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Picked up an extreme mission

After years of mentioning to my wife (she probably classified it as whining) that I wanted a bass boat, she surprised me the other day by showing me a picture of a boat for sale in our area. After debating for a week or so I called the guy up and finally pulled the trigger and brought it home. It's a 1997 Trtiton TR21 with a Johnson Venom 200. The gentleman had bought it in 1999 and fished a lot of local tournaments. It has a few dings and scratches (which is okay because I do not have to worry about being the first to scratch it now) and the carpet will probably need replaced in a few years but mechanically the boat is in great shape. The engine starts right up and is as clean as you could ask for with its age. I've primarily been a bank fisherman the last 20 years so this is going to be a very big learning experience. But, a day on the water is still better than a day at work.

I only drink when fishing buzzbaits , its part of the strategy .

New fuel for the age-old debate! http://www.bassresource.com/fishing/spinning-baitcasting-choice.html

My 4 horsemen now that the spinning rig is up and running *** Black 7'3" HXF & BB1 Pro w/55# FX2 Dobyns 705cb glass & Curado I w/12# Tatsu NRX 852c & Ito Ai w/15# Smackdown *** Black 7'1" MLXF & Supreme XT w/8# Yo-Zuri Hybrid Stoked to head out tomorrow.

Drop shot with 30' tag line length is bizarre. Use your sonar and drop down to the depth the fish are suspened. If you can't see your rig, simply make a cast about the same distance and let is swing down though the suspended fish. Several rigs and lures work for this; spoons, dart head jigs with 4 1/2"-5" curl tail worms, drop shot rig with 12" tag line to weight. Tom

I dont know about you guys, but a squarebill is a reaction bait for me. Bounce in shallow riprap, throw into laydowns, bounce into docks, etc. I use a 7.*:1 with 15# fluoro. I want to be able to pull them out of the cover fast.

Started messing around with the new band saw Friday night. This is the rear grip for a 12' surf rod I'm building for a friend. as much fun as watching glue dry! Once it's on the blank, I'll do a final sanding to taper it down to the reelseat and blend it in to the butt cap.

Halo...Hello...

Its true. However it did snow!

This is actually a fun topic to read about. Me beeing the young dumb wipper snapper I was 2 or 3 years ago I didn't go fishing without beer. Now, when bass fishing i no longer bring alchol because every time i pop a top the beer just sits there and gets hot and i end up going home with all my beer but thats probably a good thing saftey wise. I have my own boat and when I go out on the water not bass fishing of course I take beer almost every time. I had my bachelor party last weekend and me and my buddys put out set lines for catfish. We set the lines and went back to the sand bar drank a few then checked the lines and over and over all night. By morning you all know what shape we were in. I didn't feel good so i was ready to go home and get in my bed we loaded 3 coolers 3 tents a grill and 4 grown men into a 17 ft bass boat!!!! It went from a 5 min trip to a 30 min trip. Not smart!!!! Now the moral of this story is I'm done with BWI. I have learned my lesson and I will never take more that 3 beers in my boat again. I fished a tournament a couple weeks ago and me and my partner got checked. the warrdens went on around the corner. A boat comes and anchors in a fishing spot not far from us, they all take out some beers. Wardens come back around the corner. They had to poor out all the beer they had or get taken back to the landing for a test.

Raymond from Mondo asked me if I wanted to fish Angler's Paradise with him last week. He said he'd rather buy my gas and pay for my fishing than rent their old boat, of course I jumped on that. It is a really cool place and very secluded. The owner is a super nice guy and you can tell he's completely obsessed with monster bass. He was telling stories about teeners, and you could tell he was 100% serious. Said he had a 12-14 pound fish investigate his bait this spring, he knows because a customer caught a 12 1/4 not long before he saw that one and he'd caught a 7.5 earlier that day. For those of you who don't know, it's a big strip pit. If you've never fished a strip pit, it's a very unique experience. Big fish in strip pits are odd fish, almost a different species of fish altogether. They will beat you more often than not. They beat us Monday for sure. I caught a good number of fish on a wacky rigged Senko (wacky rig is what the owner catches a lot of his big fish on). Raymond stuck with the bigger stuff on the bottom and it just did not work out. There was 2 other boats on the water that Raymond knew. One boat was struggling bad, the other was doing okay with a craw colored crankbait of all the odd things. As soon as he said that, I switched from a black and blue jig to a more craw colored jig. Wasn't long before a fish flashed on my jig, and then I caught a little one a few cast later. I stuck with the jig for the most part after that and caught a decent number of fish. Raymond switched to a craw colored jig also and finally caught a keeper sized fish. In the same area I fired a long cast and saw my line jump while it was sinking and I finally got to set the hook into some weight. Wasn't the monster I was hoping for, but it was an example of one of the more quality fish the lake holds. We saw a couple big ones guarding fry right by the ramp, but no interest in biting from them.

