I think I just bought a lifetime supply of buffs/face shields on the TW sale. 

Wife fished a two day tournament with me yesterday and today. She stayed frustrated trying to use my good gear. Backlashes, not feeling bites with worms etc, wind knots with Braid, etc. You name It. 

She said more than once to just give her a d**n rooster tail, which I didn’t have. 
 

So we got home today and I went straight to academy and came back with a new ML spinning setup, 8lb mono, and a bunch of  1/8-1/4oz rooster tails, 1/8 oz spinnerbaits, and a few light bandit square hills. Said here you go girl, have at It next time. She’ll probably out fish me. 

Went to the store to get dinner, clearance prices were good enough max scent for 0.79 a pack now take 50% off that. That led to this haul all for under $7, not bad if I say so myself lol.

43 minutes ago, Jmurphy87 said:

Went to the store to get dinner, clearance prices were good enough max scent for 0.79 a pack now take 50% off that. That led to this haul all for under $7, not bad if I say so myself lol.

Wth.  I need a store like that!

45 minutes ago, Jmurphy87 said:

Went to the store to get dinner, clearance prices were good enough max scent for 0.79 a pack now take 50% off that. That led to this haul all for under $7, not bad if I say so myself lol.

 

2 minutes ago, hokiehunter373 said:

Wth.  I need a store like that!

Out of curiosity, what store was it?

1 hour ago, Eric 26 said:

 

Out of curiosity, what store was it?

A local meijer, they are still in the process of remodeling it. 

2 hours ago, Jmurphy87 said:

Went to the store to get dinner, clearance prices were good enough max scent for 0.79 a pack now take 50% off that. That led to this haul all for under $7, not bad if I say so myself lol.

I'm imagining a stripped, empty peg board, and you shuffling down the isle towards the register murmuring "mine, mine, all mine".

Wasn't really looking for this rod yet but did plan to buy it later this year.  Lucky for me I came across a price on a show room demo model 893C I just couldn't pass on so grabbed it.  Plan to grab another Zillion to put on it and be my main 5/16 & 3/8 ounce jig rod.

7 hours ago, PhishLI said:

I'm imagining a stripped, empty peg board, and you shuffling down the isle towards the register murmuring "mine, mine, all mine".

Yeah that’s how it went mostly lol.

I couldn't be more hooked on finesse tackle.  I'm a 48-y fly fisherman, and have caught well over 100 species on fly rod in rivers and salt.  Finesse tackle pretty much makes the fly rod obsolete for all except trout fishing moving water.

If it makes you guys feel better, also have a local 400-acre no-motors reservoir, high on creek headwaters, where I kayak and fish my BFS MM bass rod (or 2). 

I use a stream trout BFS set-up for our endemic river bass - Texas Brook Trout - this is most often busting and wading, just like you'd use a fly rod (a bit of kayaking thrown in).  Also a good way to beat the summer heat in spring water and cypress tunnels. 

My most recent Japan purchase included Meiho 800NS lure boxes, which are the best for small lures I've ever tried.  You can fit a gang of them in your fishing bag, along with whatever else you want to bring.  (Meiho 1200ND is the same adjustable box sized up for bass-size plugs). 

Nothing in the boxes below is over 4 g, and only a few are over 2 inches.  Newly put together this floating (and +diving) box

Rounded out my sinking box with Smith Niakis spinners

and the black/gold Shine Ride crank on the bottom row is for bottom-bouncing. 

 

Salt finesse has 3 main uses for me.  Winter glass minnows in tide passes, and especially nite-lite dock fishing along a favorite navigation channel.  Same nite-lite use for tiny summer mullet in coast neighborhood canals.  The third use is wading and sight-fishing expansive salt "lakes", same place you'd use a fly rod. 

I added these lures to my salt finesse boxes.  Magbite Mimiq slow-sinking pencil shrimp that makes me want to wade Fence Lake with UL right now.
Timon Buriburi glow floater/diver (wakebait) going into Arroyo glow finesse box (only floater in the box). We mostly prospect deep in the navigation channel for schoolie specs and snook along the dock piles, but have seen times when their defense mechanism sent them to surface-only eats.
The bottom two are Smith Gunship floater/divers for sight-fishing reds in skinny grass. The "larger" 45-mm Smith plug has bad-boy Vanfook #3 single hooks installed. 

