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I honestly believe that most people aren't trying to make the fish look bigger, they're just unconsciously making the fish the primary focus of the picture. Take a look at pictures of people drinking. How many people hold their drink towards the camera when they know a picture is being taken. They trying to make their Coors look bigger? Perhaps I'm naive.

am I the only one that has bigger worries than how others hold their fish. Maybe we should call our local/state game and fish commission and DEMAND standardized fish picture holding laws..... because clearly this is an epidemic that needs to be solved.

Which is the functional equivalent of holding the fish away from your body. People need to chill...

100? What hatchery?

CAN'T WAIT!!! Man, we are just getting finished with a forever winter. Let's get some fishing time in before we rush football season......lol Hootie

So, tight is better for weeds huh? I am glad no one told me, or the thousands of fish I have caught out of grass with a wide wobbling crankbait , that it was the wrong choice.

Here is how I do mine. i just take the bags I will be using with me that day.

Caught 6 keepers (in spite of the cold front) pitching 1/4 oz jigs today on my new (to me) NRX 893C JWR. The rod pretty much blows my older Powell Max out of the water- which it rightly should, considering the difference in price. I'm not sure I would have caught less fish with the Max, but the NRX sure makes it a lot more fun. Fishing with 12 lb Tatsu, I could feel every submerged dollar pad leaf, every stem; even some algae that the jig occasionally picked up off the bottom (jig would feel "funny"). The level of crispness and clarity is amazing, I couldn't feel (distinguish between) half the stuff on the bottom with the Powell, and that was when I fished with braided line. Rocks vs brush vs weeds vs laydowns was never a problem with the Max of course, but this is like watching a movie in a much higher resolution.

Most everybody takes pictures of their catches but one thing that bothers me is why so many feel the need to push the fish toward the camera in order to make it appear bigger than it really is. If you catch a nice one, distorting the picture that way to me, is just like having the fish "grow" when you tell someone how big it was. Is it really necessary to make that fish look 3 feet long, when it's already a very nice fish?

Go ask the guys at Walmart what day the truck delivers the ammo. The Walmart by my house told me a certain time every day. I sat there and watched him roll up with a shopping cart full of ammo. One case of white box 9mm for $20 a box.

Yea I say save up and pay the money for nice boots. Good footwear can make or break ya, When I was in the military then L.E. I paid for Danners etc. my wife would chew me out. She finally saw the light when she spent the extra $ on shoes and her back and legs didn't hurt after spending 16 hours on her feet.

If that's the case, instead of moving the fish away from you toward the camera, all you have to do is zoom in or move the camera closer to the fish. You can fill the frame with the fish without distorting the size relative to the size of everything else in the picture.

Most are just happy they have a nice bass and want it to be the main focal point in the picture. Don't stress it. Not everyone is a professional photographer.

Ha ha, fair enough. Chicago for me is a 13 hour drive away from the daily pressures of my life. Some real deep dish pizza, good local beers, a couple of museums and culminating in my Bears winning. But yes, let's have a bass season first before we get back to football, ha ha!

This has been a pet peeve of mine for a very long time. I worked in a tackle shop years ago and we'd joke about the posters on the wall and in the ads featuring Bill "Big Hands" Dance, Jimmy "Popeye" Houston, and Al "Thumbs" Lindner. I understand the diff perspectives, that wide angle lenses can create bold statements, highlight the fish, and let's face it, big fish always seem bigger than life, esp when you first get them in the boat and are doing your war-woop, and then there's fact that media is 75% eye candy. But, along with oftentimes poor weight estimation skills, distorted photos bug me too. It's one thing to show a fish well, another to hide its size, or distort reality. The flip-side is wide angle lenses can make nice fish look small, if you are not careful. Bottom line I guess is: photos are often lousy at recording reality. Know that going in. My heart long ago stopped leaping at such photos, but it still does when I see photos that shows beautiful fish well and in unique ways.

Fishing lures

When wearing it do you suddenly have the urge to tell everyone that you see that you caught a great big ol 7, 8, 9 pound bass on (insert lure name) fished on a (insert rod and reel name) spooled with (insert line name) covered with (insert scent name) while wearing (insert clothes and sunscreen name) and of course you couldn't have done any of it if you didn't have your Minn Kota trolling motor and your Power Pole down

I don't understand CP's problem. If the jig was really as bad as he says, anyone could have seen how bad it was while on the shelf/hangar and still in the package. Why buy one that looks that bad unless all you want is an excuse to sound off about something.

