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Sunset over Lake Baccarac in Mexico last week ~ A-Jay

You kind of insulted your own parents in a roundabout way. Based on your posts, I don't believe you are qualified to judge the parenting skills of others. It may be best for you to just sit back with your bong and enjoy yourself until mom has the meatloaf ready.

Another good with with the jerkbait and jig ! To many to take pics of but got a nice photo of the biggen of the day. She swallowed the jig whole , thunk!

Well, our first trip out to the Crappie hunting grounds on the Potomac was pretty epic. Not to say that 95% of the time we catch fish is too much to ask but on this day there were some bigger fish to be caught. Muddy water, super high tide (see pic) and a ripping current due to a lunar tide made it interesting but we caught well over 50 fish and just kept a few for pictures then released. Water temp was still in the high 50's and that's a little warm for me to keep fish for the table. The longer I wait and the colder the water, the better the fish tastes and firms up the meat. I would venture a guess, my next trip out will be what I call a grocery store trip....time to bring them home for dinner!! We caught them 2 ways. First was a slip float (I prefer the type with the long tubes out both ends) and a 1/16th oz ball headed jig rigged with either a 2 inch tube or 2 inch curly tail grub. I was using Yamamoto baits but alas, Yamamoto has discontinued their Crappie line and when I am out, I will have to switch gears to another brand. Second way and the most productive was to cast the same jig and bait without the float and do a slow retrieve. Key was to use light line. My partner was using 4lb test and I was using 6lb and both worked but when I tried a rod with 8lb, I couldnt get the small jighead to run deep enough. There's just something about going out and getting your string pulled all day and it was a bonus that we got some of the bigger fish to bite.

@NittyGrittyBoy fileted 10 reds and 3 trout last night, gonna get the slaw made tonight. Be at the house at 7:30. Dressing is for sissies, I personally eat my ruffage on all fours with my face out of another man's garden. @LuffDaddy this entire thread started when you attacked a man not even here to defend himself.

Please don't tell me you only fish retention ponds...

Took the boys to a truck or treat Friday night, Ferdinand and a Lion.

Started fishing around 330 today. Man, was it slow at first. Got a couple on a red shad culprit worm, and a small grape lucky strike worm by our island. Drifted across the south end all the way to the farthest point from my house. Found a school and picked off 4 or so with an orange senko and 5 inch watermelon red yum dinger .Started working west into the setting sun along the south shore and decided to pull out the zoom lizard. Immediately began getting blows ups around and across eel grass. I caught 8 or so with the lizard until they quit. I decided to head toward home and maybe the bite would start again when I got closer to home and it did. This time they began clobbering 5 inch senkos, again on eel grass edges.The last fish was 4.14. Got a crappy pic. The fish was bleeding badly, which I didnt realize until I looked at the pic later. Hope she'll make it. She swam off like nothing was wrong anyway. I enjoyed the afternoon very much. Temps were sooo nice, low 70s. Bluebird skies, and nice ripple on the water. Bite Started very slow, but ended very hot ! Ended up with 18.

Man oh man today was strange. Father in law smoked me for about 5 hours and 45 minutes of the day. The last 15 minutes of the day I looked down into my bag at a bait I’ve been wanting to tie on just to see how it looked in the water. It’s a bait I really only purchased for a local private camp with “giant bass” and Toledo Bend. I reached down and grabbed the Savage Gear 5 inch swim bait in baby bass color and tied it on. Second cast got a little 14 incher and let him go. Next cast I felt a subtle thump, then thought my line was running with the current but no....I set the hook and immediately I knew I had a big fish. Father in law about fell out the boat trying to get the net to get this thing in the boat. Beat my personal best by over 2lbs today. Borrowed a scale back at the ramp and weighed in at 4.01lbs and 19 inches long.

Well, this is as close as I’ve gotten to an Orange Smallmouth. A 20 incher, with a pale underside and orange fins... caught yesterday on a tributary out of Mille Lacs. Maybe from all the rusty crayfish they eat??

"MOM, MEATLOAF!!"

Start a crappie thread and I might post more there than I do on the bass forums Definitely one of my favorite fish to chase. Been half a dozen times in just the past 3 weeks or so - lol. Nice job, TOXIC

You might also find a way to comfortably reel the line between your fingers. The added benefit of keeping a finger on the line will be increased strike detection.

