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Best day for bass would have to be my very first trip to KY Lake. Between my son, father, and me we boated 150+ fish in 4 days. None under 2lbs and the big one at 6lbs 12oz when the taxidermist weighed it.(No scale in the boat)

Glock called and said they want their guns back......

More, More, More and More.

Hello I'm Kyle, 14 and from New York. I have fished for as long as I can remember. I have excelled in fishing ever since. My biggest fish is a 42" Tiger Muskie when i was 4 and in weight a 32 ILB salmon two years ago. I fish mainly for bass, panfish, trout, and salmon but I'm happy with anything that bites. One of my biggest focuses when fishing is catch and release I rarely keep fish.

A hippie with a voice like a women.

WOW!!! Great stories and pics on this thread! My best day happened in March 2013. I was fishing a small tournament on KY Lake with a good friend of mine. I knew we were on some good fish but a mega school of smallmouth pulled up on my spot this day. While our competion was out slinging A-Rigs, I was jerk-pluggin' 4-5 lb. smallies and a couple of big green fish showed up for the party too! We ended up with 5 fish weighing 26.82 lbs. We threw around 20 smallmouth back ranging from 3-4 lbs. I did have 2 fish straighten the hooks on my jerkbait and 1 broke my line.

This guy, http://siebertoutdoors.com/Siebert-Tournament-Swim-Jig-022.htm

First one that comes to mind was the first time I broke the 5 lb mark. Everyone was catching dinks on spinnerbaits. I was using a Senko knockoff and not getting any bites. I cast over by a weed bed and felt a tap tap. I set the hook on what I thought was a dink. Turned out to be a 5 lb 4 oz LM.

I'm thinking wifey has a crush on Michael Bolton

When the site was down I got so bored I tried crapping out a crawfish claw.

Kickin' Wing - you won't be getting the captcha thing again. That's been fixed. Everyone else - the network we're on went down for 3 hours today. It's back up and running again, so you shouldn't encounter any more problems. Apologies for the high blood pressure, loss of appetite, cold sweats, and bloody knuckles from punching computers.

Welcome Ben, if you want to catch numbers and don't have a lot of time I would say fish a senko. Start off wacky and go from there. You will do better in one trip than you did all last year. It's a great technique that will get you numbers of fish. Good luck!

gotta love the freshwater fishing here in SW Florida, my PB LMB here on Christmas Eve. 9# 14oz.

I just wanted wish everyone a Happy New Year. Be safe and responsible. I'm looking forward to a great 2014. Thanks to BR for all the new people I've met through here in the past year and a half and all the great sponsors who help keep the lights on here. Looking forward to all ghe 2014 fishing reports! Hope I can contribute to that more this year! Cheers! -Mark

Merry New Year to all!!!

Illinois guys rule I don't think i will see midnight

You want to be convinced a specific color works, just have a partner kick your arsh with a color you don't have! Tom

If he's catching, throw a Fluke ~ If he's not catching, throw a Fluke. Andy

There's only one minivan I'd buy\drive, it's a renault espace f1

Finesse soft plastic swim bait, Gene Larew sweet swimmer, Keitech easy shiner, swing impact, River Rock Baits RR Striker. All of those are between 3" and 4" and work great on a jig head, the same for hollow bodied swim baits, I prefer the Bass Magic as the come in a 3.5" and a 4.5" which I like to use as 5" seems to work better in warmer water, around the upper 50s. I use a jerkbait but I've had a lot of luck using swim baits when the water gets over 48 degrees, however a friend of mine just sent me pics of smallmouth he caught on a swim bait in 42 degree water . If I wasn't going to throw a jerkbait then I'd go with the swim bait.

