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My Mom and Dad divorced when I was 23 years old. That's about forty years ago. When my Dad left my Mom, he didn't take much with him, but he did take most of the family photos and all the photos of his family before I was born. Our relationship was awkward for a long time after and his wife was did not want anything to do with me and my family. I learned to accept that. When my Dad was diagnosed with terminal cancer, I was never notified he was having a lung removed but the information leaked out and I was there when the surgeon came in with the news. The next twenty nine months were special for both of us because it opened a door for me to become a part of his life and for his wife to see who I was. What ever issues she had with me paled in comparison with my desire to be there for my father and for her. My Dad died on a December day 20 years ago. My relationship with his wife quickly became distant. Well my step-mother recently passed away. Her son and daughter came to me. I hadn't seen them since my Dad's funeral service. They had gone through their mother's estate and found a box of photos. They were the photos my Dad took with him when he left. My Dad's wife never mentioned them to me and I did not press her. Her children immediately recognized what those photos were and what they might mean to me and they gave them to me. I have not had a single photo of my Dad and or his Mother, Brothers and Sisters until know. This is one of the greatest gifts I have received in my entire life. A picture is worth a thousand tears. It has helped me to have some closure in a time of year that isn't always jolly. It was special to see my Uncle, who is my name's sake and my Dad's baby brother. I can see myself in him. My Dad's baby sister looks just like my youngest daughter. I would have never known had not been for an act of kindness.

All the ponds in the northern portion of my state are frozen so I headed an hour and a half downstate to see if they wanted to chase some cranks. Water temp was 45-46. One thing I didn't bring and it bit me bad was a net. Within 30 minutes of each other I lost two 6+lbers trying to grab the lip without getting hammered with the trebles. They were not lethargic at all thrashing around the side of the boat. Should have done a few things different including boat flip em but didn't trust the line not breaking. Had a few 3lbers smack at the crank near the boat then swim off. Eventually after trying new areas managed to land three 4lbers before packing it up. Net will be in the boat next time.

Shiny brand new, old-n-faded, painted black, red, or green pumpkin; I've tried em all. Makes absolutely no difference at all

My wife likes white lights and I like color. I put up the tree and we decorated and lit it. Looks great! She left the room then I push the remote and presto chango color! She came back in and I told her is was color the entire time. That her brain was so used to seeing white lights that she thought the color lights were white. Really had her freaking out for about 5 minutes. Then she looked at me and said yea right and all your rods and reels really cost what you tell me they do. I pay the bills dummy! She's a keeper! Merry Christmas!

I am excited to announce the Leaderboard as the latest all new feature of the BassResource forums. The new Leaderboard is designed to better highlight our most active members and content based on reputation and other metrics. The Leaderboard will greatly enhance both member and content discovery on our community. First you will notice the new feature of member leaders based on a specific time frame. The default view is set to All Time, showing those members with the most reputation overall on our community. It also shows the content with the most reputation for the same timeframe so you get a snapshot of both popular members and popular content in one view. The Past Leaders tab shows the "winners" of each day in a history. The system counts all reputation made each day and logs the members who had the top reputation counts that day. Using reputation rather than post count encourages members to post quality over quantity which is really important to our community. Those who “win” the day also get a badge on their profile page to highlight that they were the member with the most reputation for a particular day. Top Members shows you a list of all members sorted by various metrics. By default you will see members sorted by reputation but you can also easily sort by total post content. We hope you enjoy this initial launch of the new Leaderboard feature. We are excited about the new content and member discovery abilities this offers and look forward to adding new options to the Leaderboard as we continue to develop!

Nice feature. I wonder if can get mine up high enough that i can use it as a bullet point on my fishing resume

Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays to everyone in the Bass Resource! Best of wishes from our family to yours.

Yes, they definitely catch fish. I would skip the size 90 though and get the 130.

Took 15 minutes out from shopping and hit the only open water in the area, an outlet below a lake, and even that was mostly frozen. Using a 5/8oz jigging spoon, quite possibly my last fish of the year.

Internally they are identical. The shallower spool on the 50 makes them capable of throwing lighter baits. Outside of that they're interchangeable as far as application

Most anglers fish too fast with all baits but especially soft plastics. You can't fish a senko slow enough. Watch Gary Yamamoto fish. He is the opposite of all the power fishing we see on TV. Wish I had learned to slow it down years earlier.

Seriously? Pretty sure j bab was making a joke. Happens to me All. The. Time:

Couldnt pass these up for $120 each. Tatula CT Type-R-6.3, 7.3, 8.1

Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays guys. If there is something you wanted I hope Santa brings it. Enjoy it with family and friends. It's my hope we all have a prosperous 2017 Bass Season.

Here's our little tree this year.

Will there be prizes??