I feel bad for you guys up North. At least all your personal best snowballs are bigger than mine.

Ikehara Reservoir, one of the biggest retention ponds in Japan.

The older and crankier I get, the more I enjoy fishing during the winter when the fair weather fishermen and water fleas are nowhere to be found. Plus it seems every year for the last several years, I've caught my largest bass of the year in the months of January-March.

Cape Update: Spin Cycle Rather than battle perfect storm conditions offshore in the salt, a buddy of mine and I dropped the bassin' tub into Long Pond on Sunday afternoon to fight the good fight against white-caps and gusts to >20mph (SW). Surface water temp was 55-degrees, down from 60-degrees 3-weeks ago. The initial plan of fishing deeper humps and drop-offs with blade-baits in 25-35ft immediately went out the window as my TM couldn't keep us in place (in need of an Ultrex upgrade...), so we were limited to fishing drift-style and in areas not directly in the prevailing gust. Plan B wasn't exactly scientific but where we found the confluence of rock, weed and bait, the fish weren't too far removed. We did a bit of idling, but as soon as we saw the screen lit up (like below), we would fan cast an assortment of smallie favorites. Biggest fish (a hair over 3.5lb) came on a dead-sticked tube in 6ft near a mooring anchor. Over the course of 5hrs, this pretty random process got us 7 bites with our limit just north of 12lbs. Not too bad (all things considered) for a windy late season outing, with plenty of time to spare to watch the SOX win the series!!

If anyone has been thinking of going to Wolf Creek, don't, it's pretty terrible right now. Their weekly report for last week had 58 boats on the water and something like 105 smallmouth and 20 largemouth total? I didn't do much to increase their numbers either. Even white bass were hard to find. Catfish are biting great if you want to go through the hassle of getting on the water out there to catch catfish. La Cygne was pretty good but all smaller fish and shad are super thick. Only one over 18" on a Shine Glide early in the day. I was hoping they'd eat it all day but that was my only bite on a swimbait. Whites and wipers were biting really good though. They must have stocked a bunch of wipers recently because I was catching a bunch of 2lb wipers.

Matt Anderson, Jumpmaster for the WWII Airborne Demonstration Team, stands in front of the "That's All Brother," a restored C-47. The plane is based in Frederick, Oklahoma. On June 6, 1944, this very plane carried soldiers of Headquarters Company, 502nd Parachute Infantry Regiment into France during the Normandy Invasion. "That's All Brother," will soon be flying back to Europe to participate in the 75th Anniversary of the Normandy Invasion next year.

Finally got my first fish on a chatterbait

Finally got this pic from my buddy. He snapped it over the summer on our trip up to Maine. Turned out to be my PB smallie. Caught at 40ft in water that had 30ft visibility. It was awesome being able to SEE the fight almost every step of the way.

I also use the Nitrile gloves I picked them up at harbor freight. I use the 9mm ones and I think they were 10 bucks for a box of 50. I think I've had the same box for 3 or 4 years now as the gloves are pretty durable and I usually get multiple uses out of each pair. I like that these gloves extend onto the wrist, it allows me to pull them over the cuff of my sleeve if I'm fishing something on the bottom like a jig/shakey/tube. This keeps my sleeves dry. If I'm cranking or throwing a jerk bait where my hands are pointed downward, I'll tuck the gloves into the sleeve. I will wear those cheapo-stretchy- knit gloves underneath them when it's really cold. I dont like the bulkiness of gloves and these fit very snug. Even with the Nitrile gloves over top, this set up keeps my fingers warm and dry.

The nice thing about crappie is that if you find one, you found a school. We sat on one spot and probably caught 20. They are notorious light biters and many times you just feel weight and a light weight slip float helps. You just have to be patient and let them take it and be careful, you don't need a lot of hookset, just a sideways sweep works best. Good luck!!

I'm over in the NW Burbs, but my best advice would be to fish for awhile and get a good feel for what method of fishing you like to do the most and invest in that. And then as budget allows keep investing in the methods you enjoy the most and you find catch you the most fish.

Nice! I have finally got my crappie setup completed, now I just need to find them and catch them! Lol. I've never caught crappie, and my intent would be food for the table, so your comment about water temp and firmer meat actually makes sense. I never thought about that.

