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In my area, mainly a long river leading to a decent size lake.. the main thing to fish are Channel Cats. There are ofcourse Largemouth, Smallmouth, yellow perch, northern pike and various amount of baitfish. I havent fished in years and when i have its been for Channel cats because.. well.. YUM. Only ever used hooks/sinkers with bait (shrimp, fermented chicken liver etc) I've been watching alot of videos lately and talking to some local fisherman and i always see them pulling in decent size bass (15-18 inches) so I went home and looked through an old tackle box my grandfather gave me when i was 14. I found some nice jigs, spinnerbaits, crankbaits, and some worms (wacky and spinnertail) I headed out this morning with my spinning reel to cast in for an hour or two. Threw on this worn out shad crankbait (i believe atleast) needless to say FIRST cast I pull in a small 11" bass.. All i can say is WOW. I have officially found my new hobby. Nothing like pulling in 4 (small for you guys) but nice size bass for me!! All were between 9-12" and caught on the same shad crankbait!!

Also I consider it a favor to my friends that I don't mix words or sugar coat things. I tell it how it is. Those that can't handle the truth shouldn't ask for it imo. I'll tell like it is & you no data supporting your claims, there is some research out there but it has not been proven just suggested. Another attempt of government overreach!

So are you saying I should stop sprinkling lead in my cereal every morning? Is that bad?

Well, you just called me cheap, lazy, selfish, and irresponsible. And I'm one of your favorites. My sympathy to the guys you don't like....WOW!! Hootie

Huh? You're getting closer...that almost made sense...almost. Well there's the pot calling the kettle black. Don't let us down.

I don't understand why people want to instigate arguments. The OP was wanting an honest opinion from members of this forum, and I believe that Alonerankin2 just wanted to give another option that hadn't been brought up. For all we know, the OP could try out the suggestion of Alonerankin2 and like it better than the others mentioned, leading him to be happier with his choice. Now, to the OP, I have never used a St. Croix, but I have used the Dobyns and the GL2, both of which you asked about. The Dobyns is hands down 5 times the rod the GL2 is. I have heard a lot of good things about the St. Croixs as well, I don't think you could go wrong with the Dobyns or the St. Croix, but there would be a lot left desired if you went with the GL2. I do not own any of those rods anymore, as all of my rods now are customs and great sticks, that are even at a lower price than all of the above mentioned. If you would be interested in a custom rod, shoot me a PM, but as stated earlier in my post, you would not be disappointed with the St. Croix or Dobyns.

Dang, son. Beast for sure! You are lucky you didn't shart. Don't ever eat mexican the day before leg day.

Well... That escalated quickly

Just another person who cannot tell the difference between being upfront/honest and an arse. I do like how his post said "illegal here in MA" but his profile said Dunedin, FL.

100 1/4oz lead weights is 25lbs? I've been doing math wrong all these years... On a more serious note, its actually only 1.56lbs 100 ÷ .25oz = 25oz 25oz ÷ 16oz = 1.56lbs. 16oz in a pound buddy

Is it okay if I hold off any praise until you can pick up your SIL and toss her like a midget?

Spinnerbait season for me begins January 1 and ends December 31.

never used a net.. if it gets off .. well I was gonna release it anyway

Well I got a chance to get out on the water this afternoon and this new strategy paid off! I researched a few spots before I hit the water and sectioned off a part of the lake that I was going to fish. It was very slow starting out. I worked my way along the banks pitching worms and jigs to possibly get a strike out of a lazy summer bass. The water temp was 82 degrees and it was hot out! After what felt like a few lazy hits and no fish, I was beginning to get discouraged, but I didn't give up. I came up with a new strategy and I decided to fish a nice point I had found in the part of the lake I had sectioned off. I quickly watched my graph drop from 8 feet to 21 feet and decided to sit on the flat and fish a deep crank up the bluff. Boy did it pay off! I caught 4 within 30 minutes and several more over the next hour or so before I had to pack it in. Thanks for the help guys! I'll keep working at it, but it helps to know that I'm on the right track!

