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This past weekend, my little brother was in need of a boat captain for a high school tournament on the James River. I hauled the boat home from WVU on Friday, and we woke up bright and early Saturday to go put in a day of practice. Low tide was around 10am, which made for good fishing conditions early in the day. We started out in a well known creek near the ramp, and we found a few, but they were small. The previous year, my brother found good fish on main river wing dams, so we decided to give that a shot since the tide was right. No dice, not that fish are supposed to do the same thing each year though. We tried several different locations and presentations, but couldn't buy a bite on the main river. Since we were fishing close to low tide, which is typically the best time to catch them, it told us that it probably wasn't a viable way to fish, we decided to fish more creeks. Our consensus was that since water has been so high and muddy this summer, the fish probably haven't been "living" on the main river, since creeks had cleaner water and probably ample food due to the high water. There are very few creeks in the upper section of the tidal James, which makes things easy since you can cover it all fairly quickly. The tough part is that fishing pressure can effect these areas very easily. We barely slid over a mud flat and made it into a tiny creek, where I caught one 2.5 flipping a drop shot (something people do on the James because of fishing pressure). That gave us a clue as far as how to get the pressured fish in creeks to bite. We had been pitching jigs and Texas rigs at wood cover, but maybe they had just seen enough of it this year, they have had an entire summer getting things dropped on their noses. We tried one more creek, and had good success there. At this point we had already decided to shake off all bites, since the creeks are small and fishing pressure would probably be a factor. It doesn't take much weight to do well at the James, so we couldn't risk hooking anything he would need on tournament day. In that creek alone, we shook off around 10 fish, and they "felt" to be decent sized. My brother was pitching a 7" power worm on a 3/16oz weight, and I was tossing the ol' wacky senko behind him. I was getting many more bites, which was surprising considering how dirty the water was, but we chalked it up to fishing pressure making them behave that way. We tried some different backwater areas to no avail, by now the tide was coming in pretty strong, and raising water levels. My brother told me he wanted to go look in the Appomattox River to check on water conditions. We assumed there wouldn't be great fishing at the current tide, but he wanted to get an idea on if that would be a good backup plan if there was heavy fishing pressure in areas we had already found. To our surprise, we found a great area on a high, incoming tide. I hooked two solid 2+lb bass on a chatterbait, and caught another 2.5+ flipping a texas rig in a bush. My brother and I began shaking off fish after that, we tried 3 other creeks but our bites only came in one 100 yard stretch in the first creek we stopped at. Our practice was the "perfect storm" for a tidal fishery, we found a good bite for both the low and high tide, low tide was around 11:00 on tournament day, so our plan was to fish the first creek until the tide started coming in, and then head to the Appomattox, where the other creek was, to finish out our day. We drew boat number 1 out of 40+, we were thankful that we would get 1st dibs on the creek we planned to fish close to the ramp. My role as boat captain is to drive the boat and not offer information during the event, I do get a handful of "time outs" when I can tell the guys to stop fishing for a few seconds and make a suggestion. We had fine-tuned the wacky rig setup from the day before, with black and blue senkos for the dirty water, and a heavy 12lb fluorocarbon leader, to help with abrasion resistance and muscle the bass away from the wood. I also told my brother to pick up a 1/4oz black buzzbait from the tackle shop, we hadn't tried one in practice but I had a feeling it could be a player early in the morning. Besides that, the only other baits we planned to put to use were the chatterbait, and a heavy texas rig, both of those were for the other creek at a higher tide. When we got to the first creek, boat wakes were pretty thoroughly churning the mouth of it. The tide was still pretty full, but on its way out at a good pace. You would think they would position on cover and feed accordingly with the current, but that was not the case. They fished for a solid 30-40 minutes without hooking a fish, covering most of the good water from the day before in the process. Finally, my brother put decent keeper in the boat on a senko. There is one small stretch of creek that is grassy with gradual banks, a