Or you you can buy some of these cranks. https://corestrikebaits.myshopify.com/

This decision is totally up to you... What do you think is missing for the type of applications you fish, spinnerbaits, jigs, crank-baits, frogs and so on each combo has its place like every tool in your tool box. What do you think you need to add for your style of fishing? Get what you need to get the job done.

It's going to fill with water and sink eventually, along with the fact that it won't have much action. C-rigging a toad would make much more sense to me.

Where I fish, abrasion is not an issue even in the rocky rivers I prefer. That, and I don't like having to tie extra knots, or have those knots go through my guides so I never use a leader. I don't need a special rod for bottom dragging techniques, my other rods will do the job just fine.

2nd half didn't go as good as 1st half. Sad. I was rooting for them, really I root for any team that plays the Pats.

They are so smart that they can reason and they see line like braid and won't eat anything attached to it, but anything the mono or FC line (that really is still visible) is attached to is OK? And then, these fish that are so smart, try to eat a hunk of wood, plastic or metal without sensing any problems? Really?

I personally wouldn’t put it on the foot of the guide either but I got what your saying it is annoying to buy a rod then have to worry about spending 8 bucks on a keeper you would think the manufacturer would do that for us already. I guess they are trying to save 8 bucks to?

Thank you! That is exactly the kind of info I was looking for! I'm definitely planning on going. The wife will be along, but she's a good one. Even though she's not a big fisherwoman, she knows I love it so she won't complain...too much! And our 4 year old daughter loves fishing so she'll be busy looking for stuff for her.

I know when I was a kid we use to put a swivel up the line from a Original Rapala Floater and put a weight in front of the swivel just to get it down further.

I'd put it on the reel before I'd put it on a guide.

It was crazy windy today but I survived to tell the tale...

You peg a weight just in front of the split ring on the front of a crankbait. When you cast, you let the crank dive nose first to the bottom, when it comes in contact with the bottom the crank will actually twitch a little. After a few seconds, you quickly pull up on the rod and then allow the bait to dive again, reeling up slack as you go. I only caught a couple dinks today, but I've landed nice ones in the past using this method I was shown. I've never tried letting the weight slide freely, I was shown to peg the weight.

My top five would probably be 1. Texas rig 2. Texas rig 3. Texas rig 4. Texas rig 5. Texas rig (in that order)

That would be 5 for Kistler ?

My rotation of drop shot specific baits include: GYCB shad shape worm Robo worms of all shapes and sizes Z-man trick shots Half a beaver Dreamshots were a dud for me. For a few years I used Yum Warning shots as a replacement for the half a beaver trick, but now that I am back to using beavers for flipping and pitching, I don't bother with the yum baits anymore, and just recycle my torn up flipping beavers. I have Jackall cross tail's, but they have, much like the dream shot, not been real good for me.

24.5" inshore red, biggest out of 11 my friend and I caught yesterday.

No help from me. I use either a Yamamoto Pro Senko or a Yamamoto Shad Shape Worm for 100% of my dropshotting. Never had the need to try anything else.

Finding them is the hard part. A number of years ago I launched the boat and fished the docks on a 300 acre lake with marginal success. Before getting back to the ramp i tried a downed tree no more than 10 yards from the ramp. I pulled 45 crappies off the tree. I was in view of every shore angler and none of them were happy i found it first.

So, there is a guy that lives next to a pond. One day there is a knock on the door. There are two less than " bright" looking young men at the door, and they say " we came to ice fish on the pond, but forget to bring anything to cut a hole in the ice with. Do you have anything we could borrow?" The guy says " I have an old axe you could borrow, but I'll need it back."" Of course" the young men said " we'll get it back to you". So off they go with the axe. The day goes on and it's starting to get dark. The guy is beginning to think his axe is gone for good, when there is a knock on the door. The two young men are there and say" here is your axe back, thank you very much". The guy says " no problem, did you catch anything?" " Well to tell you the truth, it took us so long to chop a hole in the ice big enough to put the boat in, we never did get to fish"?

Got a mixed bag today bunch of short largemouth and short crappie. One 16” largemouth and one keeper size crappie (10”) . Also got a bluegill and a yellow perch, water temp 60 and windy/cloudy/rainy

What a beautiful morning

My brother is having a party at his place for his girlfriends birthday, he did some carving for the festivities. I expect a few of them may look like this at some point this evening ?

Got to get out for a lil while today. Cool and damp. Caught a couple green fish too. Nothing big just checking to see if they are where they should be this time of year.