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A little something you might enjoy ~ A-Jay

Signed up, paid and confirmed to fish the Kissimmee Chain Southern Open. Husband is fishing it too as a co-angler. Both of us wanted to challenge ourselves and do this level of tournament atleast once. We've both fished tournament trails together and the PVA Bass tour is a favorite. The chain of lakes is home waters and we are looking forward to a great experience and maybe making new friends. Any suggestions or tips would be welcome. My birthday gift from my husband was a roomy back pack style tackle system and will limit myself to about 5 rods.

I got my degree in wildlife/fisheries management. I do wildlife damage control for a living during the week and work as a fishing guide at a fancy resort in weekends. Like @WDE just said, all of my actual "fishing" is done when I'm off work. Even a fishing guide doesn't fish hardly at all while working, it's more like adult baby sitting

Interesting time today. I went exploring other parts of the pond I’ve been wading in lately, felt like I was walking in quicksand. My knee-high boots were basically pointless, as it rained last night and the pond was up considerably. I managed to stumble on a sunken branch and puncture my boot, but thankfully it didn’t pierce my skin—it bruised immediately. And I also caught what I think might be a bowfin(can anyone confirm?). He was fun to bring in, and I’m super glad I didn’t try to lip him when I got him close. Also happy that I had my grippers nearby, put him on the scale for fun—3.2lbs.

Last chance is great, I've ordered from them several times and have nothing but positive things to say.

Boy that got everybody quiet ? One of the most detrimental things to young anglers (not chronological but experientially) & even some seasoned anglers is this thing called the internet. All this technique specific information keeps y'all in a box! It does no good to say "think outside the box" until ya actually get outta the box. Last couple of years I've thrown swim jigs a lot, now while I'm throwing a swim jig & I approach a laydown I don't switch jigs...I simply flip-n-pitch the laydown with the swim jig. I don't have a casting jig, flipping jig, football jig, grass jig tied on...I got a jig tied on & I know how to use it! I'm told "yes Catt ya can drive a nail a pair of Klien's but that aint the proper tool"...the jig aint the weapon...I am!

Grew up in small town of St. George, KS. Closest neighbors were my cousins. Learned to ride a bike on a dirt road, played basketball on dirt with a backboard nailed to the front of a barn. Played in the creek, caught crawdads, snakes, and lizards for fun. Ate a lot of wild game and helped on my grandparents farm. I was well aware of where my food came from at a young age. It may not seem fair or humane, but anyone that doesn't live in fairy-tail land knows that nature is never fair or humane either. I do my best when I'm hunting to do so as humanely as possible, and my grandparents always treated their animals as good as they could to the end, but something has to die for most everything to live.

Fisheries biologist?

Caught this fish and was wondering what you guys thought it would weight, be honest please. It was 20in and I'm around 5'10"-5'11" if that helps.

I'm taking advantage of the few last days we have here in the upper 40's. Not sure what water temp was today but I'd guess around 40. First cast at the first spot I pulled up on caught a 4lb pickerel. Thought it was going to be a toothy day. Caught 8 bass while anchored with a couple 4lbers mixed in. Continued to move along catching bass pretty frequently on cranks and swimbaits. Didn't get to hit too many spots before having to cut the day short. Ended up with 18 bass 4 pickerel. They were still hammering moving baits, didn't have to slow roll too much.

Guys and Gals, Just a reminder: With the influx of on line shopping and Christmas Shopping, thieves are on the prowl. Deliveries left on your porch or front step are at the highest risk of the year. If you shop at shopping centers or malls, place ALL valuables in the trunk or out of sight and park in highly lit areas. Vehicle prowls are at the highest numbers from now through Christmas. Remind your wives, gentleman to NEVER EVER leave their purse unattended, even for one second or when a foot away. Check your bank statements for debit and on line purchases often. If you travel, alert your bank or credit union of your destination and the period you will be gone. Be aware of your surroundings when shopping and travelling. The best defense is, " don't be there." Only carry those charge cards or debit card you will actually be using. Leave the rest at home in the safe. Have a safe and crime free holiday season. A retired cop.

CURADO K $120 Use code PHOLIDAY20 https://www.ebay.com/itm/2017-Shimano-Curado-K-CU200KXG-8-5-1-Low-Profile-Casting-Reel-/352228012551?hash=item52026cf207

Bait monkey got me on one of these.. and already out for delivery!

