Leaderboard

Last weekend in Northern NY was incredible. These were my biggest five of a 70 fish Friday with my dad. Just under 20lbs and Dad had 18.5. We fished ABA early bird tournaments Saturday and Sunday which were even better. I'm at my max for pics so I'll have to make a separate post.

Hadn't gotten the boat out in a while, but I finally have my college things at bay and had some free time this afternoon. Water from the river had pushed down into the lake with recent rains, 48 degrees at the ramp! Found some 55 degree water and got to work slow rolling a spinnerbait

Holy tags...

What you are getting confused by is that there are preferred lb test and or types of line that have characteristics that enhance a certain presentation. If I only had one line to choose for everything it would be 12lb mono. I can make that work in almost every situation. Remember, line manufacturers have to keep us buying so there will always be something new to spark your interest. Each type of line lends itself to certain presentations better so you need to learn what they do best and the situations they will not work.

Hey Guys! I appreciate all the comments and gestures! So, I had some great advice from this thread and took em up on it. 1st. I contacted Abu Garcia and it's under warranty. For $9.95, they are shipping me another. 2nd. And oddly enough, Abu did not want my rod back. They were easy to deal with and I only took pictures, two emails, and two phone calls. But since they didn't want the rod back, I've already had the broken one fixed today for $4.70 at the local shop. Last night, bummed big time! Today adding a brand new fav to my collection for $9.95 and fixing my other for $4.70 "just 3" shorter", I'm ecstatic! Thanks for all the help!

Let me know when Johnny Morris buys out both Pradco and Pure Fishing. Tom

"A" for straight shank hooks "B" for offset hooks

Gotta love the footballs of fall...

The rods are in the rack and the vice is on the bench. Here are a couple of photos of recent creations intended for Quabbin Reservoir's smallmouth next April: The heads are cast from Do-it's Poison Tail mold. Alloy used is 88% bismuth/12% tin. Powder paint is cured at 300º for 45 minutes. The adhesive backed eyes are further secured with a coat of HARD as NAILS polish. Thread is UTC 140 denier which most jig tiers consider light. My head cement is unconventional as well: Caliber Super Glue liquid (thin formula). My wrapping procedure is to start at the top and then apply a drop of glue. If I'm heavy handed I absorb the excess with a small piece of paper towel immediately. Next I tie a side and repeat with another drop of glue. The opposite side is next and then the bottom. Finally each side gets four strands of Wapsi Grizzly Accent. The last step is dragging a drop or two of super glue around the completed wrap with a scrap of paper towel. This renders the jig nearly bullet proof but, sadly, not rock proof (which other smallie chasers understand all too well). Here's a testimonial from a 4 lber:

Hi folks, been lurking here for a few months. Thanks to everyone for their contributions as I've learned a ton from what you guys have shared! I moved to NY (westchester) a few months ago and have been putting in some time trying to figure out freshwater. I used to live a stone's throw from the salt in NJ and spent the past 3 years hitting the surf for stripers, bluefish, and fluke. It took a little while but I finally found a good body of water for fishing from the bank. I poked around some reservoirs, ponds, lakes with little luck for 5-6 outings. Started off catching a few perch so I switched over to the perch pattern squarebill. Caught 6-7 perch, 2 pickerel (1 on topwater, 1 larger one on the crankbait) but I kept moving around looking for some bass. Found a spot that was holding them and landed 4 healthy LMB (all over 2lbs) including my new PB! Didn't have a scale on me but guessing the larger one was in the 4-5lb range

Stick, Rodman, Toho, Istopoka, the Glades and of course the Big O.... If you're willing to fish in 90+ deg weather while running from pm thunderstorms, but knowing in the back of your mind that any pitch or flip can be your dream fish, then this is where you want to be. Time of the year be da**ed You may have to work a little harder but a wise man once said.... "The hard is what makes it great"!! Mike

It wasn't big but it was number 300. I live in Loxahatchee, FL and work in Deerfield Beach and am able to fish for an hour during my lunch break most days. This is my first year of keeping a detailed fishing record so I am able to know exactly how many bass I land. The breakdown for this year follows: <1 lb 262 Bass 1 - 2 lbs 27 Bass 2 - 3 lbs 6 Bass 3 - 4 lbs 3 Bass 4 - 5 lbs 1 Bass 7 - 8 lbs 1 Bass Maybe next year I will learn to catch greater numbers of bigger fish, but for right now I am having a blast chasing these little guys around.

