SoFlaBassAddict

Wow, thats a serious assortment of goodies. Must have been like Christmas morning when all of that showed up. Hope you have some fun with it.

So, tomorrow morning I'm actually going to wake up early to do some fishing. I'm curious to how you guys would attack this lake. One section is mostly submerged vegetation in around 10'-15' of water that drops down to the mid 20's. The shallower section of it is a broad cove, the narrower section is a step drop off on each side with lots of weeds that have a small channel in the middle of them with a harder clear bottom. Water temps recently later in the day have been mid to upper 70's. So I'd expect the surface temps early in the morning to be in the lower 70's. I'll probably bring two rods with me, I might bring a third. Two casting M/mod and MH/XFast, one ML/Fast spinning for finesse gear. What would you throw if you were me. The first spawn recently ended, so theres not much sight fishing happening. Edited to add: Looks like it'll be pre-frontal conditions also.

Thats a very nicely done carpet job right there. Having that quality carpet probably makes it much easier to work with as well. Nicely done.

Nice fish right there. I'm still trying hard to get my first real jig fish. Catching them on swim jigs just doesn't seem to count for me. And yes, the Carbonlite rods and reels are pretty nice. I've got one with the rod and reel for casting as well as a ML carbonlite spinning rod that I picked up a couple of days ago that I LOVE. For anybody wondering, they're sensitive enough that I can feel a wacky worm wiggling in the water as it drops. Great job, hopefully I'll grab some of your mojo and nail me a good jig fish in the next few days.

yes ;D i was NOT expecting that. ill be up that way again tonight through sat afternoon if you wanted to meet up. btw ,why is the font so tiny and gray when i type in the reply box , but when its posted , its normal? I'll let you know if I'm free on Saturday. I'm trying to go out on the boat sat or sun to nail some fish on the reefs. Snapper and kingfish for dinner sounds mighty nice. All depends on what the weather does though. As far as the font being tiny, resize it back up at the bottom right corner of the reply box. It happens to me once in a while also.

So thats what you pulled out of Tree Tops? I may have to try and do some fishing out there one day. Nice fish right there. WTG

Although I don't really need them, I may pick up another couple at that price. I was extremely happy paying 100 bucks for them when I did. 70 bucks is even better.

I have mine spliced directly into the main power cable for my TM on my Jon. I get little to no interference on my sonar. If there is any, it's very minor and I rarely notice it on my screen.

Went out again for an hour later on in the day. Saw several Peacock beds as well in a different part of the lake. Some were loners, most of them had a male and a female on the bed. Others were just a male and a female that were roaming around. Caught a few that were between 16" and 20" on the old elbow measurement. Several 2 to 3 pound LM on beds and in schools also. Along with a bunch of fish just cruising around on the drop offs. Like South FLA said, lots of empty beds as well. Looks like this lake is in all three stages of the spawn right now. Been some great fishing for the last few days.

x2 I use #8, but I'd imagine the difference is negligible. I think the 8 is like 0.11 and the 6 is 0.10 diameter. Or somewhere right around there.

Any of you guys out there know of any software that lets you take a picture from like google earth or something and create a lake map from it? Or would something like that just be easier to do in a normal ms paint type of program? Theres no topo maps of my lake and I'd like to start mapping it out a little more as opposed to just going by memory.

Well, I guess it's officially here in Broward for me. Basically finished up on my boat right in time for the spawn to hit my lake. Got out for about two hours total and picked up a good 15 fish. Picked up a few large females that were just dripping with eggs. Saw several fish sitting on beds, and several fresh empty beds. Had good success today on my new finesse combo with a shaky head dropping into the beds. Around sundown I absolutely slayed some larger fish on a watermelon swimmin senko worked deep on some drop offs leading into deep grass. Warm weather finally stabilized and the fish are happy again. Hope the rest of you guys are starting to have some fun down here. Gotta love Springtime in southern FLA.

I swear, I really need to book a trip up there one of these days. Short trip to get there. Those are some ridiculous fish, Larry. Nice job.

Congrats on the new rig. Nice smallies right there.

That was the first thing I thought of when I read the OP's post.

I totally forgot to add the space monkey. I haven't caught anything on one yet, but I'll be damned if they don't look good in the water.

So in the next few days I'm going to start a thread or three on my specific lake. Hopefully some of the info that you guys help with will help some of the other guys out there that have questions similar to mine. I've been bank bound for bass mostly for the last few years. I've never had the urge to buy a boat. I've recently picked up a rig for my lake and am having a great time trying to learn it more and more with my graph. In this part I'd like to discuss water clarity. I understand the concept of clear, stained, and muddy water. But what actually defines clear or stained water. I'd hope muddy is fairly self explanatory. Would clear water be me being able to see a white lure down into six foot of water or what? I'm assuming that stained would be half of the visibility in clear water. That being said, I know that weather conditions can also affect the clarity on a lake. Wind, cloudy days, clear bluebird days, etc etc. Things like this are where I'm positive I need to improve on to become a better bass angler instead of starting on a guess and trying to work towards a pattern from there. So, with your help, I'd like to try and actually define what a clear or stained lake would be. Short of me dropping a tape measure in the water with something attached so I can see the end, I'm d**n clueless here.

I've never done anything else buy t-rig them. Normally use the zoom brush hogs, but I've got a surplus of hogg assassins here right now. Good style of lure, it can mimic a lot of things and can be worked a ton of different ways.

I got my butt handed to me by my daughters today on my pit lake. They were using bubblegum trick worms on like 1/8 weights. Just tossing them into the grass on the drop offs. I think they pulled in about 10 fish each in an hour and some change. Gotta love the warmer temps being back. I managed a dink on my junebug finesse worm drop shotted in the deeper water.... Teach me to laugh at pink worms....

Way to go. I've really got to get my hands on some of those skinny dippers. I constantly hear how great they are from a lot of the Florida guys.

If you're a little handy with tools, you can easily make one yourself out of some thin gauge aluminum. It bends really easy and you'll be able to make it whatever size you want.

For a guy your size, you'll want the widest you can afford. Remember, the bottom width is the important number, not the beam at the top. I'm 6'1" and roughly 235 and I manage with little trouble in my 1236. You've got to be a bit cautious if you move to one side or whatnot, but you wont instantly flip into the water. On a 32 you'd be swimming. If you can, find something at least 40, or 48 wide. You can get away with a 12, but you may find the extra length on a 14 or 16 footer handy.

5200 is great stuff, you'll be happy with it. Like I said before, DO NOT get it on your hands. The last tube I used cracked when I was rolling up the bottom. Use one of the tube keys if you have one. I had to soak the stuff on my hands in Acetone and scrub for a while to get it off. I still have some stuck in my skin almost a week later.

I'll say this, I loved the 570 at first, then I had transducer issues. I no longer own that sonar. I'm not sure if Humminbird is having QC issues or what, but lately I've been hearing about a lot of problems with their stuff.

Oh, I can and do. The threaded pedestal is a removable piece. The seat mount pin drops right into the base mount. I was hoping somebody knew of a shorter pedestal though. I like being up a little higher, but the 11" might be a bit high.