On 5/20/2018 at 5:09 PM, A-Jay said:

 

Personal Best Brown Trout Today ~ 

A-Jay

How...

my biggest bass of 2018

21.5 inches 5lb. 7oz.

on a swimjig

On 5/23/2018 at 1:25 AM, Bluebasser86 said:

Mama decided that this is the year that Lake is old enough to go with me on day long fishing trips and Monday was set to be the first one. I was torn between going to a lake with lots of fish so he'd have the constant action that is so important for young ones, and one of my favorites that I've heard has been fishing good and kicking out big ones left and right. My brain told me go for the numbers, but my gut told me that he'd really be pumped up if we could get a big one or two in the boat. It was the right call, and we put the hammer on them from beginning to end, literally as we caught the biggest one of the day 10 minutes before we had to leave. We crossed paths with several boats, none reported any success. We finished up with our best 5 going 22.80, and lost at 3 more keepers, 2 of them would have been big culls that would have bumped us up over 25 pounds. Lake did a great job casting and really stuck with fishing his own bait a lot more throughout the day than I expected, unfortunately, he only got 1 shot a fish on his rod and it didn't stay stuck. We worked as a tag team all day though with me hooking them and handing the rod over to him to do the rest. 

First big one of the morning smashed a Repo man in 90* corner of the riprap and went nuts trying to get under the boat, in the trolling motor, pull Lake in, whatever it could do to get away, but he got her guided into the net. 

Little slider action. Lost a much bigger fish, then caught this one the next cast. Lake got her to tailwalk right into the net for me.

Another slider fish. I had just said we needed to move and turned to look to see if there was any boats where I wanted to go when my bait just disappeared. A few cranks of the handle found it swimming down the bank with this little chunk.

We'd just crossed paths with another boat that said they were having no luck when we got this one right behind them. Jerkbaits only work in cold water

He wouldn't lip this one because it bit when he tried to do it the first time.

This fish bit a small plastic on a slider head and jumped almost immediately. Having it on 8lb test, I had a split second I wasn't sure about handing the rod over but I had the drag set well and Lake was right there ready to go and did a great job fighting it. Thought it might go over 7 when I netted it. 

He even got to meet up with my buddy, Mr. "Fathead" as he was calling him. I was trying one of my wiper spots and thought from the bite that I'd hooked a white bass and handed him the rod. When it got to the boat it just stopped coming up. Took a considerable amount of grunting before Lake got it moved off the bottom put he did a great job fighting it. 

Nice bag of fish. looks like he was having fun.

I was going to fish that lake today, but there was a chance of thunderstorms, so I decided to stay close to home.

16 hours ago, Dorado said:

Are you fishing that U-Vibe weightless?

1/4 oz bullet sinker (unpegged).

Thanks! Those fish were nice and you caught them in such a short window. I’m going to try those worms out next week 

Great. I hadn't tried the U-vibe worms until this spring but so far they've proven miraculous in the post spawn. They are very versatile -- you can fish them several ways. I love the watermelon red color.

Went out for a couple hours this evening. Very windy. The fish have been as active as can be all month. Today I lost a 4 pounder by the 4th cast or so to a jump.Caught a dink and 2 pound size fish. One on a fluke, one on a senko , and one on a pit boss. Just not biting good. 

So with a little daylight left, I put on a black grape 10 inch Mr Twister worm, threw it up against a pontoon boat, and the pictured fish nailed it when it hit the water. Another 5 pound 11 oz. Fish.

Pic. Turned out grainy for some reason.

The picture doesn't do this girl justice.  She had a lower jawbone like a porkchop.

 

Actually went 9 pounds, 6 ounces on the scale.  I think my scale is broken.  Gonna test it later.

2 minutes ago, Hook2Jaw said:

The picture doesn't do this girl justice.  She had a lower jawbone like a porkchop.

 

Actually went 9 pounds, 6 ounces on the scale.  I think my scale is broken.  Gonna test it later.

I need to be fishing where you are. Nice bass! ?

 Went out yesterday evening and tried some new spots. Game wardens were in full effect as they talked to me at the first pond I went to. Nice guy and told me about some areas I hadn’t been to.

 

The first pond had about 15 people already fishing at it and I caught nothing as I couldn’t hardly fish any of it. The second spot I hit was almost at dark and another game warden found me.