So your saying you got one bad jig and they now suck? I've always wondered where the bad reviews on websites come from?? I see your only 16. Let me give you some free advice. Before you trash a product online thats known for good products, give it more than a 10 second thought. True NSCB jigs are better quality. Doesn't mean SK, jigs are crap.

The jack of all trades and the master of none applies to bass fishing. Knowing how to cast a lure doesn't mean you know how to catch bass with the lure. You can be very versitle like that Jack and not know how to catch a single fish. For example you are skilled at skipping jigs under docks, casting frogs under tress, walking the dog through a jungle of Lilly pads, flipping a punch rigs into a tea cup at 30' and not catch any bass because the fish are in 35' of water on main lake humps. Being versitle also means knowing where to fish and when to fish there with lures that work at that location. When I first started posting on bass fishing Forums, some anglers would mail me topo maps of the lakes they tournament fished and asked where would I fish on this lake and what would could they use to catch bigger bass at these lakes. Studing the lake map isn't rocket science, bass are bass and relate to specific structure elements seasonally and with that in mind it was fairly easy to mark up the map using color coded highlites to indicates areas that should work seasonally and suggest a few proven presentations that work under those circumstances. Most of the anglers that received these maps back committed they never fished those areas or specific presentations before and some would remarks the areas were well known, but the presentations were new to them. Some anglers did very well and others never responded back. The point being you can fish a lake you have never fished before and do OK, if you know where to start and when. Today more bass anglers know how to read water and fish more outside locations then they did just a few years ago. We all need to be more versitle with both presentations and electronics when fishing deep structured bass lakes. Tom

Once I get comfortable with it, my Ruger SR9c will be my boat gun. So far I have enjoyed shooting it but practice time is limited to lack of ammo.

Don't like em one bit. SK jigs are not high quality..... not even close. I bought a bitsy flip once. The head was malformed, the weedguard was not even in front of the hook point, the point was dull, and the skirt had barely any action. Stick with seibert and northstar. The extra quality and performance is worth it in the long run IMHO.

Berkley Lightning Rod Shock..................seriously. They have a nice parabolic action, are well within your budget, have plenty of "feel" for cranking, and you can find them at just about every Wal-Mart form coast to coast.

I wish I could use a peg board. My garage gets way to hot in the summer here in OK so my tackle has to be stored in the man cave in the house. The wife is still boss as far as what I put on the walls.

Water temp or weather. These two are often overlooked yet play a big roll in whats gonna happen that day

893 and 894 are the two best rods in the series.

I like them, especially the Bitsy Flip. I catch plenty of fish on them, big ones too. Are they the best, prettiest, most finely crafted jigs out there? Nope, far from it. But they are cheap, and available every where, and for me, since I don't make my own jigs, they are hard to beat for less than $2. I lose dozens of them a year with no tears shed. When the skirt falls apart.....I throw them away. When the hook gets dull..............I throw them away. That's even if I have them long enough for that to happen. If your not putting a jig where your going to lose it, your not putting it where the bass are. Some one would have a real hard time trying to convince me that a $4 jig, while it might be better built, have a prettier skirt, and paint job on the head, with the best of the best components is going to catch me one single fish more than I catch on the bitsy flips. I am not anti-spending money on jigs either, I have boxes full of more expensive jigs, but 9 time out of 10, when I am faced with a tough bite, and need a small flipping jig, it's a bitsy flip tied on.

I use hand made and tied floating jigs, you are limited to one single hook, on one single line, and the hook can be no larger than 1/2" from point to shank. Walleyes have incredible sight, and when rigged properly they just roll down the bottom, excellent feel is required to keep them from hanging up and on the move. Many use plastic grub type tails, I prefer the Bucktail. They do work, as I just got back home tonight with limit #11 this year. That freezer is starting to look quite good!!

I let them take it....nothing, set the hook immediately..... Sometimes landed it.... Tried setting the hook horizontal and vertical too- had a lot of bass fall off my hook to when Landing them too

I had a good day today I went out at around 11:30 when if was raining a little and I caught 4 in a hour. Went back out around 3:30 until 7 and I pulled in 25 with only 6 being smaller than 2lbs. It was a good day I pulled in some nice 3s and 1 4lb.