I'm a big fan of a 3/8 oz Dirty Jig swimjig, great color selection, fantastic durability, and I've caught a ton of fish on them

Jerkbaits don't work unless your working them over fish.

pbizzle, you get my vote for best smallie picture! We all have those memories of our "first bass" and your photo is a keeper. There are so many good-looking freshwater fish - pumpkinseeds, northern pike, black crappie, even bowfin look cool! Don't want to stir the pot but, I have to vote for steelhead (migratory rainbow trout) as best looking freshwater fish. Though my first choice is to chase smallmouth, if I lived as close to the Western MI rivers as I do Lake St. Clair and Erie, I'd probably fish steelhead during fall/winter/spring. Caught this about 25 years ago in WA state and something about that shiny chrome gets me. As far as fight though, pound-for-pound smallmouth win easily!

My New Years resolution? Well after the night I had.... Disregard females...acquire aesthetics.

You can never have enough jigs on hand but you can have too many colors to psyche yourself out in selection. keep it simple. that weather is fine for learning jigs. especially football jigs.

Back to the OP. Boat looks clean from the pic. Have the motor checked out, crawl around in the compartments to see if there is any signs of standing water. Make sure the transom is strong and all the accessories work. Check the wheel bearings and tires as well. I would use NADA as a guide but it's not set in stone. If all checks out, Start at $3k and see how low you can get it for.

I will also say that the hits i get when fishing these baits is nothing short of a freight train. It also seems like they hit hard to stun it then if you don't hook up, they hit it again. In these situations after the initial hit i usually pop the rod tip once and let it fall and they nail it again. Man, now i want to get out there and throw some....nothing beats feeling that thump of the tail when you find that perfect speed.

BEAUTIFUL !! Thanks RoLo !!!

I am a Seaguar InvizX fan for everything except topwater. The views and opinions expressed on this post are solely those of the original author. These views and opinions do not necessarily represent those of Seaguar, others who have used it, and/or any/all contributors to this site. Just in case -

Haha, I'm glad you card me out. Will try again after work...

If you want to go "budget" you can always go the route of buying just a regular 2d sonar like a humminbird piranhamax for under $100 and then use your smart phone for the GPS....assuming you have a smart phone. There are apps that you can use to record your locations and I know that you can buy maps of lakes for your phone as well. I think if you are wanting a decent GPS unit you are going to need to spend more than $200 or you will be disappointed in the functionality and use.

Sounds like you're a fluorocarbon salesman or something? It's also been proven time and time again that fluoro stretches equally and in some cases more then mono does. It's advantages are abrasion resistance and less visibility. OP Sunline sniper is a great fc line and has a good price tag also.