Welcome aboard! Congrats on the PB, and you'll learn quickly being here, having a scale is utmost necessity!

Caught my PB Chain Pickerel a few weeks ago. I was topwater fishing with a Bluegill colored 90 Whopper Plopper and she slammed it! 2lbs 7oz

This is a prime example of why you should check what's in the background of a photo before posting it.

Glad it turned out well. Now what to do with the $ saved not having to buy a new rod? Maybe put it in a piggy bank for a new ride, I'm thinking red Grand Torino with racing stripe...

You do some fantastic work sir!!!!!

Didn't have much time this morning at Wally World before work. Been needing to get another one of these so I picked up a 3/8oz white Arkie jig. I was unhappy it didn't have a baitkeeper like my other one had though.

My son cast over a tree branch a few years ago and dangled the wacky worm on the surface a couple times and got hit. A small one and we laughed it off. Fast forward to this spring and I did it over a relatively small branch, but decided to dangle it on the surface a few times. BOOM!! Big boil but whatever it was missed. Dangled it again and this time he didn’t miss... So now I’ve got him hooked - what now? So so I set the hook and gave ‘Er Heck and snapped the branch and the fight was on! Big 21 1/4 inch bronzeback in the river current. Barely had him hooked but finally landed. Fished this river for years and caught some 20+ inchers but this was the biggest to date...

Eh, leave the poor guy alone, hes got enough to worry about.

I would have rather they put nothing in there and let the customer decide.

Have spent the past year working on restoring an old jon boat. This is your typical jon boat to bass boat. It took a very long time and there were so many times where I needed help for a 5 minute thing, but ended up taking an hour just to do. The boat and trailer itself are probably from the 70s? I sanded it down to bare aluminum, did self-etching primer, regular primer, than top coat. My wife gave me permission for this project since i needed a boat, and gave me an excuse to buy tools. Most importantly, i have no idea what i am doing so this was a challenge that i, without fully knowing what i was getting myself into, started. I chose to do all aluminum bracing. Towards the end, i started to get the hang of it all and would have changed several things structurally to improve it all around, but it is what it is. I tell myself that i will know what to do next time to improve it even more, but after the amount of crap i went through with this project, i don't foresee a next time. It ended up costing twice the amount i anticipated, which could be due to various aspects, but mainly, i didn't know what i was doing the first half of the build. I really tried not to take any shortcuts. The build is still not fully done, but it was good enough to fish from and catch my first batch of 5+ pound bass. Boat's old look prior to renovation.

picked up some line to test out

yeah im with A-jay on this one. I find it difficult to believe that a bass will not eat a green pumpkin worm but will eat a green pumpkin purple flake worm. for most baits I try to stock a dark color(junebug) a neutral one (green pumpkin) and a lighter one (watermelon) . those are examples there are variations and exceptions but to try to sort out all the deatails and variations of color is mind boggling to me. I tend to focus on location ,presentation and speed of lure before worrying about the minute detail of color.

Ran out of my 3/0 os and was left with 5/0 widegap os for wacky rigged Senko. This little bass was awfully lucky.

Knowledge is a process of piling up facts; wisdom lies in their simplification!

AJ for president

Even before you can start down the pathway you need to learn good casting mechanics and the only way to do that is practice. Fishing is a lot like golf, having the proper casting mechanics goes a long way to becoming a good bass angler. You can over load yourself by reading too much theory that doesn't apply to catching bass. Knowledge of basic bass behavior will help you eliminate unproductive water. My pathway started as a pre teen with 1 rod, reel and lure, after a lifetime of bass fishing my journey is still ongoing. Good Fishing, enjoy your journey. Tom

Yeah. Truly pitiful... In other news, sales of paper bags soaring in Cleveland.

40 degrees and rainbows here in western PA this past weekend.