Mine arrived today......will open tomorrow

In the northern hemisphere today is the shortest day of the year. For the next six months, the days will be getting longer, and, in a couple of months, they will be getting warmer. There is an old Yankee proverb, "As the days begin to lengthen, then the cold begins to strengthen". January and February are the two coldest months of the year. I have noticed that, for me, as the days get shorter, my ambition wanes, kind of like a bear who hibernates in the winter. The lengthening of the days stimulates my ambition. Maybe it hearkens back to my days as a commercial lobsterman. As the end of the season neared, with the days considerably shorter, and cooler, my enthusiasm to get out there and tend the gear waned. Production would seriously decline in late September, early October. The gear was also further from the beach. thirty to fifty miles offshore. Combine the raw chilly days, with smaller catches, and the result was a loss of enthusiasm. It became more of a job, and less enjoyable. The highlight of the late fall was the final trip of the season, when the last trap was on deck, the boat was loaded, gear tied down securely and I pointed the boat in a northerly direction, headed for port.

That's one way to look at it, but if you want to learn from someone else on new bodies of water, waiting to get asked isn't going to be as productive as just asking yourself. I've become good friends with a few in my club and we all share info. But a good point of fishing behind or with someone else is you can learn new ways of fishing which will better serve you down the line. Out of my local club I've now aquired a fishing partner who is a boater as well but fish out of mine in bigger tournaments as he wants to learn other techniques other then the ones he is comfortable with. His strong points are some of my well weaker areas and mine are his. So in combination we mesh and grow as we learn from one another. Fishing alone has its perks but fishing with someone else has some as well especially if you're wanting to learn more about fishing.

I didn't buy a mold but I may do it next spring. For my waters the ideal condition is hard bottom with scattered rock and it works best when the water is like glass. Early in the summer we had a day when there wasn't a bit of a breeze and the skies were partly cloudy. I threw square bills, spinnerbaits and swim jigs, nothing. So we started hitting some cover and pitching worms and I was getting ready to finesse fish when I decided to give the Biffle Hard Head and a beaver a shot for a few casts. Over the next two hours I landed 11 fish with my smallest being a 17" smallmouth and the biggest was a 21.5" largemouth. It didn't seem to be a fluke either, almost every outing when the water is super calm and the fish are scattered this works, you'd think the square bill would be just as good but it isn't, so ideal conditions for my water is hard bottoms with smooth as glass water. We fish them like a square bill but slower with no stops, we will alternate speed but never stop and almost all my strikes come after hitting rock.

i dont use the chart that way, i use it for dia, and breaking strength for that dia. It is a wonderful reference and allows me to see all the most critial information on the line. Now if i were worried about a catch that i wanted to register for a record then that would be an entirely different problem, but i just want to catch them and have fun. How many fishermen is that a real problem for???

To all my Eastern Mass fishing friends I wish you a Merry Christmas and Happy New Year and I'll be thinking of you while fishing the 60+ degree, stump filled shallows of Lake Moultrie. I really miss the cold and snow and chopping through the ice, and the cameraderie of the folks sharing my coffee and brandy. Best to All. Grampa

Cold muddy water = go find something else to do for me. There are much better conditions to fish in.............in fact, I can't think of anything worse* * this is assuming it's not a year round muddy water fishery. Fish that usually live in clear/lightly stained water, do not react well to mud/cold.

I thought that video was more about the products he was using though he did show a couple ways to fish a lipless crank bait. On a bigger lake I look at maps before even leaving the house & pick a area or 2 that looks productive & find a ramp that is fairly close that has a store & gas. Then I'll ride the area looking for promising spots. I use my eyes, sonar, sidescan, downscan, & GPS mapping. I realize everyone might not have all the electronic features but you have eyes. That is what we had to use before depthfinders. Watch for wildlife along the banks, especially shore birds. Look for cover, grass(what type),wood(tree's , docks), rocks etc. Look for baitfish put your trolling motor down & move around in the grass & watch for what moves. Look for openings in the grass & if you have sonar look changes in the bottom especially depressions. If the area has this start fishing.

It really all depends on what you're looking for and what your needs are. At 4k I'm willing to bet you could go up in size a little which would give you more room and stability. Your concern about someone else's problem are valid. A couple ideas to think about...if you're handy enough you could buy cheap and fix what needs to be fixed you could do it pretty cheap and with aluminum you can pretty much make an old boat look new. Or save another couple grand and look for a bass tracker 2000-2005 or so model year. Another thing you can do to cover your hind end buying used is have a marine mechanic look over the outboard. Hope this helps, good luck with your purchase!

To be fair, there is a thread for "what rod to buy" for everything. If there were rods made for rainy days VS sunny days, they would be asked about and purchased on here.