While a few of these plugs come ready with single hooks, most come with tiny trebles.  I also tried Vanfook ME-41 plug single hooks for the first time.  The photo on the right compares the tiny 36-mm Smith plug with #6 ME-41 hooks installed, next to an Owner/Cultiva S-55 #6.  The short shank on the Vanfook hook lets you go up a hook size - the tiny plug would need a #8 in the Cultiva hook. 

I just bought  a bunch of hardbaits and jigs from Rapala, haven’t fished with them yet but they look great

I’m also planning to order the Lews Classic Pro Speed Spool SLP to go with my med heavy 7ft casting rod.

Got a new tackle backpack for Father’s Day…

I just got a 6” bullgill and a strong shad 6” both in slow sink

20 hours ago, treble hook said:

Got a new tackle backpack for Father’s Day…

That’s a great bag, I have the same one for surf fishing.

There's an unwritten rule of the universe that if I like something it'll either be discontinued or "improved" into something I hate. Might be bottled iced tea, or portable saw horses. You name it, if I love it, it's doomed.

 

I'd hate to be without my Magellan Sling pack. It's perfect for me as an addition to the other bags I saddle myself with, and especially by itself for pond hopping, but oddly I've neglected to grab a backup. Recently the universe slapped me upside the head again by vaporizing one of my favorite things, so with that reminder and Academy's father's day sale I chose not to delay any longer, and got me a back-up. Threw in some nice H2O tungsten weights for good luck, cause why not.?

 

On 6/18/2022 at 8:06 AM, bulldog1935 said:

I couldn't be more hooked on finesse tackle.  I'm a 48-y fly fisherman, and have caught well over 100 species on fly rod in rivers and salt.  Finesse tackle pretty much makes the fly rod obsolete for all except trout fishing moving water.

If it makes you guys feel better, also have a local 400-acre no-motors reservoir, high on creek headwaters, where I kayak and fish my BFS MM bass rod (or 2). 

I use a stream trout BFS set-up for our endemic river bass - Texas Brook Trout - this is most often busting and wading, just like you'd use a fly rod (a bit of kayaking thrown in).  Also a good way to beat the summer heat in spring water and cypress tunnels. 

My most recent Japan purchase included Meiho 800NS lure boxes, which are the best for small lures I've ever tried.  You can fit a gang of them in your fishing bag, along with whatever else you want to bring.  (Meiho 1200ND is the same adjustable box sized up for bass-size plugs). 

Nothing in the boxes below is over 4 g, and only a few are over 2 inches.  Newly put together this floating (and +diving) box

Rounded out my sinking box with Smith Niakis spinners

and the black/gold Shine Ride crank on the bottom row is for bottom-bouncing. 

 

Salt finesse has 3 main uses for me.  Winter glass minnows in tide passes, and especially nite-lite dock fishing along a favorite navigation channel.  Same nite-lite use for tiny summer mullet in coast neighborhood canals.  The third use is wading and sight-fishing expansive salt "lakes", same place you'd use a fly rod. 

I added these lures to my salt finesse boxes.  Magbite Mimiq slow-sinking pencil shrimp that makes me want to wade Fence Lake with UL right now.
Timon Buriburi glow floater/diver (wakebait) going into Arroyo glow finesse box (only floater in the box). We mostly prospect deep in the navigation channel for schoolie specs and snook along the dock piles, but have seen times when their defense mechanism sent them to surface-only eats.
The bottom two are Smith Gunship floater/divers for sight-fishing reds in skinny grass. The "larger" 45-mm Smith plug has bad-boy Vanfook #3 single hooks installed. 

While a few of these plugs come ready with single hooks, most come with tiny trebles.  I also tried Vanfook ME-41 plug single hooks for the first time.  The photo on the right compares the tiny 36-mm Smith plug with #6 ME-41 hooks installed, next to an Owner/Cultiva S-55 #6.  The short shank on the Vanfook hook lets you go up a hook size - the tiny plug would need a #8 in the Cultiva hook. 

