Hello,

I've been catching a lot of bass since I started using the Ned rig in January.  I've also been loosing a lot of rigs due to snagging.  I fish a lot of dirty ponds and lakes that are heavily stained or chocolate here in Texas.  I tried the weedless zman mushroom head and it doesn't help much.  I switch over to Lifted Jigs Ned EWG 1/16 oz with 1/0 VMC hook.  This helped a lot but still have snags.  I'm thinking about bumping up my leader or going straight braid.  What are your thoughts?

Currently using:

Laguna M/L custom rod

Shimano CI4+ 3000

Suffix 832 20 lb. (this rod is also my inshore finesse rod)

Seaguar invisx 8 lb.

I'm going to go against the prevailing ned rig wisdom here - I spent sunday fishing in 14 feet of water (approx 4 feet of visibility) with a 1/10thoz ned rig jig head tied to 20 lb 832 braid on a Lew's carbon fire medium power spinning rod.  The bite was a little slow all day, but I picked up a 4 pounder and two 2 pounders in a couple of hours along with a small rock bass.  I had never used a ned rig before that day, but it was working for a friend so I borrowed some baits and used the second lightest rod I had with me at the time. I wouldn't hesitate to use the setup again as there were no issues getting the bait to the bottom and it caught fish.  

 

I chose the rod with 20lb braid over another, lighter spinning setup spooled with 10 lb mono because I lost confidence in that rod after I broke off a 3+ pounder caught on a drop shot while trying to net it at the side of the boat earlier in the day.  As an added plus, I had no worries yanking the ned rig out of any weeds it (frequently) got caught up in.  I will say that, using the medium power rod, hooking weeds and hooking fish felt identical, but maybe that's always true.  I don't have enough experience with it to know either way.  

If you're not fishing around rocks, there's no reason to use a leader in dirty water, especially since you're really just fishing a small T rig anyways. 

I fish it on 20 lb 832