Paul Roberts

LMB and stripers both appear to be capable hunters at night and lure color is probably not all that important.

Don't confuse OCD with determination. The latter will get you where you want to go.

I can't imagine anyone keeps enough actual "data" that a database is needed. Plus, how do you adequately qualify all the parameters? Then, who fishes enough that they could expect to revisit the same sets of conditions. Even if you fished the same areas on the same body of water, things change year to year. Live systems are far from static. Don't want to be a party-pooper here, but I question the value of such a log, beyond gimmick. Maybe someone has made good use of such a thing and can chime in.

I do a lot of this -can't avoid the weeds where I fish! -Go up in rod power and line weight. Instead of the (now standard) moderate action rods go to a fast rod. -Choose a fat type plug with a wide lip. Lots of em out there. -Certain weeds are easier to fish through than others. I routinely fish through cabbage (Potamogeton), milfoil, and coontail. Coontail is softest and densest and therefore most likely to load up your lure. There are a few tricks to fishing it: -Cast short. Don't cast long because you don't want to crash into the backside of a big clump and have to pull through it. It'll stall and load up with weeds. That's probably what's happening with you. -Target the edges, and seams, deeper areas in between clumps. If you can see the individual clumps so much the better. I'll even buoy some of them. -Crank down. When you bump a clump you have three options: Give slack and the plug may float free. If it's calm, lay the line on the surface and watch it, bass will often take as the plug rises watch for the tick' in the line. Another option is to walk' the plug through by pulling smoothly and firmly. Often a fat plug will roll right on through and you'll feel it pop free. Let it float up a bit, then start your retrieve again. The last option, and the best (but can't be done until you're plug is in position on the clump) is, when you know you are on the front edge of a clump or wall, to lower your rod and rip the lure free -like a hookset. If your plug was on the backside of the clump it'll likely stall and bury. But if it's at the front side, or up in the tops, the plug will accelerate and rip free cleanly. That acceleration is a major trigger. You'll probably get most of your strikes on the rips. These three options are not at all exclusive. You'll likely do all three on a given cast. Try to set up the rip though; It'll often get you the most strikes. -You can use lipless cranks but you have to target sparse weeds, or know where the clumps are and avoid the thickest parts of them. Lipless are GREAT ripping baits but much less weed-less than fat plugs. -If bass are active they will likely be near the tops of the clumps. So you may not need to fish very deep at all. Even if the weeds are rooted in 15 feet of water with the weed clumps topping out from 3 to 6 feet, you may do well with a shallow running plug. In fact, I'd start there, and work deeper only if you have to. Heck, you can even twitch that plug before you crank it down, for some topwater hits. To summarize: -Use a powerful rod, (14# test minimum). -Use fat, wide-lipped plugs. -Set up the rip by casting short and accurately, targeting the top of unbroken weed beds, the edge of weedwalls, or the front side of weed clumps.

It just takes time. -Make sure the line is not twisted AT ALL. -practice overhead and sidearm -try pitching: Opening bail, pulling out some line, holding it in her left hand (if she's a righty) and pendulum swing the weight out. -The target idea -something fun to cast, at, in, or under, is a great one. -be careful with weights caught in the grass Maybe use a soft casting plug, rather than a lead weight.

The action on the drop is why I bought a couple. I haven't tried them yet though. I doctor my lures a lot and the first thing I did was peel off those ridiculous red eyes. I then used vinyl fabric paint in pearl and black for realistic eyes. The eye sockets are large and perfect for large realistic eyes. I bought the "green pearl" color that should make for a decent shad or young bluegill mimic.

Lures are not food. They are rarley of any interest to bass unless they are manipulated appropriately. Some thing to try: -Do not let the bass see you -Cast from the closest distance that they cannot see you -Do not cast directly on them -Cast to one side, reel the worm/jig/craw/creature near them and then kill it, long pause, then twitch it ever so slightly. -Swim an active topwater past them -Try them at different times, especially early and late or under overcast. -Rest them 10 minutes after each lure attempt. Let us know how they react.

Ah, spinning can be accurate, and quiet too. You can feather the spool with your fingertips on a spinning reel, similar to what you do with your thumb on a levelwind reel.