If money is tight, sahara or president, if you have a higher budget get the stradic fj.

Before northern snakeheads were in the river 5lb. lmb were a rarity. They're pretty common nowadays, but like I said water quality and other factors are also relevant. One sure thing is that the snakeheads have not had the devastating impact that was dreadfully feared 10 years ago. But like Delfi said the snakeheads still need to be studied more extensively for a conclusive answer, and they are still relatively new here. The northern snakeheads in the Potomac are already diverging from the predictable behavior and migration that they exhibit in their native Amur river drainage, so it's still hard to say where it will all lead.

Easier said than done, especially if you've never fished the water before. IMO to be versatile requires one to strive to fish different waters and at the same time use lures and presentations, new or basic, that allow one to confirm their usefulness and versatility. Fishing with someone who knows a new water and uses lures you are not familiar with or in ways you thought would never work, saves a lot of time and frustration by expanding one's choices through experienc. That 's not to say I should once again become a lure junkie, buying every new model that hits the market, but that to know the versatility and limitations of a small group of basic lures (jigs, soft plastics, plugs, spinnerbaits, topwater), makes one a specialist that is versatile using each arbitrarily in high potential situations. For example, take the lowly plastic worm. C-rig, drop shot, split shot, surface jerk, shaky head jig, as a trailer and of course, the Texas rig make this lure one of the most versatile at different depths, in different cover, on different structures types, used at different speeds, successful in three seasons and in rivers or lakes. How many of you can say you really know when and how to use the plastic worm the ways mentioned? If so, you are a lure specialist, versatile in its use but only if you've had proven successes more than a few times. Flukes don't count. This goes for every basic lure category ----knowing when each has the greatest potential for catching bass, but only if you know the water and structure you can use them on and when to interchange lures and presentations as the need arises thereby fine tuning your approach. (For that to happen, sonar is essential !!!) Sure, a plastic worm works many places a jig will work, but a jig will work better at times because of a jig's unique characteristics - bulk, skirt flair, trailer. By realizing and capitalizing on those differences, you are more versatile but also more selective because depth and cover types are less daunting and you appeal to a bass's senses in a different way. Besides knowing the bottom or structure like the back of your hand, timing is everything. You can have the best set of lures in the boat, but knowing even the time of day they might produce better adds to one's versatility. A specialist won't catch bass using lures fish won't bite (maybe because of sun angle, hourly water temp change, sky brightness, etc) or aren't even around to bite because they went deeper or deeper into thick cover. Active fish aren't active every hour of the day and respond to all lure types. I don't have the experience of many of you, but I have caught fish on all lure types and presentations at one time or other. That doesn't make me specialized or versatile, just experienced and at times just plain lucky.

I tend to use Tupperware shoe box size boxes to store at home...I only carry about 20 bags of plastics when I'm out so they go in the side pocket of my tackle bag.

i put in at southgate n rock island

Iaconelli is definitely in my top 10 for versatility he says his main style is power fishing but he can finesse really well and do everything in between.

#1 reason I wouldn't fish an ugly stick- weight. #2 it simply isn't as sensitive as even lower end graphite. I will guarantee you that you miss fish, you cannot, and I mean 100% cannot feel a lift bite on the drop on an ugly stick. The physics of the rod make it next to impossible. You may feel that you're successful with it, and that's fine, but declaring that it is sufficient for all presentations is simply ridiculous. Skill has its limitations, and you cannot replace those lost senses. A progressive taper rod like the ugly stick cannot account for so, so many things. You cannot feel the transition from one bottom type to another. You cannot feel the light tick of hanging on a stem of grass. You cannot feel the light push of a spot moving your jig to you. Skill alone cannot tell you those things, either. Is it necessary to spend $450 on a rod to feel those those things? No. Is it necessary to have a adequate feel and transmission in a rod to be able to feel them? Yes. If the Ugly Stick is so sensitive and so adequate, why does not a single angler on any major circuit fish them? Even by comparison to other modern rods they lack the most essential qualities to be deemed even a workable bass rod. So you're happy fishing them, fine. But to claim that an ugly stick will do everything a $150 to will do, and do it better is asinine. The laws of physics alone deny that claim. In limiting your ability to delineate structure and other items by fishing sub par rods that are incapable of transmitting those changes you limit your ability to increase in skill. You might be fine with moving baits on an ugly stick, but I will guarantee you you're missing fish on them when it comes to bottom contact techniques. That, or you have super human senses and reaction times.