 

As he was talking to me I started to see the bass hitting the top. Threw out the whopper plopper and caught the bass in the picture. Think I may of found a nice morning and late evening spot.

I finally caught a couple decent largemouth the last two days. Sad to say but these are the only largemouth I can recall catching that were over 1lb since almost New Years (and they werent much over 1lb). I usually catch smallmouth white bass and drum, probably more because of how far upstream I typically fish. I also had another breakthrough in my learning curve this morning, I caught a fish with a spinnerbait. Luckily the fish hit the crap out of it so there was no guesswork, a skinny beat up smallmouth that fought like the devil. Followed him up with a deeeeeep Texas Rig largemouth, I love setting the hook with a worm down deep

Our nephew never gets to go fishing unless we take him, so we decided to take him and my son bridge fishing. Well it was a good night. Until last night a bluegill was it for him. He caught a 1-14, 2-4 and this 3-1. My son got a 2-5 and surprisingly enough a 3-1. Thankfully they were both exactly the same weight so there was no pouty or gloating boys, just one who was on cloud 9 and another who was pretty geeked too. 

 

 

First Smallmouth of the year! 2.14lbs from shore on a wacky rigged Dinger in Bama Bug color

 

 

@12poundbass those are some gorgeous smallies!  So dark!

On 5/27/2018 at 9:06 AM, Hook2Jaw said:

@12poundbass those are some gorgeous smallies!  So dark!

Thanks! All the ones we pull out of that river are really dark.

 

 

Caught this one on a zoom lizard this morning.

39 minutes ago, JustJames said:

 

@NYWayfarer are you in the trend that post with invisible Bass

I don’t know what was going on this morning. I tried posting before coffee. I hope you see it now. Here is another pic of it.

 

 

Details about this catch and others in "Flakes in the Sun and the Wind."

Just now, Will Wetline said:

 

Details about this catch and others in "Flakes in the Sun and the Wind."

That should be captioned and posted in the "fishing memes" topic. ? Nice fish by the way!

21 hours ago, Hook2Jaw said:

The picture doesn't do this girl justice.  She had a lower jawbone like a porkchop.

 

Actually went 9 pounds, 6 ounces on the scale.  I think my scale is broken.  Gonna test it later.

Quit catching them hawgs man! Nice catch

Still catching dinks here - dunno what I'd do if I actually caught a fish over 1lb.  lol

 

 

Won big bass at our Weekend Warrior bass club tournament yesterday on West Lake Tohopekaliga. 7.34

pounds.  It was caught on a swim jig and a space monkey trailer. 

Didn't have much going on so I hit the bank in the rain for a few hours this evening. Spent about an hour with one bite that took the trailer off my spinnerbait, but no hookup. Decided to slow it down and put on the senko. Finally hooked a pounder that shook off in about 5 seconds. Had two more grab it and run and yank the line, but they spit the lure before I could get a swing. But at least now I'm getting bit. 

 

Found a sweet spot where some logs were piled up next to deep water. Caught a pounder, tossed back in and backlashed, got that straight and pulled up my line to feel if there was a fish on, nothing there until I popped the tip and felt a bite. Pounder from down about 12-15 feet. Tossed back in to slightly different spot, wait for the bait to fall back deep, "thunk" another pounder. 

 

Tossed back in same spot, wait about 45 seconds for it to fall, don't feel a bite but the line starts pulling. Set the hook and feel a couple solid head shakes. Fish shoots for the surface, jumps three feet, dives back in right into a tree branch. Get pulled out of there and drag it onto the bank. 

 

Three and a quarter pounds. A bit shy of 19". 

 

Spent another 20 minutes or so working back and forth across the same area and got nothing else after that. Good way to end a day that started with a mower that wouldn't run! 

Spent the weekend on a small river in Bath County VA. Lots of fun, bagged over 30 fish, but none of real size. Broke in my fly rod which was really enjoyable. Late this afternoon I set hook on an absolute stud in a farm pond close by, got it within 5 feet of the shore and it jumped and shook my jig :/. Coulda shoulda woulda kind of scenario. Anyways here’s a few pics from the trip. Had to much fun not to share!

Tapped into what I think was a final, but rich vein of pre-spawners here last week...the key was hitting the denser clusters of newly-emerging pads; they were happy to gobble either a Siebert Fogy or a T-rigged Zoom lizard.

 

Some blurry pics of representative fish: