I would like to get some feedback from anyone who wants to participate.  

1.) What bait do you use for the first 30 or so cast of the day? Why?

2.) What bait do you use to locate bass and find what they are going to hit that day?

If I am starting first thing in the morning I like to use a top water (buzzbait or popper).  Then as soon as the sun is up for a good 1/2 hour I switch to a spinnerbait burned near the surface or a soft plastic jerkbait.  Then I will go to crankbait.  When the sun is high I will go to soft plastics and jigs fished around and in cover.  Sometimes though. one bait will work the whole day.  Crankbaits along a creek channel with structure seem to produce all day and all year long.

First thing in the morning I look for rock banks because of the heat factor, I fish slow and start with a dark color tube or finesse worm then as the day warms up I go to a small drop shot worm such as a dead ringer or such then it all depends on what the conditions are such as sunny day, or cloudy.

That's a good point.  What I said I do above is what I do in the summer.  In the spring I usually fish slower in the morning and then speed up as the day goes on.

Spring, first thing I throw is a 3/8oz white spinnerbait. Summer throught Fall a shallow running crankbait.

Here's a reall dumb question that I just have to ask as a follow-up on the others.  What is meant by "find fish?"  I've seen others write about using spinnerbaits to "find the fish."  What does that mean?

It means to find what cover the fish are at, what depth, etc... Spinnerbaits work well for this because you can fish them almost anywhere, and they catch fish.

A spinner bait is a reaction strike kind of bait. You can cover a lot of water while fishing with one until you locate active fish, then you can slow down and go to work on those more active fish.

As for the original question, depending on the time of year I usually start off slow rolling a spinerbait, or fishing a topwater (Summer time). Then I try to pattern some fish. Try and figure out what kind of structure they're relating to and once that's achieved I'll try several things until I figure out what they are wanting that particular day!

Most of the time I go out and I know that at this time last year, at this water temp, on this kind of day, I was catching fish on this, in this area, and in this type of water conditions. Then I'll start with that and go from there!

Right now the local ponds have warmed to about 55 degrees and the fish are active early. I have been throwing one lure only on any given morning and caught fish on everythging I've thrown! So, here's what's working: Rat-L Trap, Spinnerbait, Square A, Bagley BII, Sammy and Spook. As I get a little more vegetation around the perimeter I'll go with a Slug-Go, which was very effective last spring.

If I fish midday I'm back to Senkos or Fat Ika and killin' em.  Just for variety I'll probably throw a C-rigged lizard soon. Tubes and jigs might be  effective, but the ponds have soft bottoms and exposed hooks are messy.

I'm going trout fishing on the White River this weekend and Bullshoals the following weekend. I'm looking forward to wearing out a few jerkbaits, that's my favorite technique. Hope to catch both smallmouth and walley on the lake and maybe the world record brown trout on the river!