You can use the old school weedgards; small rubber band stretched over the hook eye and under the hook barb. Dental rubber bands are the right size with lots of colors to choose from. Tom

When I first started bass fishing from a boat I was not very successful , just like everyone else. I had a lot of days where a skunking or just a handful of fish were caught . A twenty fish day was exceptional . Now a twenty fish day is below average . So where have I improved ? 1: Lure selection . I'm simply much better at knowing what lures to use and when to use them . I dont switch nearly as often . Over 90 percent of the lures I use fall into four categories . Texas rig/ jigs , crankbaits , spinnerbaits , and buzzbaits . I use other lures but these get the most playing time . No doubt this selection would be different in other bodies of water . 2: Casting . I'm not a great caster and could use a lot of improvement but I'm a fearless caster . If theres a small opening in a piece of cover I'm gunning for it until I hit it or snag up in the process . Watching the pros live this year I noticed a lot of errant casting on their part too . 3: Boat control . Get the boat positioned to make the best cast . Often times this means parallel casting to keep the bait in the strike zone for an entire cast . Why sit in unproductive water and cast to shore and have the lure in the strike zone for a small portion of the retrieve ? 4: Identifying potential structure . I had no idea how to fish deep and took many years to start getting the hang of it . Especially points . I was clueless on finding productive points . I fished at short steep points , mouths of coves...and caught a few fish . Then when I discovered the long tapering points my catching success hit a whole new level .

Another rod you can get, The 70s paneling on the other hand....

If you're going to car top then weight should be a definite concern. I have a Santa Fe that I top with my kayak, a native Slayer propel 10. Mines around 60lbs when all broken down to the bare hull. I could have gone heavier, but I'm not getting any younger and after being out on the water some days for 10+ hrs I'm pretty beat and it can be a little bit of a struggle. There are load assist racks that you can put on your car to help, but my issue is I would have to remove them to park my car in the garage, so those were more trouble than they're worth. You definitely want to look at your own situation and try to plan accordingly. If it's a pain to use your kayak you won't end up using it much.

Very cool. Was your boat's maiden voyage in the canals of Lakeside Park? I remember catching a big carp at that very boat launch almost 30 years ago...

Nice job, took me darn near a week of "after work" work to do a transom in a jon boat. I figured it would take like 4 hrs. I also made a giant mess with fiberglass resin and wasted one tub of it that I soilidified in like 5 seconds somehow

After redoing the transom, painting trailer and outside, scrapping the inside, re-riveting the leaks... Finished-ish Boat First 5+lb Bass in the Boat...no smiling allowed

Evening before last I went to the smaller pond in my neighborhood. Had a green pumpkin/chartreuse belly Strike King S Toad(used a black Sharpie to color all of the belly leaving a trim around the edges chartreuse) Texas rigged on to my spinning rod with an 1/8oz bullet weight unpegged. First cast with it this 1lber chomped it down. Lowered my rod, reeled the slack and set that hook. Didn't know til I got him in that I had hooked it through the top of his mouth and out his eyeball. Was pretty tough getting the hook out. I thought I was gonna pull his eye out through his mouth with the hook. Fortunately that didn't happen, unfortunately his eye won't be the same. Getting the hook out turned his eyeball inward and I carefully used the hook point to turn it back right so he at least looks kinda right. The eye is still kinda sunken in but he is ok. He swam off quickly upon release. Don't think he'll see like he used to though. You can kinda tell in the pic below that his eye isn't exactly right and kinda sunken in. Never done that before. There's a first for everything though. You can kinda tell in the other pic that I felt bad about jacking his eye up. Wasn't purposely done. Happens to us all at some point I guess.

Tough fishing yesterday. Some dinks and a couple 2-2.5# fish.

Fall is finally here in AZ. This 4 lb bass took a Zoom Trick Worm - Candy Bug - tail dipped in Spike It Dip-N-Glow in Chartreuse/Garlic in a foot of water right off the bank. She was busting shad near an inlet Some fun metro pond night fishing!

Holy smokes you guys -- I can count on one hand the number of bass over 4lb I catch per year, and none of my smallmouth make it into that group. Here's my own modest contribution to the Digitally-masked Costume Party and the Smallmouth-Fest going on here (a little under 3lb, from back in July):

Was able to finish out the regular tournament season on a hot streak with two wins and 3rd. No pictures from a win on the Potomac since the fishing was tough and I didn't expect to win with a small limit. Took 1st on Conowingo with a decent limit of smallies on spinnerbaits. Finished up with a 2-day tourny on Deep Creek...Got 3rd with a mixed bag of SM/LM, mostly on jerkbaits.