Wow! Congratulations again, Paul. I too jumped on the X-Walk when I saw it. Topwater jumpbaits are my favorite as well. There are times when I just can't get the bass to break top, so the subsurface option holds a ton of promise. In the past I've made some subsurface jumpbaits by weighting -even tried carving one. Only one panned out really well -a very cheap knock-off plug that is simply too small for quality fish. But it really catches smaller fish. So far I've only tried my X-Walk just to see how it runs and found it's not as easy to get really good glides, as with the topwater types. But, with some more playing around I'm excited at what it might do. Thanks for the motivation!

Another point: Stick to a name brand -get a lower line Daiwa, ABU or ... I'd say $80 minimum for a decent starter reel (new price). All companies have these. Although, Daiwa has a new Procaster that just came out for $60 in the latest Bass Pro catalog. That with a Convergence would put you at $100.

There are national field guides (like you find for birds) -Peterson series has a freshwater fish one, called Freshwater Fishes. But, fish are not like birds, and are a bit more complicated to ID. I'd suggest you look for a regional guide, probably available through a university outreach (Cooperative Extension) or your state fisheries department. They will get you on the right track. Such books are less likely to be found in your local Border's, but are worth asking around in the right places for.

$100? Probably not anymore. There are a lot of good rods for little $. Shimano Convergence is a decent rod for $40. The reel is the sticking point. Do some research and then check for a used one perhaps. Others may have some particular suggestions.

I'm a long time devout spinning tackle user, but levelwinds are much better at certain things. I started using one for bulging spinnerbaits and for buzzbaits because spinning gear doesn't provide the torque (if that's what it is) to handle fast retrieves with lures that pull back at you (spinnerbaits and cranks). Bulging a big tandem bait all day, or rip-cranking vegetation will wear you and your spinning reel out quicker. Similarly, levelwinds shine for controlling of big fish. They take some practice, but with modern magnetics the learning curve is much less risky to your fishing day LOL. Dial 'em down until you get the hang of it, then start backing off. Nothing casts farther than a levelwind with a tailwind! LW's are best for heavier line and lures -1/8oz and up, and 8lb or 10lb and up. Although I'm not up to date on the latest gear, I've not seen a LW that really can cast light lures, especially with any breeze. Maybe someone will bring me up to date here and correct me. But, going back to spinning, I think spinning is more versatile, once you get the hang of them too. (There's always a learning curve to get the most out of things). I often shore fish and if I'm headed to a new pond with only one rod, I take a spinning rig. Having brush or trees behind you just isn't a problem like it can be with a LW rig. And spinning tackle skips lures much better than LW. I'd say, if you can afford it, and you fish aggressively at all with SB's and CB's (and you should ), definitely get a good LW rig.

I wouldn't recommend the SmartCast. It's a neat gadget, and useful in a very limited way -like checking depth, finding large isolated cover pieces, and spotting large fish away from cover or bottom. It has a "fish ID" feature that shows "fish" as a fish symbol, which may be effective at picking up large fish away from bottom amongst sparse vegetation, but it also marks any hard object such as rocks and wood as "fish". The problem is it doesn't have a grayline feature, which would allow for some target separation and relative hardness differences. Since you are in a boat the size of the unit is not such an issue, so any compact unit with as much pixels as you can afford would be better.

That is a rare fish. And you targeted it. Congratulations. Very well done. The eastern coastal waters (MA to NJ) seem to give up some bigger bass than more inland. Interesting.

Howdy!

Wow. Thanks for sharing that. I meet a lot of anglers who don't bother with a pfd. And we have drownings every year. I'm not going to be one of them. Glad you and your son weren't either.

It's in the subject title. Great question. Sharkbite, did you feel your questions were answered?

It applies to all baits, but probably less so to soft plastics. But, the main part, in terms of catching fish, is that all the elements of angling enter in. The problem is angling in general. You just have to fish "better" than if the pond hadn't been fished before. Meaning: #1 Be stealthy #2 Learn to present each lure very well. Learn to adjust (vary) your retrieves to trigger strikes. #3 Pay attention to what others are using and either use them better or, if it doesn't pan out, try something very different. BUT before you write off any lure (often people choose them for a good reason) know the conditions and situations where that lure shines and it'll likely still work for you (see #2). #4 Changing lures, after catching a few in a particular spot, is a good tactic.