I'm guessing you're breaking at the knot because the line is burning itself when you tighten it down. I'll try to hold the knot in my mouth and tighten it slowly and smoothly with fluorocarbon and give it a good strong pull test before I fish with it. If it's breaking further up your line, check your guides like was suggested.

A 10 in' culrly tail worm. Its versitile- You can fishit on bottom, in the middle, on top, and you can een punch mats with a heavy enough wieght. Its changeable- You can always down size a 10 in' worm, bet can't upsize a 6-7 in' worm It's recycleable- You can get a single mold for that bait, and every time it gets worn out just melt it and remold it. You'll never have to by replacements, or very few! Ish

TNT.

As much as I hate to say it....5'' Watermelon w/ black flake GYCB Senko.

I just pulled the trigger. Went with another 1001Xt and 2 Metaniums. First time ordering from this site. Thanks again for the awesome hook up you just save me like $400 lmao

Kind of skeptical about the reviews... Looks more like an ad for Sears. I will look more in depth into this website. I will come back to visit this thread again after I dig deeper.

Some footballs from a couple weeks ago, all weighed on a good scale. 14.25'' 2.24 lbs Would have been barely a keeper at 14'' but weighed that much... 3.00lbs 4.3lbs Fat fish.

No offense at all. Crazy thing is, I learned to cast a baitcaster very young(2-3y/o) and at the time, I needed to have a hand in front of the reel to not throw the rod in the water. Just never changed. Allows me to use a right handed reel and have my hand back on the reel handle before the bait hits the water. Works very efficiently for me! Jeff

Get the old one now and the new one later. I have not used the new Ald yet but I just took delivery of an old model this morning and I am glad that I did. My only regret is that I waited so long to get one. I like it so much that I bought another one this morning.

All my rods have a foregrip, both spinning and baitcasting for several reasons. Baitcasting; I hold the rod with most of my left hand holding the foregrip, the reel side by the base of the thumb, my index finger and thumb tips feeling the line, the trigger grip rod handle against my forearm. This allows me to detect strikes with ease and get a leveraged hook set. When landing a good size bass I tend to hold the rod by the foregrip so the rod doesn't move in my hand to have more control of the fish. Casting the foregrip doesn't matter. Spinning; I hold a spinning rod with my right hand, all fingers or sometimes 3 fingers in front of the reel on the foregrip for better, strike detection, balance, hook setting and controlling the bass. Casting the foregrip matters with spinning rods. You give up about 1/4-1/2 oz added rod weight with a 2 1/2"-3" foregrip and that is why rod builders today make rods without them. Tom PS, keeping a finger on your line during the retrieve will improve your strike detection, catching more and bigger bass.

Meh, spots could have been learned in many, many other ways so I could care less. Would it have ok if they had emailed the waypoint coordinates before they knew they were going to fish the tournament? Is anyone with a secret spot privy to an unfair advantage? When I think of cheating, I think of putting big fish in a cage and using them for weigh in. Or cramming lead down a fish's throat. Or sabotaging a competitor. But spot sharing? Get over it. You got beat. Try again next time.

Better get some Hornady's..

I know the ch50 or scopion 1000 would be on my very very shortlist

Slightly slack with the rod down has worked for me.

Theres a beer in this photo. I like beer . If I feel like having a beer , I have one and dont think anything of it .

