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Quite a few back in the days before I owned a scale.

I finally got my opportunity at a big whitetail buck and I made the most of it. He green scored at 147-3/8" and according to the PA record, book, would put me at 15th in my county (of all time) for a typical buck during rifle season. The rack is almost perfectly symmetrical with only 1.5" of deductions.

Texas, Louisiana, Mississippi, Georgia, & Florida ?

Picked up a 9" curly tail worm and started pitching it up under some overhanging tree's this summer. Be advised. Results may vary.

Tucker always tries to lick my face off ~ A-Jay

@A-Jay That was a cheap plug for that fat girl pic, haha. Nice!

Interesting . . . I imagine that my reflexes may have slowed a bit. And there's a decent chance that a few young to middle age bass could come & go undetected. But since I prefer to target the Older Slower bass - I think it sort of evens out. So I'm OK with that. A-Jay

I'm 51 and gave up tournament fishing about 15 years ago. Tournament/club fishing ruined the fun for me. Didn't regularly fish for almost a decade. Got back into it and now it's just about the passion and fun. I would rather be the only one out on a lake. I avoid fishing weekends as there is just about always a tournaments going on. Plan to keep it this way.

Next thing you're going to tell me is you removed the bottom of the Lund and replaced it with a screen door coated with flexseal

I don 't use trailer hooks, don 't find them necesary, when I detect the fish are striking short I slow down a little bit or change for a shorter armed shorter skirt spinnerbait; also, I don 't set the hook until I feel the fish weight pulling the line just as a precautionary measure when in very thick cover, in my experience it 's not necessary to set the hook most times, normally when the fish strike a spinnerbait they impale themselves on the hook, but of course, my hooks are always razor sharp.

Hi my names Seth I'm a 16 yo and am trying to organize a high school fishing club atm. Lots of kayak bassin Anyways, I'm a licensed stihl mechanic and enjoy hunting and racing things with motors. Always have an open ear so any pointers are appreciated. Have a nice evening and I'm excited for my stay here!

2 over 10, 14-2,12-6 Florida.

Bunch of 10s and a couple 11s for me all out of Florida. Came close in GA with a 9 1/2.

"Let me show you this reel, I had it made custom, all the settings go to 11. You know, maybe you are casting and casting, and with a regular reel, if you go to 10, then what?...This one goes to 11..."

12lb 8oz / Tennessee

I generally fish small waters because I hate crowds , so its not likely to happen with me. That being said, if anyone fishing a tournament asked me nice, I would gladly give up the spot , unless I was fishing a tournament myself. If they roared up and cut in to where i was too close without asking , I would have a problem with that. Although I wouldnt leave , I may or may not say anything. If I had the chance to share a few tips on spots and baits with a pro on a local water body I would do it in a heartbeat. With me , its the non fisherman boaters that cause most of the problem. Had a dunce run right over my line the other day with no regard to me whatsoever. Then seemed genuinly suprised when he got yelled at !?

If only the deer were as tame as the squirrels are...

I'm NEVER on the water without some kind of worm tired on. Either senko or curly tail.

? I'm ol' school, when it first came, well down here any way, any color with red metalflake in is called "Neon". Throw any Watermelon Red piece of plastic in the water & tell me it doesn't light up like Neon!

And another one from the archives . . . ~ X2 ~ Spinnerbait bite is a fan favorite. Once I get bit, I keep reeling, and as the rods loads - so do I ! A-Jay

Use an extra fast rod, and wack them with the same hookset you'd use on a worm hook. Always use a trailer hook!

I will be 42 when tournament season rolls around in 2018. I have had enough. For 10+ years I have fished just about every open team tournament that has been on my home lake. And quite a few on other area lakes as well. Have won a lot, cashed a lot more. I have nothing to prove, and I just don't enjoy the grind of it anymore. I have given up running team opens, and evening tournaments. Someone else's turn. From now on, I will only be running my "single angler" opens. These are cheap, low stress, and low turnout. Usually it's an 8-12 boat field with my close friends and guys I know/trust well. Most of whom are all great anglers so the comp. level is still challenging. It's kinda like club fishing. I hold one or two a month, bouncing between Silver and Conesus, and I hold them on weekdays, or on weekends later in the season when boat traffic is gone. I will pick and choose my spots for any and all future team opens I fish from now on. And I will only do so as the non-boater. My boat is getting long in the tooth, and I just don't enjoy having to be there if I don't want to any more.

Trailer hook or not? Set hook when ya feel tap or wait until ya feel weight? Mono, fluoro, Copoly, or braid? Fast-n-high in the water column or low-n-slow? Each bass is different, each bite is different, each fight is different!

When I feel a bite I just sweep the rod . No crossing their eyes hook sets . I rarely use a trailer on spinnerbaits . Its a heavy cover lure . I just dont like the idea of the lure snagging up a few more times a day .

