two bass with it too! Still no big un but it was a great day regardless.

Another one for the baitcaster/white chatter bait/sprayed grass sweet beaver combo. Could be my new PB. Didn't have a scale but it felt bigger than any of the other bass I've caught. I'm guessing 3lbs.

Caught a monster today pitching the tule reeds. For the curious I got it on a Dbomb, 3/0 ewg, 3/8 tungsten bullet weight and straight 50# maxcuatro braid. 

 

 

This small but chunky bass fell for a chartreuse with black back square bill while I was bouncing it off of rocks. Caught half a dozen more that was smaller. This small lake is recovering from a bad drought and is coming back nicely. 

I lost my white chatter bait just a little while ago to a low hanging tree branch that I was trying to cast on the edge of. Lost the battle and had to cut it off. Oh well the main reason for this post is before I lost my chatter bait I finally got me a big un(a big un to me). My new PB! This girl is every bit of 4lbs. Was alot heavier than the one I caught earlier. She put up a bit of a fight but I got her in. Caught her on the red bug Ol' Monster out in the middle of the sunlit smaller pond here by the house. Glad I decided to cast out there. My original PB was 2+lbs and today I broke that twice! What an awesome day this has been! ?

On 9/2/2017 at 2:22 PM, Swbass15 said:

new pb went 4.45 caught on a tube @ 930 in the morning. Had been a slow bite, saw some shad skipping and threw my tube in behind them. I thought I hooked a tree when I set the hook and the she jumped and bout had a coronary. Anchored my limit of 8.33 and big bass. Can't wait to break 5lbs now!!!

CONGRATS ON THE NEW P.B. !  nice fish!

On 9/4/2017 at 4:01 PM, MichaelCopeland said:

I lost my white chatter bait just a little while ago to a low hanging tree branch that I was trying to cast on the edge of. Lost the battle and had to cut it off. Oh well the main reason for this post is before I lost my chatter bait I finally got me a big un(a big un to me). My new PB! This girl is every bit of 4lbs. Was alot heavier than the one I caught earlier. She put up a bit of a fight but I got her in. Caught her on the red bug Ol' Monster out in the middle of the sunlit smaller pond here by the house. Glad I decided to cast out there. My original PB was 2+lbs and today I broke that twice! What an awesome day this has been! ?

great big congrats! new p.b. is always fun ,nice fish

 

 

5 hours ago, Ktho said:

Caught a monster today pitching the tule reeds. For the curious I got it on a Dbomb, 3/0 ewg, 3/8 tungsten bullet weight and straight 50# maxcuatro braid. 

 

 

Did you weigh that pig?

I didn't. I don't typically weigh fish so didn't have a scale with me. It was a solid one for sure, probably up there somewhere good. It looked and felt bigger than an 8 I weighed a while back. 

Went out tonight bank fishing a local pond from 7 to 8 pm and caught this 6+ on my last cast, as the sky became dark. I was tossing a Menace grub, and at first I was hopping it back slowly.  I caught a bunch of dinks that way, kind of finessing the bait, because in the summer here fish are often shy. But on my final cast, just for the hell of it, I burned it back really fast -- and this pig slammed it hard! 

 

 

Caught my first fish on our "new to us" bass boat that my brother and I have been restoring all summer.  It also happened to be my PB!  Tipped the scales at just over 3.5 lbs.  Great way to break in the boat!

My Father In-Law and I had a record day of doubling up on Saturday. Three times we doubled up on Smallmouth and then we had a double when he caught a Smallmouth and I got a Redbreast Sunfish. We were using Zoom Salty Tubes and finesse TRD's

 

 

Visited a couple more friends this Sunday in Virginia before I came back to WVU. One of which was a minority not often seen in Virginia.

Still on a solid bite here in Indiana. Picked up a few more on a short trip Monday before a line of storms moved through the area. Cooler weather also has the crappie bite picking up, so trips have been back and forth between those two species - hard to pick one over the other. Good problem to have 

 

22 hours ago, hawgenvy said:

Went out tonight bank fishing a local pond from 7 to 8 pm and caught this 6+ on my last cast, as the sky became dark. I was tossing a Menace grub, and at first I was hopping it back slowly.  I caught a bunch of dinks that way, kind of finessing the bait, because in the summer here fish are often shy. But on my final cast, just for the hell of it, I burned it back really fast -- and this pig slammed it hard! 

 

 

They starting to get more active. Here lately the only way I've been able to catch em is either snailing an Ol' Monster back to me or burning a chatter bait back. Both ways got me two big uns yesterday. Heckuva catch and on your last cast at that. Nice! Bass!

10 hours ago, PAbasser927 said:

Caught my first fish on our "new to us" bass boat that my brother and I have been restoring all summer.  It also happened to be my PB!  Tipped the scales at just over 3.5 lbs.  Great way to break in the boat!

Congratulations on your PB and first bass caught off your new to you bass boat! ?

On 9/4/2017 at 7:01 PM, MichaelCopeland said:

I lost my white chatter bait just a little while ago to a low hanging tree branch that I was trying to cast on the edge of. Lost the battle and had to cut it off. Oh well the main reason for this post is before I lost my chatter bait I finally got me a big un(a big un to me). My new PB! This girl is every bit of 4lbs. Was alot heavier than the one I caught earlier. She put up a bit of a fight but I got her in. Caught her on the red bug Ol' Monster out in the middle of the sunlit smaller pond here by the house. Glad I decided to cast out there. My original PB was 2+lbs and today I broke that twice! What an awesome day this has been! ?

Man you are killing it with this white chatter bait and even caught a four pound on it!

I love seeing you do so well with this one lure and I'm considering picking one up after never using one before.

 

The last time i got baits or lures was a few months ago.

I happened to be at a local walmart that day and decided to look, I found a yum box for 10$ and decided it was worth it.

Saturday morning i woke up early, grabbed my gear and headed to my local private lake and fished it for about two hours and ended up killing it all from the bank.

I killed it with lizards then the bites stopped, Switched to a june bug ribbontail and landed my first five pound bass!

After that i got a picture of her, released her and headed back home.

Mind you these were two different plastics i never used/rigged before and it was nice to be catching fish on em.

 

I guess what i'm trying to say is keep doing what you are doing!

 

Thanks man! I actually caught the 4lber with a weightless weedless Texas rigged red bug Ol' Monster. I did catch the 3lber with the white chatter bait. Unfortunately I lost that bait in a low hanging tree branch. That's when I called it quits for the day. What all was in the Yum box you bought? Whatever it was sounds like you're killing em too. Nice to see you doing well out there. The fall season is practically here and they're getting more active so we all should be catching bunches and big uns too. Post up that pic of the 5lb big girl and brag about it...lol! ?

Didn't do a lot of fishing on my days off this week with the holiday, but I still made it out for a couple shorter trips to avoid the crowds. Took my son out again on Monday, and my parents (Papa and Nana as my son calls them), went along with us so Lake could show them his fishing skills.

 

 

Tuesday was just me for a few hours in the morning. I got started off with a bang, sight fishing this one with a wacky rigged 4" stick worm as she cruised the shoreline.