Went fishing with my buddy in his 10 ft Aluminum boat with 30 thrust trolling motor. I didn't care about it. It took us to the spot where we wanted to go. I will always use a jig. Im a jig fanatic. Always pitching. No matter what, its my style. I make my own jigs and put on Xcite craw on the jig. Anyways, I told my friend to go the the spot that had gravel pit and tree hanging over the water. Had so much shade and very cool under that. so I knew that theres gotta be a 4 to 5 pounder. So I started pitching towards under the tree. Nothing. Did it again, nothing. Third time, I pitched a little bit over to the left. I see my line moving a bit. Hookset the pig hard. I use my Sunline FX2 with football jig. Braid has NO abrasion resistance. Hooked a 4 pounder. I was right Rest of the day nothing. Next day, we went out and try it again. I caught 2 beautiful bass. 2.5 pounder and 3 pounder.

This is like the 4th or 5th time with this guy. First it was the world record bass being caught in FL. Then it was spinning gear is better than casting gear, 2 or 3 times. The Quantum thread from the other day and now this. It's clear what the common denominator is.

Agreed. Hootie

I hate forums where members "attack" other members for giving a different suggestion. But since you did, here you go. I find it hard to believe that you have used all three and prefer the GL2 over the others. I would rather save the $170 and use an ugly stick. That's just my preference. This is the only time that I will say anything like that, I just felt after the responses you made towards Alonerankin2 that this post was needed. I'm sure everyone here will agree except you.

It will depend on what you are going to throw with it. Are you going to use it for the same baits as the first one, and same weight. MH is a good center point for rods, but if you start getting into 5/8oz and higher jigs you may not have enough power. Same with frogs in heavy weeds and a H would do the trick. A M would work for some smaller jigs, and t-rigs. This is just my personal opinion, but I would look at trying to expand a little. Not a similar setup to what you have but something that will allow you to throw a wider range of baits and different sizes. How to expand depends on the areas you normally fish.

I am not advocating banning. I am more of public caning advocate.

My legend tournaments have a split grip, so does my 13 ***...and guess what? They caught fish all weekend! So did my full grip premier and my full grip loomis GL2 lolI must not have a clue

It's Monday and people need a reason to complain about something?