I catch piles of bass on blades in the winter, they are an excellent bait when the conditions are right, as with anything. If you're fishing shallower than 15', a blade becomes much less effective. My guess would be that it's because they just fall too fast at that depth, but I have no way to prove that. If you're fishing vertical, your boat is really close to the fish at that point too. For me, a 1/4oz blade is best in the 15-20' range, and deeper than that I go with a 1/2. However, I have caught them as deep as 35' on a 1/4oz. When the bass get moody, the shift from 1/2 down to 1/4 can make a BIG difference. I think it's almost solely the slower ROF that triggers the bites when the 1/4 is outfishing the 1/2. I don't do much yo-yoing with lipless cranks, I probably should. Usually when I do well with them in the winter, it is fishing them as slow as I can on a steady retrieve, and popping them whenever the bait comes into contact with anything. Like @Bluebasser86 said, lipless is the way to go in 10' and less!

Thanks for your patience. You're right, it's like whack-a-mole. Making progress though....

The only time I have has been in the middle of the summer .

Notice all the ice on the small lake I was at this afternoon. Also notice the water temp. Even got a double on my first bite - It's never too cold!

If I wanted to worry about the finish on my boat I would have bought fiberglass

The weather kept us in this weekend but I did manage to get some stuff done on the boat. To avoid from losing my marbles inside. One of which was my Bluewater LED bow light kit.

Haven't fished club or money tournaments is decades, enjoy a few night charity events each year with my son when he is available. Enjoy fishing when and where I prefer. Tom

In the event you can’t do it correctly frabile conservation series are darn good

I don't fish any lakes where there are an abundance of big tournaments. I fish some smaller tournaments, and even when other small tournaments Im not involved in are going on I won't cut anyone off. However if someone is pleasure fishing, and I am fishing a tournament I wont cut them off either. If I was fishing during a big tournament I would not impede by fishing around someone intentionally. If I was somewhere fishing, and they pulled up on me I am not going to pack my stuff and leave. I don't think someone fishing a tournament has any more right to a spot then anyone else, but you should still be courteous. As far as comparing it to playing catch on a football field during an NFL game I think you might go to jail for that, but its not illegal to keep fishing a spot if a tournament fisherman pulls up on you.

You should get a $500 loomis rod. Also the StC legend is very good.

I agree with the trailer hook. Also, is the rod your using really limber? A spinnerbait actually has a pretty big hook on it and while a forgiving tip can help, you really need some backbone.

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 tried something yesterday that I haven't and it seemed to work quite well. Part was from a friends recommendation and the other was what I've been wondering for awhile. Since it was cold yesterday and the guides were freezing some "I tried it" My friend said to put hand warmers on the underside of my wrists as it would warm the blood going to my hands and second I wore a light latex glove on my reel hand under my light gloves as this hand is prone to get wet. Well....my hands are horrible in cold....horrible....AND IT WORKED!!! Perfect no....but I'm impressed and will continue this. The day was very bearable. It was also nice to handle fish with the latex...hand stayed dry. Anyway...my story and am sticking to it Tight Lines

Well, since you're in Yankeeland and up there any 5 lb dink is considered a big momma ...... hell, be a man and fish with a real swimbait, get yourself a Hudd 68.... who knows maybe you’ll catch a 6 lb dink.

Sweet

Yeah , it reads Poes .

I picked up some Reaction Innovation swimbaits to use as a chatterbait trailer. Finally got to throw one today and I like the tail kick on those better than the grass pigs.

Try applying toe warmers to the inside of a glove over the top of the hand starting from the wrist. It is warmer than the palm side and the sticky material holds it in place. Ski coaches have been doing it for decades

Used to always use the latex glove trick when I work for a municipality and had to fix water leaks no matter how cold it was. My hands would get cold but they always stayed dry and that's 80% of the battle. Nice job by figuring out the hand warmer trick. Also works in reverse, if you are feeling nauseous and clammy, run cold water over your wrists and it can alleviate some of the "grossness" youre feeling

I use a Keitech 4.8" Swing Impact Fat on a 4/0 Owner Beast EWG in that exact situation. Sometimes I go weightless, sometimes I go weighted if I want faster fall. If you need some flash or vibration, add a hitchhiker blade, like the Talon custom lure colorado blade.

From yesterday, possibly the last open water boat trip for me this year...

My dad and I use his 18 foot 97' hydra-sport with a 150 hp (newer evinrude). Been on the big lake since it was new. We live and breath lake erie, and rarely does weather stop us, but like others mentioned, it comes down to your experience as a captain. The key is when in doubt, trim down, nose up, go slow. As an aside, it is actually rather interesting in how boat handling correlates with length and wave size. For any given bass boat length there is different tiers/thresholds for waves that handle better or worse, for example: *assuming average wave frequency and true wave size, and no typical fisherman exaggerating "4 footers"* 1 to 3 footers - No problem in 18 foot, but a longer boat would be smoother 3-4ish footers - Hardest. The waves are big enough to create a challenge getting the nose up, but not not big enough to give a ton of time to get the nose back up for the next wave, leaving little room for error. 4.5+ footers - Challenging, experience necessary for comfort/confidence, but waves are big enough that you typically handle them one at a time, with enough space between them to reset comfortably and get the nose up for the next. That is my experience in an 18 footer, and also, the reason why I wrote those intervals, is that with a longer boat, certain intervals may be easier/harder, even counter-intuitively.

I do not use trailer hooks. MH moderate action for me.