That should tell you a lot right there. Lures don't catch fish by themselves. It's what you do with them that catches fish. that might just be the take-home message for this whole thread. I'd do some reading on presentation -there's lots here in the articles section. Learn how to fish just a few lures well -your choice, but I'd suggest: a plastic worm, a jig, a spinnerbait, and a topwater.

Not odd at all. This was likely an aggressive fish (a "retard" in natural selection terms if there are many anglers about) or one with a penchant for crankbaits. This is not that uncommon. I knew a good sized pike that lived in a quarry I fished a number of years back. It loved small crankbaits. I rose the fish many times on various larger "pike lures" (spinners, spoons, plugs) but only eliciting follows. But I caught her four times in three years (her growing from 28 to 30 inches in that time) twice on a small 2" Big-O in crawfish, once on a Shad-Rap, and again on a larger 2-1/2" Big-O in a dark bluegill finish. That same quarry had a big largemouth (21-1/2") that would hit big crankbaits. I caught her twice on a Swim-Whizz and a friend took her the following year (now 22") on a 3+" Big-O. We never caught her on anything else. I now have a big female I raise or catch every now and then at the same location in a pond I fish often. She is always vulnerable to a Mepps #3. It seems she just has to come take a swipe at that lure! Sometimes she engulfs it, other times she strikes short. I caught her on back to back evenings once -the second night I got her to chase and then to commit by zig-zagging the spinner in front of her -she couldn't stand that. Interestingly, a nasty slippery swimming jig (killer) she doesn't seem to care to chase. I did catch her on one once by dead-sticking it on one of the rare opportunities I got to sight fish to her. And I could probably get her to take a dead jig at other times, but the Mepps she's willing to chase, so I'll play that card as long as she's game.

senile, very lucid thinking. 8-) Maybe they'll let you out of the memory ward yet! ;D

WRB brings up a related point: That selective pressures (angling) can remove aggressive fish from populations. This is most intense when it's catch and kill fishing. C&R still has an impact, by aggressive individuals eventually being killed or damaged in repeated capture. There's a good study on this highlighted on a great site run by Brian Waldman: http://www.bigindianabass.com/big_indiana_bass/research/index.html Scroll down to: Pressure and Bass Aggressiveness But, although related in that it explains degraded fishing success over time, it's not the whole story, nor the question at hand: Whether bass can learn to avoid lures. They can. There are numerous examples but I'll offer this one: Keith Jones, Director of fish research at Berkley says that, in his tank experiments with lures on bass, he has to use a new group of bass for each test, because they learn so fast and stop biting. The question is; What is it they are reacting to? What part did they learn to avoid? Which brings up RogerWaters neat question: My thoughts, not research backed, is two-fold: That no bass will have enough bad experiences with crayfish to stop eating them altogether after being caught on them; They'll likely eat 100 or more successfully for every 1 they get caught by. But beyond that, and what both gobig and WRB brought up, is that you can't separate the lure from the presentation complete: The One of the best examples of this I've seen was a time I fished live nymphs on 2lb line to stream brookies on a public fishing stream. Now, I've been a dedicated, scholarly trout fly-fisher for years. I know my bugs and am a meticulous fly designer. It's amazing what people can come up with in terms of ultra-realistic flies. What I had driven home forcefully by those little brookies was that the fly, no matter how accurate an imitation, cannot be separated from the rest of the presentation. What trout expect is for live insects to drift downstream with the current. The resulting image is FOOD. The response is, GULP! When I fished a live stonefly nymph down to those trout, the legs kicked, the body wriggled, the pale belly flashed; I couldn't have tied a better fly. But, if I didn't present correctly, if an errant current caught hold the line causing the slightest drag, the trout would reject the nymph. And interestingly, it wasn't that they spooked, they simply let it pass, like any piece of non-food like a pine needle, grass blade, or leaf bit. But, get it right and they eat the nymph, or a reasonable synthetic facsimile. The point is: The lure cannot be separated form the rest of the presentation elements, unless you are able to make it so. Interestingly, if you ***** one of those trout with a hook, they'll sulk for a while, and can be more difficult to dupe afterwards. Contrast this with trout that have never seen an angler (high mountain streams here in Colorado) where I can be somewhat sloppier in my line control, and can literally ***** a trout 3 or 4 times before it's put off to a good presentation. Now head to a heavily fished C&R tailwater fishery and holy moly those are difficult fish to fool. The take-home message is, the lure, no matter how accurate an imitation, cannot be separated from the rest of the presentation. And that individual fish do learn. The saving grace is that conditions for bass vision are not always perfect and that aggressively feeding bass (especially in competition) are more willing to believe, for lack of better. But after being caught a number of times (or even once, according to some studies), bass become more circumspect. So...How long can bass remember? In one nifty study a group of bass were introduced to a Rapala minnow plug. They struck it readily for several minutes, then strikes fell off. The bass were divided into groups and tested after different time intervals, and the bass showed that they remembered something negative about the lure (indicated by greatly diminished hits) for as long as the study went for 3 months! But, in our fishing, we have a certain amount of latitude in control in our presentations (within, of course, the considerable confines of having the lure attached to a d**n cord!). This is what presentation really is; It's attraction, then triggering. If you know how to control and adjust these, you may be able to continue to dupe fish on a given old lure. Presentation, all aspects of it, is in large part what separates the really good angler's from the average ones. From my trout fly-fishing experiences, I'll offer an adjustment to the old adage, Presentation is 90% of catching, to this: After you've got presentation down, lures that fit the expectations of the fish, the one's that say FOOD! the best at that moment, will turn the most heads. From my bass fishing experiences, where food imitation is more difficult (because of the combination of still-water and the size of prey and lures), that triggering (how you manipulate any given lure) is critical to the amount of success you receive with any lure. And this factor increases in importance enormously as bass become educated.