This kid has 4 open threads on the same topic, he's either trolling or has no clue how to use the internet.

You will never know what works best under specific circumstances unless you are exposed to a technique and give it a try. Fishing by myself most of the time robs me of learning from others on one hand, but allows me to perfect a skill on the ther hand. I learned a long time ago not to force feed bass anything, they have a mind of their own. I have however also learned location trumps presentations; the right lure in the wrong place doesn't work nearly as well as the wrong lure in the right location, the right lure in the right location at the right time is the answer to being a successful bass angler. You will never know without trying. When I fished tournaments and caught a good bag of bass, I would think I have this won, however someone or several others figures out a totally different presentations and locations and also catches a good bag of bass and your catch is just average. Sometimes you only catch a few and win the tournament because knowone else figured out anything and that is bass fishing. My late fishing partner would say " fish where they are and if you don't catch anything, then fish where they are not"! Sounds nuts but sometimes works, fishing nothing water instead of bass looking water. Some of my best kept secret spots are nothing looking water passed up by nearly everyone, sanctuaries for big bass waiting for me to find them. Being versitle is a mind set. Tom

Sanders is a babe.

Duckett is a *****, IMO...........he says "shaw is making a mistake, WE have proved the bass are on the inside line" LMAO, the only thing he proved is he could catch Shaw's fish when he cut him off. I know some might disagree, but taking both of their personalities........ if Shaw said he cut him off, I am inclined to believe the happy go lucky Shaw instead of the smug Duckett. another thing I noticed......Shelly Sanders has gotten "thicker" since the last series. LOL

Is it me or does Tak sound like hes on the can every time he sets the hook?

Tell them the receipt looks fine. The problem is the rod....lol Hootie

I see it this way.... A good Auto mechanic can fix most problems with a limited set of husky tools, but with 20k in Snap on tools he can fix cars with less chance of tool failure, greater comfort of his hands/wrists, and maybe the job is easier based on tool design. However, A pianist will never be capable of quick and proper car repairs no matter what tools are at his disposal. Same with fishing, concentrate on learning and upgrade gear as you get more proficient in using different techniques.

There are many positive aspects to any fishing forum, but negatives as well. It's easy to get "programmed" into buying this brand or that brand and the fishermen using the more expensive gear are having more fun. Catching more and or larger fish comes down to 2 main factors and that's knowing how to do it and where to do it at. Debates over the "best" are really nothing but self justification for buying a certain item. IMO if one wants to get the most out of BR, learn the techniques, how to read the environment, the hot fishing areas and the species running at that time, the lines, rods, reels, hooks and all that will take care of itself.

With any luck prices will drop as will demand. At least if the previous cycles are an indication. I have been wrong before though. You very well may be correct. Staying as non political as I can. I doubt another play for our firearms and magazines. However, there is still that nagging in the back of my mind that this may not have played out all the way yet. My greatest source of being worry free is that we are in Alabama. I sincerely believe this state would leave the union again if any laws were passed like the assault weapons ban. Especially in todays age and time. Our red necks, country folk, and ghetto dwellers LOVE their firearms. I love that our ghetto dwellers are more hospitable then in other states. Southerners are the greatest regardless of race. Others play the stock market. I play the firearms market. Not as much since my son was born. I still try to when money permits.

" Be Real " " Be Realistic " While Im at it? How about you put me 6 ft under and left for dead because that is when Ill quit. When Im dead. That what makes people adults. They give up there dreams and they lose their youth. I might as well be peter pan and live in neverland where you never grow up because I wont give up on my dream just because some "Adults" who sit in a cubicle and have eventful conversations at a water cooler, tell me to. I respect your view, respect mine.

Pizza is like sex. Even when its bad, its still pretty good.

Sounds to me like this young man has his head on his shoulders and is kept under the watchful eyes of his mother. I especially like her oversight on anything "internet". Good for you and thank your parents for their help and support!

Just a very SMALL drop will work just fine. You can use the the oil that might have came with your reel or something like rocket fuel or Boca lightning as noted above that is thinner and this will run the bearings faster. I have tried several and have decided the reel oil provided by shimano gives me the results I want with a decent life span.