At what number of posts should I have waited for? 30? 50? 3,000? Let me know the appropriate number and I'll repost at a time that suits you better.

I despise those type spools. I'd like to find the idiot who designed those and hang him up by his fruit. I use a sanding block and sand them all the way flat and flush.

The other week I was out with my buddy at a local park on the Upper Niagara. We were fishing from shore and we were targeting smallmouth, I has a dropshot rig tied on with a roboworm with an 8# leader off of 10# braid. It felt like I was snagged up, after a long cast with a 5/8 oz weight. I started to reel in for another cast and my line was about 30 yards out when it felt heavy and started to fight back. After a few seconds of fighting the muskie leaped in the air and I knew it was no bass! haha, Surprisingly, I got her to shore while my friend grabbed the small net that I had and got down to net her. I have no idea how my line was not cut and held up to the teeth. That was the first and only muskie I've caught and it was certainly a pleasant surprise, People in the park were walking over to me and asking about it afterwards! It was an awesome catch! It was by no means a monster muskie, but catching that using bass tackle is just one of the reasons I love the Niagara River!

People are ranting because the pricing doesn't make sense. Nobody is saying it won't be a good reel.

I prefer the older Aldebaran. Its more solid, I think it casts further, and at 5.5oz, it balances better with most rods.

I am stuck at 18.5"....it's like one after another.

My wife has given me several double-blind taste tests between grilled bass & grilled crappie, and I can always tell them apart. The firmer more flavorful flesh is bass, the softer nearly tasteless flesh is crappie. Roger

I just spent an hour watching Billy's videos. Now I have to have a ban saw and a lathe...

I am going to defer to this young lady, just because

This was the only Hawg I caught this past Saturday.... I know sad. Caught on a Siebert's Sunfish swim jig with a green pumpkin Rage Tail Menace. Did have a few short strikes, and hooked a Pickeral luckily that came off by it self at the bank.

Like the old saying, "guns don't kill people, it's the people pulling the trigger that do". And so it goes with fishing gear - the best money can buy is useless if not used properly. For the record, I rarely win anything worth mentioning, especially involving skills of any kind but do enjoy how I got my expensive Penn reel. I suppose if I did enter a 7-10 pounder, I would have had many anglers knocking at my door that just didn't take the time and effort to learn the necessary skills needed to get those lunkers.

Green fish are ones that are still "ripe", not ready to be landed. Brownfish are the ones that are tired out, many species fade or lose color.

Mustad straight shank denny brauer.

mccoy copolymer

Small ,1 to 2 lb bass are ok and all the panfish you can catch, crappie,bluegill,sunfish and perch.Walleye and catfish too.

Bass must taste different in other locales. The ones I catch have flaky white meat and are very mild. "Everybody" who has tried my bass fillets absolutely loved them . Even the people who said they dont like bass . Heck , even the ones who say they dont like fish .

I don't know how many times I have fried up crappie, walleye, bass, bluegill at the same time and there has not been a person that can tell bass from the others when fried (fillets are cut to the same size for consistent frying.) A bluegill and bass from the same lake are going to taste the exact same, live in the same environment, consume much of the same species however bluegill will be spending more and eating more organisms that live in the weeds. Are you guys not taking the skin off your bass, because that is the only thing that would make them taste anything different from a slightly less mild flesh than that of a crappie. Best way to eat bass species however: Layer bacon bottom of cast iron pan and layer cut potatoes on top and cover with foil on grill. Last 10 minutes of cooking layer fish and additional spices/herbs on potatoes and cover until done. Yum.

Bass is very good. Anyone that convinces you it taste fifferent than bluegill are losing it. I prefer bass over crappie,catfish etc and the ease of prep per fillet is so much nicer than bluegills crappies or catfish.

I have worked in the manufacturing sector in America for quite some time, from what I've seen the american workforce and quality has dropped to the point of not caring if my money is going to whatever country of origin the company belongs too. Quality is key, finding it abroad is easier than ashore.

Well my answer will break the no politics rule. So I'll grab some popcorn and keep it simple. I'll keep buying st croix products.