Here are some basics: Basic controls are depth and speed. You control them by jig weight, line diameter, and trailer bulk/buoyancy. Start with proper line diam for the given situation (depth, clarity, and cover, mostly). Choose a head style for the cover you are fishing: Cone-shape for weeds, bulbous (Arky) for wood, football for rock. Choose a hook matched to your line strength. Don't go Flippin with 50# braid with a light wire hook. Don't try to stick a big bass with a heavy iron on 8# mono. Choose trailers (several sizes) plastics, pork, or none at all. Choose a color that either mimics (imitation is impossible) prey, usually fish or crayfish. Or, just choose one you LOVE and fish it with confidence. Fishing it: Decide (or divine -"let the fish tell you") how deep and how fast or slow you need the jig to run at. Knowing what various combinations of components offer takes some experimenting as there are many permutations possible. Want to slow a given combination down or speed it up? Add a bulky trailer, or trim it down, tie on a lighter or heavier jig, or increase/decrease line diameter. Pick your jigs in terms of component combinations heads, bodies, and trailers. Experiment with retrieves lures rarely fish themselves. Adjust speed to fish activity and play with triggers (the many variations on the varied retrieve theme). All makers produce good stuff. Find something that floats your boat, choose appropriate components, and fish em. The fish will teach you the most.

Several things at work here. First, bass have been shown by research that they can and do learn to avoid lures -it's called conditioning. This has been documented in lab and pond studies, and empirically by anglers all over the country that have fished virgin waters and seen the angling decline as they continue to fish it -often quite rapidly. Something I've seen many times (and a good fishing tactic, as well as a good test for seeing short term conditioning) is fishing through a good area with biting fish, catching until they stop biting, then going back through (quietly) with another lure. This often turns a few more fish. It's most obvious in a discrete area -like with smallies in a stream pool. But not all individual bass are the same -some are more aggressive, some more cautious, than others. In some studies there were individual bass that were caught repeatedly, while other individuals were quickly considered "immune to angling". There are also instances, lots of them, some mentioned above, showing individual fish being particularly susceptible to certain lures. I've seen this myself. Just what part of the presentation the bass are susceptible to is open, but some individual fish have seemed to be suckers for certain lures. There are also lures that, I believe (from experience), that fish have a more difficult time conditioning to; Your Trick Sticks (and other plastic worms) are a good example. In this situation, careful presentations with such lures will still dupe educated fish, and this is often (a piece of) the prescription offered for duping trophy bass. Educated fish are also often more susceptible to lure types new to them as well.