Been slinging suspending jerks for a few decades myself. Conditions do change and what the bass want changes, but it's been my experience that finding the fertile ground to jerkbait fish is undoubtedly most important variable to control- way more so that brand, color, movement, or even lure depth. Since I fish them mostly now at Lake of the Ozarks, I'm constantly looking for shad at the depth level within the range where my jerkbait will suspend. Sounds easy, but lots of guys just go down any banks fishing them regardless of the presence of suspended food fish. When the shad are hugging the bottom, rareIy do I have a good catching day with jb's. can look at my locator and pretty well tell when I get to a patch of busted up shad, that is, smaller clumps of scattered that indicate they have been targeted by gamefish. I often tell my buddy in the boat next to me to get ready for a strike, and it happens pretty frequently when I see the right formations on my screen. After location of food at the proper depth, then one can tweak the color, speed/tempo, action to get even better results. Particularly if one guy in the boat is getting the vast majority of strikes, then through comparison, better start copying what he is doing. Sometimes it's pretty subtle. I do find it interesting that on Lake Ozark, a very good jb lake, that the suspending Rogue was supplanted by the Pointer which in turn was supplanted by the Megabass brand these last two decades. It's hard to argue against the Megabass brand for its casting distance and fish catching abilities. It tends to suspend tail down often, but occasionally rides parallel to the surface. For those wanting to save a few bucks, the Lucky Strike Clunn model works pretty much the same, but the internal weights can be fussy, and the lips are slightly smaller than the 3x more expensive Megabass. I'm not saying the Megabass 110 is always better, but it's really hard to argue tournament results around here. Like Bo says, and we have won money before together jerk baiting, sometimes bass want something different for no apparent reason. At times, the could prefer a painfully slow sinking model that will get down to the 10-12 foot level with a quicker quiver than a spoonbill will give, but there are times that the fish want a spoonbill, wide wobble. And some around here even drill holes in a floater Rogue to make them sink in a circular pattern as deep as the angler wants and they can be deadly at times. So the real key is to be flexible and not tied in to one approach or lure. Sometimes the retrieve pattern makes a difference, but I like to fish them as fast as I can as long as I'm getting bit. I'll cover more water that way. I might actually only suspend and slow it down for 6-8 feet during a long retrieve(and I might hold it still for 6-10 seconds in a preferred zone) when I'm really dialed in to the location. Faster can be better when fishing against the clock. As far as fishing the xrap, go for it. They catch lots of bass, and it can be slowed down and stopped in any temperature to match the bass' wants. I kind of like that little, cute fly tail too. It can be a trigger. I would agree that braid gives better feel, and I think working a jb with just the tiniest bit of slack in the line gives that bait more wiggle room if desired. I like to move my rod tip at the 8 o'clock position about 2-3 inches before I feel the lure pull tight. I think I get better twitches that way if the bass want a sharper twitch. For economy, I can't find a way to beat straight Yozuri hybrid in 8 or 10 lb. test, and a 6'9" medium rod, and a quality bait caster. I get decent feel, and I don't break off like I did with flouro. For me jb fishing is done below 50 at it's most effective, and below 39 degree water temps, I have a much tougher time like everyone else I know.

Glad to see lake of the Ozarks made a push up, although for size and numbers I still think it could be higher. Speaking of higher, whoever put Rend lake on at #69 is on drugs. Really, really good drugs. Shallow and dull, average numbers and size for IL. No chance it should be on there, let alone rated higher than others on those list.

Only 3.....all in Maine: Sebego, Cobbesseecontee, Kezar. But boy, what a bucket list!! Just occurred to me how cool it would be to take a few months off after the Roadtrip and hit all of them that I could on the way to CA to see my son. Ah, the joys of retirement!!

