Mattlures

I do the same as Rolo. I dont keep them very often but when I do they are the small keeper sized fish. I usualy let all of them go but there are a few lakes I fish that have a ton of small fish. So I do my part and harvest a few of them

How about something that PROVES bass cant learn. Or maybe a real pic of aliens or a mermaid

Yep the saltwater guys have been using the "dropshot" rig for a looong time.

I dont think I can ad much to what these guys have already said. My favorite technique is to dead stick it. sometimes 15 minutes or more. It is hard to do and stay focussed but after a few monster blow ups when I wasnt ready, its a little easier now to keep the faith. Of course catching a bunch on it doesnt hurt either.

The hardgill is much less likely to get thrown. I have not had one throw it yet. It has 2 dangling trebles. That is much harder to throw then 1 big hook. Of course you dont let them have their way and jump all over the place. Then you just asking for them to throw the bait. I still fight the fish hard and sweep down and sideways when they try to jump but I play them a little more then the regular swimbait winch.

Sammy I was basing my suggestions on small ponds. to me 40 acres is a small lake. I dont think it would need a rest unless it has a masive amount of presure. still if something isnt working anymore then you need to change.

One other thing to try is to bring sombody new to the pond that is a decent bass guy with little or no preconcieved knowledge of this particular pond. The idea is that the new guy doesnt know what has worked for you in the past and he doesnt know your spots. I have done this with a couple guys who I knew but never fished with and they went to spots I normaly pass up and they threw baits that I normaly dont. They ended up beating me. I liked it. The quick answer to your problem is you have to change something.

Congrats on a beautiful bass! I recomend Lyon's and O'haver taxidermy. World class work. They have won many competitions. Who ever you choose make sure you look closley at pics of thier mounts of that species. Many taxidermist are good at some and poor at others. Do not just look at the mount by itself. Compare it to pics of real live fish. If something doesnt quite look right then its not right. Great taxidermy jumps out at you.

They have most likley become conditioned. I fish some golf ponds that are only an acre or two. This has happened to me many times before. My solution has been to change up the bait with a similar technique. If you were getting hit on a popper or spook but now your not try throwing a buzzbait or wake bait. If you were getting bit throwing plastic worms, switch it up to a jig or creature. Same spots, same depth, similar presentations. This is assuming the conditions havent changed much and the fish are still in there and healthy. In small ponds they realy dont migrate much but they will still have seasonal paterns. letting the pond rest is also a good idea.

visible bass that dont apear to be in an eating mood are some times very curiuos. Often it can be very difficult to make them eat but getting them to taist a bait is easier. I have encounterd this many times with both big and small bass. I will throw a fly lines crawler with a small hook on 6lb fluro. I cast it far enough ahead of the fish to not spook it. the worm will sink very slowly. I would guess that 50% the bass has slowly swam up, sucked it in, held it for about 1 sec and then spit it out. If your expecting this then you can stick them right when they suck it in. If you miss your chances go way down for a second chance. 35% of the time the fish would swim up and look for a while maybe even follow it down and then swim off. 5% of the time the fish realy eats it and swims off giving you pleanty of time to set the hook and the other %10 they dont even bother to look. I always recomend this technique. It works on big bass and small ones. The key is to not let them see you. Your odds go way up, and be cocked and ready to sing when they swim up to taiste your crawler

Its tough to beat a good topwater explosion but.. I agree with Bass_Akwards. I love a good plastic worm bite. Its not even so much the actual bite but its the hook set. I love getting ready and then realy stepping into a good hard hookset.

Its not that the rod will break. Its that the rod will handle the bait poorly. It will be dificult to make good cats, even more difficult to set the hook and it I doubt it has the bckbone to winch a good fish in. If you give a bass too much time with a big heavy bait, it will find a way to throw it. Under powerd rods can "do" the job, they just dont do a good job.

For those of you who are saying that big bass are not smart. Well I kind of agree with you. It all depends on what you consider "smart" if you are comparring them to humans then they are incredibly stupid. However an older bigger more experianced bass is much smarter then a youger one with little experience. Its all relative

Catt thats the beauty of fishing. We have the advantage. we are smarter then them. Plus they are prisoners to thier enviornment. They have to eat, and they have to stay in that lake. Why do they get caught? well thats pretty simple. Because they are not as as smart as us. We beat them we win the battle. we are supoosed to win. I never said they are sooo smart that they cant be caught. Yes some fish can become almost uncatchable. Just like Dottie. That little lake got pounded day after day. Everybody knew she was in their but nobody could catch her unless she was on a bed. Even then it took extremly skilled sight fisherman to get her and it took a long time. The more experiance a fish has with fisherman the more it learns to avoid us. This is a fishing fact that has been proven as much as any fishing theory. I would consider it fact. Matt Fly in most cases out here the bigger fish have "learned to avoid the biggest spawning presure. They do spawn much deeper and a lot of times they do it very early in the season or very late when the presure is at a miniumum. The biggest ones will also use any waether oportunity to spawn. If there is a light rian durring spawning season the big ones tend to move up, do thier thing and get out of there. They also tend to spawn at night. Belive me they do a lot to avoid us even when they are spawning, at least they do this out here. Also just like most creatures when it comes to mating, other survival instincts take a back seat. All you deer hunters know its easier to find bucks when they are rutting. They make a lot more mistakes. A spawning fish is not eating. It has not been tricked into eating your bait. It is defending. so even though you catch a little male, you can catch it again because its instinct tells it, it needs to defend.