Caught in a public pond at about 10am on black n blue booyah frog. I retrieved so slowly so I was just barely causing him to make commotion next to the two downed trees. Not sure the picture does the justice since I was alone but I estimated 3 something probably. ( feel free to voice ur opinion on size) someone else said over 4 but I don't know This is the spot he blew up on it. Just to the left of the left branch...

About time! I was successful at catching and keeping a few rainbows after what seems like weeks of throwing my whole tackle box at them! "not literally but hopefully you get the point" I used a size 10 Owner Mosquito Hook "Used these before, Awesome hooks.", Four pound fluorocarbon and a Berkley trout worm in bubble gum. I used a spit shot rig with a single spit shot about 12 inches from the hook and that was all it took. The other three rainbows were a bit wiser and wanted nothing to do with my pink worms/powerbait. I pulled out a crank bait and spinners and it was enough for the other three to want to bite. Now i would of liked to put the others on here and show them off but stupid me forgot to take a picture of them first and was more worried about getting the next one/etc. However, Perhaps next time though. Finally got my fall rainbow feels good <3

I wanted to get started early this morning so I got to the smaller pond at 7am as the sun was starting to rise. Didn't get to stay long as it started pouring down and I wasn't really dressed for the occasion. It was a tad chilly out. Got back to the house about 7:45am so I could put my wet clothes in the dryer. Finally the rain let up enough for me to get back out there. Rain was still in the forecast so I dressed for it this time. Glad I did because it rained a bit more. It was ok though it finally cooled down some and stayed that way. Got back to the pond around 10am had my green pumpkin 3/8oz Dirty Jobs Tackle swim jig tied on with a green pumpkin 3.75" Tube as a trailer on my baitcaster and a green pumpkin 3.75" Tube with an 1/8oz shaky head hook stuffed inside it with the line tie eye pushed out the side at the head of the Tube(got the idea in an article on Tubes on this site) tied on my spinning rod. Both were productive today caught 2 on each before I got my swim jig snagged and broke off(gotta replace it soon). Ended up tying on my 3/8oz black and blue Arkie jig with another green pumpkin 3.75" Tube trailer. Caught one on that too, it was by accident though. It had a little mud on it so I dipped into the pond to rinse it. As soon as it hit the water it was engulfed. One handed I pulled it out, did my thing and released it. They were all dinks today, but I had fun anyways. The most fish I've caught in a single outing so far. Still trying to get that big un that I almost had yesterday. It's gonna happen, just hope it's sooner than later.

Hadn't been fishing in a while, until tonight. It's been hot and fish have been in the summer mood. Though the air is still in the high eighties, the shorter days are causing the water to cool slightly. I went out bank fishing on a pair of golf course ponds tonight and caught a dozen 2-4 pounders and a 5 pounder in an hour, most of them from under a wooden foot bridge. It was phenomenal. All of them smashed a green pumpkin chatterbait with a matching trailer. The fish were strong pullers tonight and I think they are becoming activated by the cooling water. We are expecting finally a cold front this week and after that the bass should be actively chasing schooled baitfish and go nuts chasing my collection of jerkbaits.

Thought I'd make an evening trip out for some walleye today, instead I ended up catching a few smallies just after sunset on a yellow perch patterned Rapala shadow rap. The location was a rock flat with a sand transition and a weedbed along each side. Biggest smallmouth shown below, guesstimate on the weight was about 4 1/2 lbs. The others were in the 1-2lbs range. Water temp 9ft down was 61F. And don't be alarmed...that's me in the picture...lol

Weather not the greatest here in the Omaha area, but I was able to get out for a few hours and catch four (4) bass. Here was the biggest at 4.16 pounds and just short of 19". Caught on a weedless 1/0 wacky hook using a weightless 5" flat dawg worm. This is the biggest I caught this year and it sure felt good.

In-Fisherman website has a lot of info available online, as well as letting you purchase any of their teaching material (books, dvds, etc.). Their "Largemouth Bass: handbook of strategies" and Critical Concepts series are usually pretty easy to track down, much more so than their original magazine Study Series reports and annuals. Should be able to find both the calendar and water body stuff in all of these.

It's like real estate...Location, Location,Location It's like skeet shooting.....put the projectile on the target Admitably I too need to work on location, and informed my partner that for the rest of this year his will be my focus for the rest of the year, which means we may get shutout from time to time. Think I will be buying a few book too!