sharp contrast from the steep banks and wood in the other 90% of it. I couldn't tell him, but I was a proud brother when he set down the wacky rig and picked up the buzzbait once he saw this change, and he put another keeper in the boat shortly after making that switch. We had run out of water, but the water level had dropped considerably by now, and the boys began working their way out, fishing the same stuff over again. Wouldn't you know, just like "they" say, those tidal bass had flipped on like light switch. With the same baits, a mere 30 minutes later in the day, the boys got to work. Fish number 3 and 4 were actually a double hookup, I can't net the fish so they both swung them in the boat, and we were excited! My brother's partner put number 5 in the boat 2-3 minutes after #3 and #4, and they quickly began upgrading. We made our way to the mouth of the creek, and my brother saw a fish boil on his senko as he brought it out of the water. He backed the boat up slightly, and made a couple more tosses to the same spot. He hooked what was our biggest fish of the day at the time, about a 2.5lber. As they netted it, he excitedly said "there was a 4 pounder chasing it!". When that stuff is going on, you have found the right area. He put another over 2lbs in the boat after that, and told me he wanted to go fish the tiny creek from the day before to give this one time to rest, before fishing it again. The call to give the area a rest was a good one, and I would have done the same. I wouldn't have gone to fish the other creek, but he proved that he made a good call. They landed one fish that didn't help, but on the same log that I caught the 2.5 on the day before, he pulled out our biggest fish of the day, a chunky 3.7lb river bass! After this, we headed back to the other creek, and once again had it to ourselves. I called a "time out" and told my brother to cut off the buzzbait, and rig up an Evergreen Shower Blows 125 in a bone color. The 4lb fish chasing the hooked 2.5lber is what prompted me to make this suggestion, I told him it was just like one of the little rivers we kayak fish back home. There, fish will get on shallow wood and wolfpack, and topwater is the best way to get the big bites. I told him he may not catch many, but it would be a good way to look for a better bite. He had one miss the topwater on his 3rd cast, which was a good confidence booster. He began working his way into the creek, and about 10 minutes later a solid 2.5+lb fish annihilates his bait right beside a tree! After that, all hell broke loose and the kid couldn't be stopped. He was putting on a show, and I had a blast watching them eat the bait. Despite the dirty water, he would see them nose up on the bait when he paused it, and then it was a toilet bowl flush when he would twitch it one more time! He culled to the point where our 4 smallest fish were all in the 2-2.5lb range, and decided it was time to go to the other creek to try and upgrade, the tide had switched and was just "getting right" for the other place. Upon arrival, things looked good and he started his way in with the chatterbait. We saw 3 fish wake behind his chatterbait but they did not eat it, they didn't eat the senko either when he tried to follow-up. Once again, we made it through the entire productive stretch without a hookup. He picked up the shower blows, and this proved to be the right move, one that I'm not sure I would have made honestly. Within 10 minutes, he upgraded a few ounces, and began catching more fish, fishing through the same stuff on the way back out of the creek. You could almost call the shots, the creek was mainly grassy, but every time there was a creek bend with some wood in it, that's where they were. He would walk the bait in place and make sure to keep it over top of their heads for quite a while, that did the trick. With about 45 minutes of fishing time left, he made the final upgrade of the day with another solid fish over 3lbs. We thought they needed one big bite in the 4-5lb class to seal the deal, but it never came. We headed to weigh-in knowing they had definitely qualified for the state championship, but curious to see how everyone else did. It turns out they didn't need a kicker, and they actually had the tournament won at about 10:30am, proceeding to put several nails in the coffin throughout the day afterwards! They had 14 and change, besting 2nd by 4lbs, and 5th by 7lbs. They did a great job, they kept their feet on the gas and didn't get too cocky or careless when fishing was good. Execution was great as well, there was one mishap with a net early on but the fish was hooked well and ended up in the boat. Besides that, every fish hooked was put in the boat, pretty impressive for close quarters around heavy wood cover! I love being a captain in high school events, I had many generous people do the same for me when I was their age, so I feel as though I owe it back!