I totally agree. But some people get all anal about their crankbaits paint job. So there is a need I presume for those anglers that are really anal about the looks. Some people just get all happy when everything matches the way they perceive it should look to the bass. I have never seen proof of it being necessary from the bass perspective. Personally I won't pay extra for painted weights but if it's the same $ for what I want I will take black, green pumpkin, and red ones for my t-rigged worms. Seems a lot of tungsten is colored these days too. I did however just paint myself some yesterday because I was bored and had some Black and Hot Rod Red paint, that is the actual color name.

Don't forget @slonezp he got one too not long ago lol

in terms of size 50<70<CT I've got a 50 and a CT. The 50 is noticeably smaller than a CT but the 50 is pretty small. I polished a few internal spots on my CT and added 4 bearings/different knobs to the handle and a bearing to the level wind. It's ridiculously smooth.

Always a Bummer losing a couple of fatties. But still looked like a Nice day on the water - especially for December. Congrats A-Jay

Sounds like some great fishing. That catfish hole isn't easy to find on ice unless you have it marked. A couple years ago a guy left a buoy out there during open water to freeze so he could go out on the ice and fish it. With highs from 40s to near 60 and more rain the next 3 days, that will probably put a hurt on the ice safety. Then the gates get closed on January 2nd, so the lake will start rising again and that might make the ice very unstable for a while. If it ever does refreeze and get safe enough, I'll have to meet up with you out there late one afternoon. Been about 15 years since I last ice fished. -T9

many moons ago, me and my cousin wanted to do some fishing but we had a high wind advisory that day so lauching the boat was out. we ended up walking the bank at a smaller lake. it was early April and the water was still chilly and muddy, plus the wind. he tied on an old red rat L trap and i did not. he makes me sick. the end

Sorry it took so long to get back to you, I've been trying to get as much time as possible in ice fishing before Sunday's rain melts it off. I meant water temperature, air temperature doesn't directly effect them. Often the air temperature varies greatly during the early spring, so it's hard to guess much based on that. You can catch bass any time of the year though, I have just noticed a decrease in activity level below 45 degrees. Got out ice fishing on Wednesday, Thursday afternoon, and today. Spent the first couple hours drilling holes on Wednesday trying to find the catfish hole again, but I couldn't find them. My depth finder doesn't have a GPS, so I can't drop waypoints with it. I tried to do it the old fashioned way by triangulating it, but apparently my triangulating skills are pretty bad. Gave up around noon and switched to crappie and bluegill fishing. I found them in 16 feet of water with quick access to deep water (in that little pocket by the dam Brian), all of them hugging bottom. We caught a little of everything there, about sixty bluegill and warmouth, five nice crappie, a four nice largemouth (who says you can't catch bass through the ice), and some white bass. The majority hit a 1/100 ounce horizontal jig with an atomic wishbone and a wax worm fished with a steady pounding/vibrating motion near bottom, but some ate minnows, blood worm imitations, panfish asassins, etc. Ended with a total of 75 fish for the day, a great day on ice in my book. Managed to make some time to go fishing yesterday afternoon again, but only for a few hours. This time I fished the opposite end of the lake from where I was yesterday, toward the upper end at the opening of a cove with scattered brush on the edge of a flat. Caught 22 big bluegill, 3 white bass, 2 largemouth, and a 15 inch walleye in that spot, the bluegill and bass in a horizontal jig with a wishbone plastic and a wax worm kept still right above the bottom, and the white bass and walleye hit a minnow. The first two walleye I've ever caught at this lake in a year and a half of fishing it, and they were within three weeks of each other for whatever reason. Got out ice fishing today, again fishing the upper end of the lake. Started out at the same spot, and right off the bat got some big bluegill and a solid 17 inch largemouth. That bass put up a challenging fight on four pound line and a light powered rod, it felt bigger than a lot of the 3-4 pounders I've caught. Then it shut down, so I moved around the lake for an hour or two looking for some more, but had nothing to show for it. Walked back to the same spot I had fished earlier around 4 o-clock. The fish were hitting big time now, they usually bit as soon as I picked the jig off the bottom from the initial drop. Went from only a dozen fish to 55 big bluegill in only an hour and a half, the frozen rain mixed with pea sized hail that came down for the last 45 minutes didn't even seem to bother them at all. Wasn't a whole lot of fun to fish in the hail, but it was mostly freezing rain, and the eight to nine and a half inch bluegill made it all worth it.

I fish a small lake for crappies when the WT is cold around 38=40. The first two hrs or so of day break can make or break the trip. Once the sun hits the water,its time to fish lmb. C22

Buying from a trusted source is worth a few extra bucks in my experience. Buying from a trusted auto shop is how I've bought my last few vehicles. I know of too many great deals that ultimately were not. Good luck.