How do you know? do you talk to bass ? ;) ;) I use the word "learn" beacaue its a comon term. I dont know that they dont learn. Whatever you call it, they do do it. Adapt,condition,instinct,learn,react, whatever. If bass were as dumb as you think then everybody would catch big ones and you would have 100's of pics with big bass. ;) ;) ;)

Catt and Rolo you are correct. The population is less, in the odler class fish. However I was not only talking about the verry oldest and biggest. Whith each encounter a bass has with an angler(getting hooked) it "learns" or adapts. so there is a learning curve. The more pressure the faster the fish becomes conditioned to specific techniques. So an old bass that lives in a pressured lake is going to much harder to catch then one the same size and age in a vigin farm pond. Also I have gone on a shocking trip with the fish and game in a lake know for small fish. You would be suprised how many fish are down there and how many of them are big. Alot more then people think. I dont remember the exact numbers but we covered probably 2-3 miles of shoreline and caught around 1200 bass. most were 1-2lbs but we had atleast 40 fish over 5lbs. They are in there they just arent as easy to catch as the small ones. There are less big one but they are there and they reject lures all the time.

That would be the same with just about any species. Survival is always the first priority. You take away the regular food from any animal and it will try to eat something else. It has to or it will die. You ever see those national geografic films where the desperate lion tries to kill a buffalo or the one where a starving polor bear tries to kill a walruss? The bear dies from wounds it got from the walruss. If that bear had plenty of seals around it would have never tried the wallrus, same with the lion. Predators, even simple ones like fish learn which prey is the best for them and they aviod the dangerous prey untill they become desperate. So Yes, if you removed all the food from a lake the poor starving fish would become easier to catch. They would also shrink. PS the trout that are stocked that the bass are feeding on are only in the lakes for 3-4 months in most cases.

Well the bass in CA must be smarter ha ha. because nobody out here who actualy catches big bass thinks they are easy or dumb. Now the guys who dont catch big bass will tell you they are dumb and easy and all you need to do is find them and you can catch them. Well this is true for young inexperianced bass. They make a lot more mistakes then big fish. The longer a fish lives around fisherman the "smarter" it gets. Or the better its survival instincts become. Just like any other animal. If it does something and something bad happens becaus of it, it will learn not to do it anymore. It may take a few times depending on how tramatic the experiance and of course what kind of animal, but they do learn.

The 15 minute thing is just wrong. absolutley wrong. No proof and its just bad info that has been passed around for a long time. Read this article. http://bassbuzz.outdoorsfanmedia.com/br_news_article.asp?thecat=2&id=257

I have only taken one deer to be processed and that was out of state and it was convenient. I dont think they did as good of a job as I do. But it was easy and it was only $50. I have been tempted to have one done by a shop here at home because they make incredible sausage and jerky but I am too cheap plus my sausage and jerky are prety darn good too. If I was rich I would definatley have them all processed. I am usualy beat up after a hard hunt and I dont feel like cutting and packaging for hours. I do it though and I certainly enjoy it afterwards. HMM I still have a little 09 deer in my freezer. I think I will have some tonight

Hey Catt you have a good coach and an incredible quarterback. Your teem is in the hunt. I know the saints have sucked for a long time but they are fun to watch and they can play with anybody. Just think of the teams that could use Brees! At 1 time my Chargers had Brees and Rivers! and for all you sports fans feelin sorry for yourselfs. San Diego has never one a championship ! Well except for when there was a soccer leauge :'(

Dont listen to Chris collinsworth. It was not the recievers. It was all Cutler. I am sure you saw where he threw 3 interseptions in a row only to have the packers catch just the 3rd one. Cutler was good in denver not great. He had great recievers and a great coach. As much as I hate Shanahan he was good. Cutler cried and whined over anything. I realy hope Orton turns out to be better then Cutler so all the critics can eat their words. I am sorry your Bears got him. I used to like the Bears. But I was routing for the packers this time. I kinda wish he was still in Denver so Rivers could beat him over and over and over!

Brush hog , swimbaits will not replace brush hogs. Actualy I use berkley power hogs but , same difference. I am also not specificaly trying to isolate anybody or even trying to apeal to only a nitch market. It just kinda works out like that. I do have other baits that are much less expencive. But the hard baits take soo long to make and everything about them is expencive from the packaging to the hooks and the materials used to make them and a ton of labor. I just cant produce them for "regular" prices. If I could I would. Most swimbait guys consider my baits among the most affordable. Also as far as me catching a 15lber by doing nothing other then holding the rod, not exactly. I had already located the fish earlier and I knew this fish was ulta spooky. I knew it would not be tricked through regular presentations. I snuck up up to the spot on foot and made a long cast and watched my bait for aprox 15 minutes before she hit while I hid in the rocks monitering my bait and the slack. She rose on it once without biting and sunk back down. It is very nerve racking and it takes more concentrtaion and patience then any other technique that I know of. the technique itself is not fun but it is highly productive for huge and or spooky bass. So while I do belive the realism of the bait is what triggered the bite, I had to know when and where and I had to do all the other things right. Believe me, deadsticking may sound easy but it is mind numbing and it is very difficult to stay focussed the entire time. I wish it was easy.

Chargers 14-2

http://msn.foxsports.com/nfl/story/10033824/Exclusive:-Merriman-says-he-didn't-hurt-'Tequila'