@Gundog I want you to know that I appreciated your words of wisdom to take care of myself after last weeks rib breaking event, but I am in some ways a glutton for punishment, call me crazy, or whatever else might come to mind but somehow sitting in my yak in pain is still better than sitting at home in the chair lamenting the fact that the months of frozen water are not far off. So, I went out Sunday and bagged 5.

I bet they are closer to the bottom on sunny days, looking down in the direction of your craws. Sun probably helps them see stuff being carried down by those rapids too. Cloudy days they are probably being mean smallmouth and marauding.

It's called selective memory. All women have it.

Nitro doesn't sell em anymore I know Allison & Bullet made one

Amazing how the wife remembers all the bad things you did but never remember the good things. ?

Stuck a nice one this evening on a 10 inch curly tail worm. First time night fishing for bass and I don’t know why I never thought it would work well. Anyways...

OMG.....I hear the cold weather is coming....hope so. Caterpillars are all brown so the locals say could be a mild winter. (have never heard this!?) Last night the &^%! mosquito's were so hungry that I had to spray myself twice with Repel and then pray I didn't miss a tiny spot.....was crazy. Anyway...this year has been tough. Also a year of many lost fish for some reason but ....hey.....I get to fish and that's a plus even though it can be frustrating. Last night .... as per the usual I put a keeper in the boat in the first half hour....(life is good....was 4.85). I'm thinking...the monkey is gone....gone. Fish was barely hooked on the trailer of a buzzbait.....whew. Moving forward....I caught a few on a jerk and a senko but all small. What I did manage to witness was loosing or missing the next five keepers (of nice size) on the buzzbait. AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH.......OMG. With only three hours to run around I didn't get the mind working to try different topwaters......water had a bunch of floaters too in the form of scum and grass...not a lot but enough to mess with some double hook baits.....soooo.....me ol brain is thinking what to do for the end of year tourney this weekend. Maybe try a larger trailer...was using a 2/0. I did manage to get big fish and second place so that was awesome...but I coulda ....shoulda.....well was hoping.......... Tight Lines

As men, we all have select hearing, lol.

I think the price went up to $119, or at least that’s what they’re at on Tackle Warehouse. I got mine for about 85 bucks a while back. When I got mine, i did a a little test for sensitivity. I tied a 3/8 ounce jig on the Fury, a BPS Carbonlite (one of the older black models) and a Powell Inferno. Using the same line on each one, with a long cast down my asphalt driveway and dragging the jig back, sensitivity was pretty much equal with each rod. The Powell was probably the most sensitive of the 3. Unscientific I know lol.

This would be my guess as well. They're cruising the bottom on sunny days and concentrating in those deeper holes where you're presenting your bait, hence the fast action. Cloudy days allow them to get out and roam around more. You might try drifting a weightless craws around faster moving riffles on cloudy days and see if your luck doesn't change.

You If you want size and numbers of smallmouth, the Northern states of Michigan, Wisconsin and Minnesota must be on your list. The overall lack of bass fishing pressure in these states where walleyes get most of the attention, makes these very attractive to serious bass anglers. There are literally thousands of beautiful lakes with a variety of sportfish that you don’t get the chance to catch in Florida. You can easily rent waterfront cabins that you can use as a base to get to hundreds of other nearby lakes. The summers are usually cool and comfortable. Most cabins don’t even have air conditioning because they’re seldom needed.

Anywhere along the Tennessee River would be good. Watts Bar, Chickamauga, Nickajack, Guntersville, Wheeler, Wilson, Pickwick and Kentucky Lake. I've never fished any of these lakes but all are stops on major tournament fishing trails.

Water can be gin clear but there is a depth the secchi disk dissapears and our human eyes can no longer see it, that is the maximum depth of light as far as we can see. The clearest fresh water lake I have ever fished was Lake Tahoe in the 60's where dark color pine trees laydowns in 100' of water were clearly visible on the light bottom. The 1st ledge at Tahoe dropped off into 1,500' and crystal clear water looked dark purple. I drifted a live weighted crawdad with all my off the reel except about 10 turns of the reel along the ledge and caught a 10 lb 2 oz rainbow trout, about 125' deep. The trout obviuosly could see the natural color crawdad and I could see flashes of white as I fought this trout in very deep water. I have caught LMB in over 60' of water and Smallmouth in over 80' using translucent smoke color soft plastics more then 3X below the depth of light. I have no idea how fish see prey that deep but the do. If bass are biting a specific color don't ponder it just use it. Tom

Sure you can. I do it all the time. I once turned down Heather Locklear's invitation to go to the prom. She never asked but I was busy that day and couldn't go. ?

Pretty cool video. His Garmin units including Panotpix made them stick out pretty good.

Drove 30 hours to Arizona 350$. No sleep for 2 days. Spending 3 days with your boys at fish camp chasing giant smallies priceless! Shallow big feasting fall smallies nothing like it. Battled small craft advisories, rain and no sleep but it all worked out! My buddy has only been to Az and mexico and so cal. He is living northern Michigan's fishing. Incredible largie fishing and smallmouth fishing. He said its paradise up here.