1/3 of the weakest link (besides the knot) in the system. With braid, that'll be the rod, or sometimes the hook, if you're using light wire. With mono, it'll be the line. So, if you're using 15# mono, you'll be fine with 5-6# resistance. If you have 50# braid, and the rod rated to 17# line, then that same 5-6# should be fine as well. But I think you knew that anyway. ******************************* The part I don't get is the change in hookset. Why? If I'm using a MH or H rated rod with a jig, I'm swinging the same way, irrespective of line. If I swing too hard, the drag will slip. Very, very few bass have ever pulled out line when the drag is over 5#. I can think of two, and they were both over 7 lbs. @Todd2 You say you want to try braid, then why do you have to go all in? That makes no sense. Try it on rod you use where you think the zero stretch will help give you an advantage. See if you like it. I use mono, fluoro, braid, and a coated fused microfiber line. Each has it's own advantage for what I'm using it for. Even @Catt is looking for an advantage using braid. I know he probably only has one rig with it, and the rest have Big Game. Last thing, I rarely if ever loosen my drags. Usually only when I disassemble the reel for winter cleaning. If the drag washers are losing their strength, it's a sub par reel. I've never seen squashed drag washers in the hundreds of reels I've serviced. I've seen plenty of issues from drags being set too tight - stripped pinions/main gears, ruptured AR bearings, even a broken reel foot, on an OG Zillion of all things. SO, try some braid, leave it the way you usually set it up. Set the hook the way you know works with that bait. If it's a drop shot, flick set. Jig or T-rig in cover, smack them a walloping lift and separate set. Crankbait, then just sort of lean into the fish and reel. It's that simple.

Bass guys discussing drag settings is as silly as,...well, bass guys discussing drag settings...

Probably the BEST thing you can do is forgo a direct "fishing job" and, instead, find a decent paying job that affords you the resources, location, and the time to fish frequently. Ironically, the closer you get to the field, the further you will get from it. If you WANT to be a wildlife biologist or fishing guide, etc, these things are perfectly fine but don't expect to see yourself fishing much (if any) during said occupation. And honestly, during your free time, you might find yourself wanting nothing to do with being out-of-doors. That recliner, tv, warm space heater (or cool AC), etc. feels awfully good when you've been out in the elements all...the...time. No. Do something which is congruent with "allowing" you the ability to fish during your off time.

My wife accuses me of selectively hearing what she is telling me, but I don't think she's being fair... oe

"Casting jig" is a general term for many types of jigs. Football, arky, brush, grass, swim, etc. are all styles of casting jigs. Casting jigs are fished differently than something like vertical jigging for walleye or perch. That's why some make a distinction. In the bass fishing realm, you say "jig," and 99% will know what you mean: a weighted hook, with a brush guard and silicone or rubber skirt.

What is the rod's stated max line rating? Set your drag to 1/3 of that.

Hey @A-Jay close the door...ya letting it out! ?

If you want an education that will help you understand fish and potentially improve your fishing, then biology or a related field will do that. If you want to make a living fishing, then no degree required, just a boat, all the licensing and a disgruntled disposition is all that is required (along with the willingness to nudge up right to the edge of the law). If you want a career in a fishing related company, then all the fields involved in business are in play, ie marketing, business management, legal, IT, etc. Oh, and the guys I know that fish the most (like 150-250 days a year) work or worked on Wall Street.

Contact Mike at Delaware Valley Tackle, and tell him EXACTLY what you want. He can build it for you.

Great Topic!! Born and raised in Omaha, Nebraska to parents who both left the country to come to the "big city" My mother from a farm in Morehead, IA and my father from Missouri Valley, IA. So, while I lived in the "city" I spent my summers with my Grandparents on the farm. I was joyfully co-raised by Great Grand Parents (dairy farm, Turin, IA) Great Aunt and her husband (row crop farm with a side of chickens and dairy, Castana, IA) Great Uncle and his wife (3 Sections of rotating row crops, Morehead, IA). My Grandfather was the outdoorsman and went to Canada every year with my Grandmother (Lac La Ronge, Saskatchewan) and I tagged along. Since striking out on my own I have had a farm in Fremont, IA and lived in big cities (Kansas City, Boston, DC) and for the last 25 years a smaller town in Virginia where the big city is finally making it to my backdoor. Time to retire soon and I will go where winter can't find me and my boat will be on a lift year round.

This is basically how I make mine, but with a swim pro head. The one I make that is similar to the Jackhammer is made with a heavily modified Poison head mold, a spinnerbait hook, part of a swinging poison head wire form, and a coffin blade.

There was a tournament out there that day. I think 12 something won it, so nobody figured it out too good. I fished Pleasanton East in the gale force winds Monday and actually caught a bunch of fish, but a majority were dinks to not even big enough to be called dinks. I had 1 exception to that rule in the form of a beautiful 5.53 pound fish on a homemade finesse jig in less than a foot of water in a willow tree. Fished Wolf for a few hours Tuesday morning before getting called off. It was really low and really slow. Dragging plastic was best but also caught them on a spinnerbait, jerkbait, and ned. Lots of my favorite spots are on dry land right now. It could be a long winter if Wolf is off and La Cygne is cold.