This past weekend I did some fishing with a good long time friend I hadn't seen in awhile. The plan was to fish as much as possible. We met Thursday evening to try a bit of night fishing. I usually don't have very good success when there is no moon. There was no moon Thursday night but we were going to try it any way. We started fishing around 830 and fished until 1130. It wasn't very windy but it was pitch black. My friend Aaron was fishing a frog and I chose to fish my usual night time arsenal, spinnerbait, chatterbait, and a buzzbait. The fishing wasn't exactly easy but we managed catch 8 bass before calling it a night. Biggest bass of the night was a 2 lb 15 oz. On Friday we got out on the water at 8 am. It was a pretty nice day temps were in the lower 80s with not a whole lot of wind. The water temperature was 80 degrees. The fishing was pretty slow for most of the day. Picking up a fish here and there. We hadn't caught much by 1 pm. While I ate my lunch I was deciding where to fish next and how to adjust my approach for the remainder of the day. After much though I decided that I would fish a deeper weed bed, my favorite sunken trees and a new spot I found that I like to call frog heaven or obvious reasons. It was time to motor. Once we arrived at the deeper weed bed I told my friend to cast out. He did and quickly caught a 2.5 lber. A few casts later I hook into a lunker on the very edge of the weeds. It instantly goes air born and I tell my friend to get the net. It is a big fish and head shaking. It ripped of some drag as I hoped it would come off. As the fish gets to the boat my friend quickly nets it. It is a very well built 6 lb 3 oz that I caught on a rubber worm. After such a slow morning it was nice to get that lunker in the boat. Over the next 30 min or so we caught several more nice bass but nothing of any size. It was time again to move to another spot, my favorite sunken trees. There is a series of sunken and submerged trees in this pond which I very much like to fish. We pull up to the first tree and it looks as good as ever. I tell my friend Aaron that I hadn't caught any fisf off of it this year. He asks me why we are fishing it. It was a simple answer : because I have caught giant bass here in the past. Aaron is fishing his beloved senko and I have chosen to fish a jig. The tree is a bit deeper in 12 feet of water. On my second or third cast I can feel the jig going through some very thick tree branches and I feel a tick. I set the hook on what feels like a good fish. It gets wrapped around the tree but I manage to get it free. It was a good fish weighing in at 5 lbs 0 oz. We continue to fish that tree and fish the rest of my favorite trees. We caught some fish on the other trees but nothing 3 lbs or bigger. It was tie to make a move. It was getting a bit later. It was about 6 pm or so and time to go to frog heaven. "Frog heaven" is an area where there is a very subtle unobvious channel with tons of thick lily pas as well as some mifoil around. I take my first cast with the frog and before I have the chance to even move it once a fish inhales it. My friend wasn't even able to cast and I had already had a fish on and in the boat a 4-11. After unhooking and weighing that fish I take another cast near where I had just caught that fish. The frog lands splat on the water and a fish makes a wake over to my frog and explodes on it before I could even twitch it. This fish weigh in at 4-10. My friend then catches a 3-4. We were catching fish nearly every cast at this spot, all on a frog. I ended up catching a 3-9 and a 3-0 before leaving the spot. My friend also caught another 3 lber before we left. We caught a lot of fish there before leaving once it was too dark to see. I ended up catching 14 largemouth and 4 smallmouth for the day. My friend Aaron caught 6 largemouth and 2 smallmouth. The next day we decided to fish an unpressured lake. It was a 500 ft walk down a goat path to get to the lake. It was a pain getting my boat and all my gear down to the lake. I couldn't have done it by myself. It was a bit windy 5-10 mph out of the west and 80 degrees. I had never fished this lake before so I had no spots already in mind. I could see some tree out on 15 ft of water though. We went over and fished them with no luck. There really wasn't anything else to fish on this pond except for weed. We caught some fish but nothing really good. I did manage to find a rock pile where I caught a 3 lb 3 oz on a rubber worm. We had been out there for 5 hours and my friend wasn't having much luck. He wanted to go somewhere else. after deciding on another pond for the veing bite we were motoring over to the launch. We had to go right by the deep trees. I told him we had to fish them before we left. The first two trees sucked. We caught nothing off of them. We pull up to the 3rd tree and I let my friend take a coupe casts with his beloved senko on the tree before I cast my jig onto it. I pull the jig up and over the submerged base of the tree and before it hits bottom my line jumps.I set the hook hard into a nice fish, weighed in at 5 lbs 0 oz. At that pond from 8 am til about 1 pm I caught 10 bass and my friend caught 2. After that fish we still decide to go to another pond. After stopping and getting a pizza we are at the next pond and unloaded within an hour after leaving the past pond. The wind is still blowing but we fished a few places out of the wind. The fishing was much faster then the last pond. We were catching a lot of 2-2 3/4 lb fish. It was fin fishing. My friend caught a 3-6 and I caught a 3-11 both fish from the same off shore flat. We fished until dark 30 but didn't get any lunkers We finished the evening with 19 bass in the boat in about 6 hours of fishing. It was a very fun and productive weekend of fishing. Hopefully everyone else had just as much luck.

Champion>Avid>GL2, in sensitivity. The Champion and Avid are very similar in terms of weight, the GL2 is a brick. There's other rods in those price ranges that are lighter and more sensitive, but the Champion is the best all-around out of those three. Granted, it costs the most by a pretty good margin as well.

Don't just do it...document it! With out anything in writing it's your word against the president as to what is or is not allowed. Do you have any other owners who feel the same as you?

With everything that you posted, if you use any lead at all when you fish, no matter what it is or how much, then you are a hypocrite!

♫imma Micropterus outlaw, half largemouth and choctaaaaw♫ i'll see myself out.

Exactly! Fluoro & I had an affair in the mid 90s, but I've since fallen out of love Roger

Just placed an order for some solid brass worm weights. Thanks Jeff. Hootie

For some reason I thought of this when I read that.

For the braid just flip it around put the used portion on reel first. This way the un-used end will now be able to use. I have braid that is 5 to 10 years old and still strong. 2 years is just getting broken in.

"Work" is tying your own jigs, reloading your own cartridges, portaging over large stretches of dry land, creating your own contour charts and camping far from electricity. Those are just a few of the jobs I love. When it comes to dealing with wiry line that forms untrustworthy knots, I'm going to leave that 'work' for you Roger

I figured that would be a breeze since don't you pretty much leg press that every time you get up from a chair??

Yeah for night-fishing I use jigs, soft plastics and Jitterbugs. I've read that a big Colorado blade spinnerbait can be deadly for fishing after dark, but haven't tried it yet. Might have to do that soon. Night-fishing can be awesome. Dead quiet, no sweltering heat, water to yourself and a lot of BIG bass.