Do you guys know that the only married guy on the Andy Griffin Show was the town drunk, Otis Campbell, who was always in jail? All the other characters were single. Go figure.

The alligator in Lake Michigan was found in northern Illinois so chances are pretty good @slonezp bought for himself as an early sweetest day present but it grew to big for his bathtub. ?

Thanks, I think. I bank fish and can do miles of walking from lagoon to lagoon so I bring only one rod with me. Between that, my soon to be senior citizen eyesight, and the fact that I swap baits quicker than swingers swap partners I don't want to spend my time tying off lures every X number of minutes. Using the tubing works. It doesn't impede the action of spinnerbaits or buzzbaits and the snap won't slide down the lure and foul the line.

I leave them at 10, as a fail safe. If I need some distance, or it's calm, I'll back off the brakes. I'd rather not mess with spool tension whenever I change baits. I have a pretty well educated thumb, though. Been using baitcasters for 30+ years.

"I'm in the dog house now, I'm in the dog house now..."

Well, lets think of the Florida gulf coast first. Last I checked at 8:30 , it had 145 mph winds, with gusts to 165. They predict some areas will get 14 ft storm surge. At St George island (where I have fished before) in that area some foolish folks have chosen to stay ( the island is only 10 feet above sea level ). The Weather channel says this is the worst hurricane to hit the florida gulf coast since recorded weather history started in 1851. Im in the jax. area and we are getting winds 20-30 now from it with higher gusts and the storm is around 200 miles to the center from here. These folks on the gulf need our prayers and support !!!

I guess it just depends on your definition of sensitive. I find the fury to be plenty sensitive, above-average for the price I would say. You referenced Mikey ballz last time, well check out what he uses to throw Ned Rigs and dragging baits way out deep in 30-plus fow. Detecting bites that deep ain't easy, and he uses some furys for that.

At least 2 marriages!

No I believe you bro but the statement that ducketts is junk doesn’t ring true to me from my personal experience, dobyns fury is a good rod for 110 bucks it’s a good all around type rod spinnerbaits chatter baits square bills and even t rigs but sensitivity is not it’s greatest attribute.

I keep my paddlerails in plano boxes and have never noticed much deformation. I don’t jam them in there but leave a lot of room in each compartment.

Wish I could help. Just wanted to come say good luck.

And how long did it take for you all to learn this......

I don't think you can make any generalizations without getting specific to either models, or braking systems. Some simply work better than others.

Michigan got me and a buddy 15 years ago as an invite from a new internet friend and we have been going back every year since. Can't wait for May. Cottage is already booked. Smallmouth are fisherman's crack!!

Nitro was the CDC model. Allison made/makes one or 2 different models. GatorTrax makes one

Keep them in the clam shell they come in that’s just gonna be the best way. Once they bend they won’t take back their original form unless you dip them in hot water.

Spinnerbait with a 4.8" Fat Impact for a trailer, bump it through the stumps.

50lb braid is almost always overkill for chatterbaits, even a 5 or 6lb largemouth is tamed with 17lb mono. Also the only way a chatterbait can effectively be thrown on 50lb braid is with a composite rod; and this is just not ideal , as it changes the action of the lure when it pulls free from vegetation. On monofilament or copolymer, a chatterbait will snap free and pop forward erratically because of the added stretch. When fishing chatterbaits to emulate a fleeing or stressed baitfish , the added stretch is crucial. This is how I fish and it's the way I encourage others to fish this lure. ModFast with Monofilament is king in 99% of situations . But of course, do what works best for you and your specific fishing conditions !

Smith Lake in Cullman, AL Guntersville Neely-Henry in Gadsden, AL N-H is part of the Coosa river, where the Alabama spots got their name. You’d be about an hour and a half from Cullman to either Gadsden or Guntersville. Gadsden to Guntersville, about 30-45 minutes.

I actually really like high-water on my own local rivers -- both largemouth and smallmouth will get right up in flooded bushes and trees, which you can pick apart with the ol' 1-2 punch: Cast and retrieve a buzzbait or spinnerbait as close to newly-flooded cover as possible, from a few different angles. Then flip a jig or t-rig a few times to some likely spots before moving on.