No need to kill it. They fight hard and are fun to catch. They live forever out of water Too. Maybe people thought it was a snakehead which I think are an invasive species. I don't believe bowfin are invasive but could be wrong. The only fish we kill and don't eat are Asian carp

I always tell people I was in a band in school, but then my wife corrects me and says I was in “the” band. I played Tuba starting in the 6th grade and throughout my school career. Loved marching season, loved concert season. I was pretty decent, made the all state band a couple years in HS. My son is now in the 8th grade and is in his third year of playing...the Tuba.

I cast all of my jigs. Allen

No offense taken man. That is how those asians eat their fish ? , for US white prefer fillet pure white/red fish LOL.

Born and raised in Parry Sound, On. Hometown of the greatest hockey player to ever live, Bobby Orr. Grew up about 20 min. out of town on a 120 acre hobby farm with lots of bush around and only 20 min. to Georgian Bay and 10 min. to the Muskoka Lakes with dozens of smaller lakes all around me. An absolutely beautiful, quiet place ( except for some tourists in the summer), and a wonderful place to grow up as a young boy that was stricken very hard with the fishing bug.

Nice deal on the Pflueger Supreme XT 30 spinning reel.....only $66. https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00LDYK7CS/ref=ox_sc_act_title_1?tag=slicinc-20&ascsubtag=e4b7f64cd9ee11e7844e42e834a7e0140INT&smid=ATVPDKIKX0DER&psc=1

Definitely. The secret? Experience. Every fish species is different in terms of body build, energy level, and swimming performance: Body build explains a lot of it. In general, the deeper the body the more that fish can pull, but this is often at the expense of speed or distance it will run. Bluegill is an extreme example. Narrow fish tend to be faster, swim more in a bee-line, and can be "turned over" with pressure quicker. (This also plays a role in what types of retrieves they are apt to respond to), and they are more apt to writhe or twist in an effort to pull free of the hook. Pike are an example. Energy level is another. While LM and SM are similar in body shape, SM are often faster, pull harder, and take longer to subdue. I've caught tons of trout, and in the Great Lakes there were varieties of rainbow trout planted, that can be broken down into two main categories: "Steelhead" (anadromous ancestry) and Domestics (hatchery mixs with predominately land-locked ancestry). Hook each and you know nearly instantly. The deep-bodied domestics can not run as far or as fast, they wallow more and give up quicker. Steelhead are scary fast, can run long, and can leap eye level with you. Then there are mid-body forms -not narrow, not deep, such as trout, walleye, and bass. Trout are faster than walleye and do a lot of writhing and shaking. Browns are notorious for "rolling", twisting. Walleye try to stay down toward the bottom and feel "head-heavy". Their bolts to bottom are bee-line and can be pretty sharp, but they give up pretty quick apparently due to energy level and body shape. Then there are catfish... They are both laterally compressed (deep-bodied/flat-sided) and have a wide shovel-like head. When I hook one (not uncommonly on bass lures) I know right away. A large one can bolt and run, often with more speed than a bass. And then they can use that shovel head to stay down, especially when they are directly below you. I call them "cinder blocks with fins" at this stage. Bullheads are pretty much cylindrical. They have a flat laterally compressed back third, are round for the front two-thirds, and don't have a lot of energy. They writhe, roll, and give up quick. "Yup, it's a bullhead." I've caught trout and bass with spinal deformities -as if they had a section removed from the mid-section making them short and rotund, and when I've hooked them I've wondered, "Bullhead?" Then there are eels, the most extreme example of a long thin fish. They have no body depth to pull with, so they writhe wildly in a backwards direction. It feels like a whole lot of pounding, but they don't really go anywhere. "Eel!" Here's a cool thing: Body length can be "measured" in the rod: When a long fish "shakes"/"writhes" (bc it can't counter your pressure as well as a deep bodied fish), your rod tip dips. The length of the dip is a good indication of the fish's length. Something else comes into the mix too and that is the water body you're fishing. I may not always be able to tell a drum from a large bass, say, but if there are drum in the water body, I may suspect this one may be a drum. Drum however seem to be able to remain upright better (are more laterally compressed), and are a bit faster than bass, in my -more limited- experience with them. Again, the secret is experience with lots of different kinds of fish. Yes! Sticks can do that too, when hooked off center.

New Orleans, a suburban kid, who spent lots of time in the French Quarter with friends. But we fished all over southeast Louisiana, both fresh and saltwater. Love those redfish!!!