I don't know why bass anglers can't figure out that memory in mono or any single filament fishing line is directly tied to the diameter of the line. Yo-Zuri Hybrid mono/FC line is 3 lb test sizes larger in diameter the most other mono line. Sunline Super Natural mono. Yo-Zuri Hybrid 6 lb test = .008 D. 6 lb test = .010 D. 8 lb test = .009 D. 8 lb test = .011 D. 10 lb test = .010 D. 10 lb test -= .012 D. You all call Yo-Zuri "thick line" I call mislabeling to convince anglers the line is strong,it should be the 6 lb test line is actually 10 lb test line! Tom

Yes RR, I did write it. Thanks for the compliment. But, I doubt I have the patience to write a book. If I do, you'll be the first to know. I'm more of a hands on guy. I like seeing the progression of a project, when at the end of the day I can see what I/we have accomplished. Take the picture of the Christmas tree I posted. That is in the living room of our home. My wife grew up on a dairy farm, and that room is dedicated to her history. I got the stones for the fireplace from her parent's farm. There were a couple of stone walls in disrepair. They provided all the flat(ish) stones for the fireplace. The wall on each side of the fireplace are faux barnboards. The came from a local saanother sitell. The owner had a stack of weathered white pine. When he found out what I wanted them for he gave them to me as a house warming present. They were naturally aged to the silver gray. I half lapped the boards and stained the surfaces where they overlapped so that bare wood could not be seen between the joints. The boards are fastened to the studs with cut nails from the Tremont Nail Company in Wareham, MA. The room is a dark red, similar to the common barn red with white trim. The only thing that I did not do was to install the carpet. My wife has wanted to take the barnboard down and replace it with sheetrock. It's one of the few times that I have vetoed something that she really wanted. I have too much labor and emotional investment in that room because of what it stands for. It's my tribute to her. Should she survive me, then she can do what she wants. Fifty two years together and still going strong.

Listen..All kidding aside, does it matter what caused the "tick" at that point ? It's under the water, you can't see your hook, you can't see where you're hook is, all you know is that you felt something that you can't explain during one of the most advantageous times to catch a bass...On the fall! So turn it around and ask yourself..All things considered how in the heck would anyone know if it was a stick?? Stop thinking about what is was, set the hook and find out. Mike

I feel you man, one time I waited 10 hours to set the hook. Turns out, by that time the bass had already eaten and pooped out my lure and when I went to set the hook my braided line sawed the fish clean in half.

I've been a big fan of the newer Rattlin' Killer B2, they managed to make that plastic square bill deflect as well as the balsa model. The best part is the rattle, it is low pitch and it has worked well in both clear and stained water, I have a dozen of them. Another new bait that have that I'm sold on is the Balsa Shad, the #5 Balsa Shad has replaced my #5 Rapala Shad Rap as my number 1 cold water crank. The bait is 1/4" longer than the shad rap but it weighs 3/8oz and runs at the same depths so I can use it on a casting rod and get long casts with it. The new one I'm really waiting to try as soon as they hit shelves is the Rattlin' B Plus and Rattlin' B Minus, they are 1/2oz lipless cranks with the plus model made to sink fast for deep water and the minus model made to sink slow so you can rip it over shallow grass beds and still use it slower, that will be a killer. In addition to these are the Sunny Bs which were discussed here, they haven't quite taken the place of my DT-6 but I use them about the same amount of time, I wasn't sure if they were going to work as well but I've been pleasantly surprised, so it is safe to say that I've become a Bagley fan, I have a lot of the newer stuff and none of it has failed to impress.

Back in the day, I know the Kill'r B was a very popular design, but I've always been partial to Diving B's, especially the DB-I and DB-II. I've got a rather large collection of the older/original versions with the brass wire and lead tuning lips that I still fish with. -T9

Not to go and buy a bunch of baits. I did and then didnt use half of them.

What a beast! https://www.outdoorhub.com/news/2016/12/21/video-massive-mille-lacs-muskie-caught-cold-weather/

What can I say, I'm a Rebel guy.

I have a VIP account w Rapala and Missile Baits and get a discount on everything they make lol. 25% off Missile, not sure what Rapala is but get the DT's for $5.20.

I bring a "supply box" with me containing a few bags each of each soft plastic I think I might burn through. I don't bring it on the boat - it's for replenishing if stock gets low. Literally, it's a box.

I had a 99 ranger danger and loved that thing swapped out the crappy vacuum locking hubs with manual ones and beat the crap out of that thing. Wish I still had it honestly but I blew her up a few winters ago.

For those interested the Modified Crawford Formula puts that big girl at 52lbs. (LxG/25-8)

20+ species in a day? Makes me wanna move to Florida! Nah, I don't know enough for that. I'll simply be fishing pristine water, rising at four in the morning, and fishing until ten in the evening for 21 days. Putting that much time on the water should produce.