That's an old list. This is the newest list from 2013 Lake St. Clair, Michigan Sam Rayburn Reservoir, Texas Clear Lake, California Lake Guntersville, Alabama Lake Erie, Michigan/Ohio/New York/Pennsylvania Chickamauga Lake, Tennessee Falcon Lake, Texas Lake Okeechobee, Florida San Joaquin Delta, California Toledo Bend Reservoir, Texas/Louisiana Lake Coeur d’Alene, Idaho Kentucky Lake/Barkley Lake, Kentucky/Tennessee Thousand Islands, New York Rodman Reservoir/St. Johns River, Florida Grand Lake ‘O The Cherokees, Oklahoma Lake Champlain, New York/Vermont Upper Mississippi River, Wisconsin/Minnesota/Iowa/Illinois Bull Shoals Lake, Arkansas/Missouri Potomac River, Maryland/Virginia Pickwick Lake, Alabama/Mississippi/Tennessee Columbia River, Washington/Oregon Kissimmee Chain Of Lakes, Florida Lake Amistad, Texas Lake Oroville, California Smith Mountain Lake, Virginia Dworshak Reservoir, Idaho Candlewood Lake, Connecticut Lake Fork, Texas Lake Michigan, Wisconsin/Illinois/Indiana/Michigan Cobbosseecontee Lake, Maine Lake of the Ozarks, Missouri Lake Minnetonka, Minnesota Shasta Lake, California Lake Austin, Texas New River, West Virginia Rainy Lake, Minnesota Bullards Bar Reservoir, California Oneida Lake, New York Table Rock Lake, Missouri Lake Charlevoix, Michigan Lake Eufaula, Alabama/Georgia Lake of the Arbuckles, Oklahoma Lake Lanier, Georgia Lake Powell, Utah/Arizona Lake Ouachita, Arkansas Lake Havasu, Arizona Lake Istokpoga, Florida Santee Cooper Lakes, South Carolina Lake Winnipesaukee, New Hampshire Summit Reservoir, Nebraska Lake Sammamish, Washington Florida Everglades, Florida Lake Berryessa, California Kezar Lake, Maine Lake Oahe, South Dakota Douglas Lake, Tennessee Okoboji Lake, Iowa Upper Chesapeake Bay, Maryland Louisiana Delta, Louisiana Lake Seminole, Georgia/Florida Apache Lake, Arizona Lake Winnebago, Wisconsin Sebago Lake, Maine Lake Mead, Nevada Lake Gaston, North Carolina Roosevelt Lake, Arizona Spirit Lake, Iowa Dale Hollow Lake, Tennessee/Kentucky Lake Tarpon, Florida Lake Konawa, Oklahoma Rend Lake, Illinois Lake Conroe, Texas Falls Lake, North Carolina Mille Lacs Lake, Minnesota Fort Peck Reservoir, Montana Squam Lake, New Hampshire Lake Anna, Virginia Lake Murray, South Carolina Red River, Louisiana High Rock Lake, North Carolina Burt Lake, Michigan Pueblo Reservoir, Colorado Kerr Reservoir/Buggs Island, North Carolina/Virginia Perry Reservoir, Kansas Lake Mohave, Nevada Wilson Reservoir, Kansas Lake Audubon, North Dakota Navajo Lake, New Mexico Lake Wallenpaupack, Pennsylvania Lake Dunlap, Texas Lake Norman, North Carolina Lake Wawasee, Indiana Manasquan Reservoir, New Jersey Lay Lake, Alabama Webster Lake, Massachusetts DeGray Lake, Arkansas Lake Hopatcong, New Jersey Cayuga Lake, New York Fayette County Reservoir, Texas Logan Martin Lake, Alabama

Berkely Twitch Tail Minnow was this year's best producer for me!

you just killed multiple puppies by posting this.....

Have more then one of those. (1) over 200 Smallmouth between 2 of us on Pickwick around 1988. Best fish was just a little over 7 lbs and more then I could keep up with that was 4lb to 5 lbs. (2) By my self the same week, over 100 bass mixed bag same bait on the same waters. Best Largemouth 8lb 4 oz best smallmouth 6lb 8 oz. (3) Fishing with my wife and 140 lbs of blue cats in only 2 fish. She had the best one (4) over 50+ Stripers on 1 lb shad for baits in 4 hours. I could not lift my arms after that morning on the water.

Excuse the small size, but it was my first smallmouth. It was huge when I was 8. Not a bad looking fish though.

I have no standards. Or morals or shame for that matter.

Here's mine build back in 2011 on a G3 1654. One 80 lb bow mount motor, two 80 lb transom mount motors, HB 898 and a few other toys. Recently I replaced the cloth hatch pulls with the flush plastic pulls. I friggin' love this thing. And some more details on the build (which I did NOT do myself ), including more pics. http://shareaproject.com/pages/projectTut,p,739,00.html

I will admit, I never knew there was such a left handed preference until I got into fishing. It seems like they are 10% of the population but 50% of fisherman

I have done a couple... And my current: Jeff

1. Fish with WRB or Big O for Largemouth 1a. Move to Cali or Texas 2. Fish with Dwight for Smallmouth 2a. Move to PA 3. Don't fish with me. 3a. For the love of God, do not move to Illinois. Location is key for monster bass. Most importantly, HAVE FUN!

1. Fish what/how others are unwilling to fish 2. Fish where others are unwilling to fish 3. Fish when others are unable/unwilling to fish

There is a lot of April left I plan on getting a bigger one anyways got to break Johns 5-1 mark in the kayak. Tuesday most likely.