Let me first say hello and thank you all of your awesome posts and info I have been reading for the past 2 weeks. I am orignally from california but I am stationed in Delaware with the USAF. I have been fishing since I was little in california but it was mostly spinner, divers, and topwater growing up never plastics. Since I moved here I found out there are alot of ponds and not many lakes. I started fishing here in Delaware about 2 months ago I went with spinner and divers but I quickly realized that these ponds are only 4-6 foot depth with an abundance of grass and brush in the water that I never really had on the lakes i fished in california. My first pond visit brought me 3 large mouth on a 2 inch yo-zuri diver went to wal-mart bought a package of zoom lizards in pumpkin with 3/0 offset hooks caught  3 large mouth in the rain around fallin trees which were the first bass I have ever caught on plastics. Then my good friend comes back from a visit from home and learned a new style with Zoom Salty Centipede with a 3/0 weedless hook right in the middle crazy but we caught 15 bass it was an exciting day. So after that I got on BASSPRO.COM and ordered a few things including topwater lures since I have never caught a fish on a top water lure either. The list follows . . .

Berkley PowerBait Wacky Crawler Worm - Watermelon Candy

Mann's® HardNose Lizard - Watermelon Red

Bass Pro XPS Magna Superlock Hooks - Black/Nickel - 3/0

Carolina Lunker Sauce Crawfish

Faceted Glass Beads - 8mm - Clear - 25 Pack

Heddon Wounded Zara Spook - Natural Frog

Arbogast Jitterbugs - Original - 2" - Frog

I appreciate anyones input on what techniques to use or equipment or anything I love this site I am always on here reading and learning waiting for my next day off to fish

first off. welcome to bass resource. youll love the site. i too am in delaware at the southern end of the state and like you said its mostly ponds. we have the most luck using T rigged worms and lizards, senkos, shallow crankbaits, and frog/toad baits are also great in the summer.

I am in Dover DE my main question is set up with weight on the plastic worms and how you fish with them. With the Salty Centipede we did not use a weight just a weedless 3/0 hook in the side so it made a U shape on the hook.

usually ill use somthing liek a 3/0 hook as well and i like to add on a 1/8 ounce bullet weight to help the bait fall faster. as far as the retrieve i just slowly raise the rod tip and bring it down then reel in the slack line and let it sit for a second or two and then repeat, soa alot of times though ill have to vary the amount of time between them to make them faster or slower though. i dont know what the places you fish are like but ill just throw to brushy areas or areas that have relatively thick cover like submerged limbs, brush and cattails as well as throw to the outsides of areas that have alot of grassy weed type cover..hope this helps. other guys will come along that might be able to explain this better than I  

how high would you raise it and lower it also what the word on top water do you cast to the shore and bring it in or you fish it against the shore

well it was another day of fishing at the ponds and we were once again killing them on weight less pumpkin colored plastic worms with a 3/0 weedless hook. I only caught one that was about 2 1/2- 3 pounds my friend caught a 4 pound and a 3 pound big mouth the other ones we just could not hook and its really frustrating but fun at the same time. You feel a couple hard tugs then i try to set the hook and nothing  :'( the only one i caught felt like a snag and was not fighting until the very end. Its funny because i remember when i was younger back home in california my dad always lecture me about how we would never catch nothing off shore we always took the boat out but here in delaware its a different story

While visiting there I fished Trap Pond and the 2 best lures were a chart. colored Mann's baby 1- and a Zoom toad. What I found was the pond had a lot of grass and stained water.

Allen