You have some fantastic lures that I’ve never seen before, makes me want to deep dive into finesse.. but living in Florida is hard almost any bass can break a finesse rod around here ?

@Ravox For us, finesse goes way back, nite-lite dock fishing nursery seatrout with my girls. 

Any coast trip, it was a ritual to eat a meal at Cap'n Benny's, then release 40 of these the hour after sunset from Fulton Beach Pier - then ice cream. (She's in grad school at TAMU)

 

I bought a pair of XUL rockfish rods from Japan to pick up where Zebo UL-1 and Eagle Claw Featherlite left off.  They added great light-rig reach to the edge of the lights over Falcon UL rod and Penn 4200SS.  They have solid tip for protecting 2-lb test, and weave-graphite butt for fish-turning power. 

One summer night watching massive specs milling over submerged green canal lights and occasionally flaring to scoop tiny mullet, I had to break out one of the rods and jig up a big spec on 2" swim shad.  Discovered that night this XUL tackle had the backbone to land a 22" and a 23" speckled trout. 

 

Where we've really honed this is winter glass minnows in tide passes up the coast, and Arroyo Colorado barge channel in far south Texas. 

 

The Japanese tradition of threadline fishing goes back farther than our perspective, but for our bandwidth, they began with salt shore, moved to stream trout, and finally to bass. 

Tide passes and deep channels are so much like river fishing already, the lures made for stream trout work great there with a simple hook swap. 

Then for me, it's easy to back up with the stream trout tackle to fish our hill country endemic bass, which occupy the same fast-current in limestone creeks that trout do in coldwater, and a lunker for the species is 15 inches. 

The reservoir bass fishing takes more dedication for me, because it's so much easier to choose a breezy coast flat or shady limestone cypress tunnel. 

All aboard the zillion hype-r train, choo choo! ? 

Another shout out to JLS for 3 day shipping and a jackall break blade bonus gift, look out jackhammer!

Hit up BPS and a local ma n pa shop with bass opener on Saturday. I walked away with a with a bag of Z-man mini max compact chatterbaits, a 75 Bone Whopper Plopper. Megabass i-Jack Crystal Shad, Evergreen SB 150 Bone - definitely grabbed the wrong size, some Berkley weighted wacky hooks, a Spro Flapping Frog and a Daiwa Fuego 6' 9" MR Casting rod for topwater duty.

 

I bought the Feugo after much deliberation, I was considering a St Croix Bass X 6' 8" MXF, current and last gen and Shimano SLX 6' 10" MF. The Fuego was as light as the others, with Titanium guides, a shorter handle and ~$40 cheaper. I took the Tatula 100 off my spinnerbait rod - 7.3.1 gear ratio was a bit too fast, seemed like a good excuse to pair it up with a Fuego CT 6.3.1. Still waiting for that one to arrive in the mail.

 

Does a $3200 jet pump to start fishing shallow water count?

 

Allen 

8 hours ago, Munkin said:

Does a $3200 jet pump to start fishing shallow water count?

 

Allen 

Yep! 

16 hours ago, Bass Rutten said:

All aboard the zillion hyper train, choo choo!

Bring some kleenex first time out, and don't blame those tears tears of joy on low testosterone. We're all manly, and we cried too.

Curado 150 MGL XG, Levante Braillist 7'5", a handful of Mini Max chatterbaits, Bait Fuel, 6" Bull Shad floater, and Damiki Mega Miki 11" worms.

MOST recently (within the hour), I forgot salad dressing on the way to work. So, I made sure I got salad dressing.

 

Bait monkey has me real bad lately, though, highlighted by buying a kayak last week. It's all been downhill from there as I reinvigorate myself on bass fishing after some years of unweighted soft plastic laziness.

I'll take a picture tomorrow when I'm in the boat.  Last weekend my Wife and Daughter went to a yard sell.  My Wife said "I got you some kind of plug at the yard sell".   It was a Devils Horse (my favorite top water lure) in the old original packaging.  She said she paid 50 cents for it.  The price tag on the box was $1.79.    I wonder how old it is.