I grew up very country. The nearest town was about 400 people and was 15 miles from us. I never had central heat, air conditioning of any kind, or city water until I went to college. I have lived in Chicago and Atlanta but hated every second of it. I live in the country now and love it.

Called my shots today-for the past few days I've been saying that Monday was going to be a great day for larger bass, I was more right than I imagined. In the two hours I fished, I caught both my 2nd and 3rd biggest ever bass and caught either my biggest or 2nd biggest limit. Best five weighed 21.7 pounds with not on but two kickers, one weighing 6.5 pounds and the other 6.7 (decimal, not ounces). I didn't even have a partner to help, and would have had a bigger limit if I'd been able to cull a 2.1 and a 2.3. A heck of a day, and the cool part about it was the 6.5 and 6.7 were on back to back casts-followed on several consecutive casts by some other bass in the 2-4 pound range. Caught them all on the vision 110 fished pretty quickly on steep dropping banks and points. The 6.5 pounder was crazy fat, the thing only measured 19.5" but looked like it had swallowed a bolling ball. If that big girl gets a little more length on her, she'll be an 8-9+ pounder no problem.

Pretty cool topic. I was an athlete in school and thought band/music was for the "nerds". I will admit, I was pretty much an idiot and thought I was cool and those people were dorks. Fast forward 20 years and my son is in the 6th grade. He despises sports and the attitude that the jocks have. He is in choir (and really good) and is in speech and drama. He absolutely loves it and I couldn't be happier for him. He is getting a guitar and keyboard for Christmas because he wants to learn to play. I am going to enroll him in lessons and support him in any way I can.

Looks like a Huddlebug by Huddleston? Took a day off from work yesterday and made a long drive back home to see family and got a picture of 4 generations of Westgate men.

The biggest mistake y'all will make is this idea of "technique specific". Almost everyone will tell ya a football jig aint for grass...huge mistake! Anglers down here started throwing football jigs in heavy grass. What they have come to understand is that big fat head creates a lot of commotion drawing the bass's attention. I've preached for years the silent approach aint always the best approach... sometimes ya gotta raise a little hell!

I’ve caught them on occasion in my favorite small lake. They don’t seem to over populate and they don’t affect the quality of fish in the lake because there’s plenty of biggens.

Looks like a bowfin aka grinnel to me. I've only caught 2 but that's a spittin image except for size

Well, if you would leave me the location in your will that would be great. There are so many quarry ponds around here that I would love to have access too. Sometimes I want to just drive around with a stack of $20s in my pocket and see if I can strike a deal will some quarry superintendent, but I suspect that insurance companies take a dim view of that sort of thing these days.

For me, 'Casting a jig' is a presentation more than a bait. I'll cast the type of jig that best suits the situation. That could vary a bit depending on what the deal is. One 'could' use one type or style of jig for all of this but I'd equate that to using the same style & size hook for everything - really not practical in most of my applications & situations. I will say however, that in quite a few different situations - a Texas rigged plastic w/shirt is quite versatile & surprisingly effective. A-Jay

My buddy is a wildlife biologist who has been doing electrofishing in MD for like a decade now, he is my goto for "what color is X around here?" questions. Last time I asked him about craws he said that in southern/central MD they are various reds/browns/oranges. I am trying to make a real go of jigs this winter as well and I picked blue/black and brown/orange as my two colors. Also, @reason, a pond with clear water in PG during the summer sounds like an impossible dream. I spend a lot of the winter walking the banks at my usual spots so I can see the bottom for a change. So many of the ponds around here are old gravel pits that it's almost impossible to predict the bottom contour from looking at the surrounding terrain.

It's under warranty, contact the company. Registering to a forum to complain online as your first post won't fix anything.

Everyone has different preferences, strengths and weakness. We all tend to taylor make our equipment around those parameters in one way or another. I tournament fish as a co angler so my combos have to be versital but still dialed in for most all presentations around the waters I fish most often. Those waters are natural lakes which for the most part are stained and shallow with vegitation of all types. With that said I have more heavy and med heavy power rods with either XF or F actions with none longer than 7'3" or shorter than 7". My reels are all mid priced with varing high speeds, 2 are spooled with heavy braid (65 & 50 while the rest with quality Flouro from 14-20#. I don't use spinning rods or mono line for anything. i just didnt come to this by mistake or guessing. It took years and a lot of time on the water to dial in what works for me. My advise is to do the same. In time you'll know what works best and hopefully be better for it. Good Luck Mike

I purchased a pair of these Under Armour boat shoes last year and absolutely love them.....

7 Back from the dead

I did not. Rather difficult to march with a piano.

7.