I have this backpack, and it works pretty well. I've got three 3700 boxes and a terminal tackle box from Plano in it. I keep a separate soft plastic bag and just throw in what I need when I go out. It holds all of the tackle I have (I don't have much) and it stays in my car at all times. While I don't think the TW bag is trash, I would agree that a regular backpack it better. There is a level of convenience with the bag being designed to hold tackle, but I have an REI daypack that also stays in my car for different things and I have put that on after wearing the TW bag to move from fishing a stream to a little light hiking and the difference was astounding. The weights were similar, but the padding and distribution was leaps and bounds beyond what the TW bag has. Long story short, if you plan on actually using the backpack as intended and wearing it a lot, better to go with a pack made for hiking and transform it into your tackle bag.

Color is the least important thing I consider in a rod. Bass don't care what color it is. I own 2 fury rods. both are good quality for a budget rod. here are a few threads on the subject. looks like dobyns may be the benchmark to judge rods.

I very much agree with @Deeare, most any store-brand hiking day pack (assuming it is loaded and adjusted correctly) is going to be far more confotable then any “fishing” pack I have gotten my hands on. There are some amazing sling packs made for flyfishing and if one can limit the tackle one carries then they are a great choice. I have a FishPond one and it holds a single 3600 or a pair of 3500’s with enough room left over for a bag or two of plastics and a few comfort/safety essentials. But when I need to carry more then that one of my hiking packs get the nod.

Not always. You don't oil your trailer bearings

Got this one 18" 3pounds dragging 1/2oz SK Rocket Shad along the bottom 22fow through weeds. Reel Tatula SV, rod brand that cant be mentioned 7'1" M/F , line 16# Sniper.

Been dinkin it up lately. Not much time to fish either with strange weather and other goings on. Last weekend made a poor Saturday fishing trip into a decent Sunday on Briery Creek. Sandy Res Saturday did her typical Sandy disappearing fish act. Marked bait everywhere. I caught 2 bass in 9 hours. My buddy got a decent one kinda early but it was same story for him the rest of the day. Couple dinks was all we could muster. Briery turned the weekend around pretty well. My buddy snagged a 5lber right off the bat, too bad it was short of citation size by 1/2”. The rest of the day we found pockets of bass in some shallow coves but not in others. And a few scattered around in deeper water in main lake. Both of of us missed hook sets on a nice sized fish which we assumed to be the same fish since it was on the same tree. Ive been fishing a Keitech 7.8 for about a year now off and on and had yet to get a solid bite on it until a 3.5lber smashed it! First fish on the big ol paddle tail, had to get a pic of that. The bigger one of the day, 4.5lber, came on a 4” Keitech, along with most of my other fish that day. This weekend a friend of mine got married Saturday and that meant no good chance for fishing. Today around 4:00 I managed to ease off the hangover and waddled my way to a pond about 15 minutes walk from where I live. Caught a dink, then made a cast to a lay-down tree top out in a cove in about 3FOW. Tiniest little tick and then the line started pulling. Set the hook and knew it was a good fish but she was swimming towards me so didn’t get the full picture until she came up just in front of me and flashed that big belly! She made a run under a log and dragged the line around across it for a few very tense seconds! Then I almost fell in the pond trying to get closer to the grass line so I could grab her! 6.0 pounds on the nose and she went 22-1/4” Citation baby! Fall is here and I feel the big bass fever!!

Had a good evening catching several decent bass and this guy on a weightless wacky stick worm. Gave this old man a real workout.

Texas rig on the Big G.

This past Thursday, also at lunch hour. Started with same Texas rig worm as day before, but switch to spinner after seeing some bait fish breaking. Strike King Mini Spinner 1/8oz. Single fish of the day. My single fish from the prior day was much larger and probably a solid +4lbs. This guy was closer to 2-3lbs. I really try to play the fish quickly, land by lipping and keeping the fish from touching anything once out of the water. Consequently, I don't get photos next to my pole for scale. I'm not good taking photos solo. Any suggestions?

I've purchased from The GPS Store before and it was a great price and service.

Avid X 7 MHF with a Curado DC

7ft ML/F- braid to leader or straight flouro, somewhere between 6-10lbs 6’9 M/F- braid to leader or 8-12lb flouro 7ft MH/F I’d probably run braid since you mentioned top water, probably 40lb braid. If you want to tie a leader 15lb flouro would be good. If you are unfamiliar with tying leader knots YouTube is your friend. I’d start with the double uni then move up to thinner knots.