I know the pic is terrible. Holding a big fish out at arms length against an open background is the worst possible picture scenario. I did weigh the fish as I do with all my catches over 3 lbs and it was 5lb. The only point of reference I can give you is my hands are pretty decent size and his mouth is dwarfing them.

Roger I think it always comes up because in order to take advantage of the great characteristics of fluorocarbon the knot is key. It is not a deal breaker for me. I know that if I tie a San Diego jam knot, wet it properly, and cinch it down carefully it is not an issue. For those who are not conscientious about getting the knot right every time fluorocarbon is unacceptable. It is like punching with a light wire hook using heavy braid and blaming the line when the hook fails.

Yeah, if something requires work; better to just give up.

I have used the same net since the '70's, changed the netting a few times! The handle is 4' long, the hoop is 17" wide X 19" long with a 20" deep net. This may seem too small for giant bass however I have landed a lot giants with this net, it's all you will ever need for bass, it's worked for me over 40 years. The key to netting big bass is keeping calm and leading the bass into the net head first.....never swipe the net towards the bass, they can turn on a dime! Lead the bass to the net and give it a little slack line when the fish is 1/2 way in, it will land it's self. I hand land most bass unless it's hooked poorly or on a treble hook lure, then a net is needed. Tom

2 things. Keeping a bass out of the water is doing more harm than good, even though a study says that they will live for a half hour, keeping a bass out of the water for that long is dramatically increasing the chances of post release mortality. Second, just because a fish swims off, it doesn't mean that it will live. Not bashing anyone, disrespecting anyone, or meaning to offend anyone, just emphasizing that if you do not plan on keeping a fish (I have no problems with anyone keeping fish) that all appropriate measures should be taken to ensure that the fish will live.

I used to be a shimano guy but finally decided to go all Daiwa route. Got a few Daiwa reels recently and also tried some aftermarket spools. There is a ZPI RC-002 spool on TD Z which remind me the DC system on shimano reel. Basically set the brake to 4 and free the spool tension knob you can cast without thumbing. The nice thing over the shimnao DC is you can totally turn the brake off and also be able to handle much lighter baits. The alphas has a megabass zonda BFS spool on one alphas but didn't have chance to try it yet.

Spinnerbaits work all year.

My man Hank Parker made a few nickels with the spinner bait. In the morning, I start with top water. After that, it's the versatile, for those who know how to use it, spinner bait, one of the most versatile lures in your tackle box. Old school basser...

Good stuff right there. 2k is certainly achievable by December.

The cottage lake I fish up in here Ontario, Spinnerbait in White or White/Chartreuse - kills. Smallmouth, Pike and largie. Spinnerbait is my go to search bait, I use often. My favorite confidence SB is 3/8oz White/Cht Double Willow. I've lost twice now what could've been my personal best pike on a white/cht SB too. One I lost 10ft out it looks to be close to 40" long and just last Saturday at the same cottage lake, I don't know what I was thinking...it was about an arms length out to the right of me, my jaw dropped in awe when I saw the size of it's head...i stopped reeling, he took the SB right under my kayak...I tried to set the hook and he spit it. It took to me a split second too long to react. Not a bass, but SBs always are tied on for me.

I contacted Mike at DVT. Got a reply already. Very impressive, especially on a Sunday. I will be sending off my Shimano for repair this week.

I sure wish people would stop judging others who choose to keep a few fish to eat!! It's legal and taking a few each year does nothing to hurt the fish population!

This past week, a friend and I made a trip north into Wisconsin for a few days and floated a couple of rivers in personal pontoons. The weatherman threatened to cancel one of the days by predicting an all day rain, but he couldn't have been more wrong as both days were just perfect. Although it was warm by Wisconsin standards while we were there, the cool spring and summer still has the water cooler than normal. Normally by this time, the bass are in the full summer pattern, hanging out near the faster water but few were found there. We still caught a fair number of fish with a few pushing 18 and several over 16 inches. Sinking plastics, worked for both of us and I also got some on a topwater popper and I also did well with an In-line spinner. I just LOVE being up North. The beautiful rivers, the wildlife, the great smallie fishing and the adventure of the road trip just can't be beat.

Spro mcstick 110 to cover water Chomper twin tail grub Water melon bitsy tube Senko wacky on a jighead...idiot rig

non toasted no crust smooth grape wheat bread Honorable mention is peanut butter and banana sandwich. Jeff