AceHigh

I occassionally will take some sort of live bait, but I virtually always catch some other species or all the bass I catch on live bait are too small to keep. Just yesterday I carried two dozen large minnows and fished them in a spot where I normally catch bass. On minnows I caught two white bass (one was over 3 lbs) and a 5 lb. blue catfish. On crankbaits in the same spot I caught one small white bass and three largemouths.

Although I haven't been on this forum very long, I have been fishing a long time and I wanted to point out that I see a lot of young guys who appear to be adopting one or two syles of fishing and then defining themselves by that style. My personal opinion is that you need to keep growing and evolving and trying to be able to do any style of fishing at anytime in any type of water and with any equipment. Sooner or later many of you will try tournament fishing and if you do it enough and over a wide enough geographical area, unless you are close to being an expert with just about everything, you're going to find yourself missing a lot of cuts and looking at a lot of goose eggs. Nothing drives me crazier in a tournament than to draw a no boater who can't or won't fish this or that style or this or that kind of bait because he's not skilled in doing so. Be it spinnerbaits, crankbaits, worms, jigs, topwaters, pitching, flipping, deep cranking or whatever, if you can't do it well then get working on your weakness. And when your partner says during his time he going to fish a way you are not comfortable with, take it as an excellent time to learn more about that technique.

Ten baits - - 6" blue ribbed plastic worm - 6" black with red tail ribbed plastic worm - 4" white swimming grub on a round head jig - 3/8 oz blue rubber legged jig and pork frog - Bandit crank bait - 6-8' deep chartruese with blue back and orange belly, - Bandit crank bait - 10-12' deep chartruese with blue back and orange belly - Bagley 3" Dredge (sinking, no rattle dives to 22') - Tennessee Shad color - 3/8 oz tandem spinner bait chrome and gold colorado blades - chartruese and white - 1/2 oz Devils Horse in chrome (bet you didn't know these once came in several sizes) - 3/8 oz Pro Rattletrap (the one where the line goes throught the lure and ties directly to the hook) in chrome

Its not always as easy as Raul may make it sound to some. Thirty years ago when I fished the same few lakes 20-30 times a year with nothing but a huge selection of crankbaits and spinnerbaits, it was easy to stay on fish and know what they wanted. Now I rarely fish any water more than once a year and half the time I am on new water. 35 years of bass fishing experience helps as its extremely rare to find myself in water or a condition wher I haven't caught fish before, so what has worked before is always where I start. However, at least half the time what worked before doesn't work at all and I will change lures (type, size, color, etc.) as well as my presentation and retrieve about every ten to fifteen minutes until I am reasonably certain I know where the fish are and what they want. I am always surprised about how unpredictable fish can be and how little respect they have for doing what they are always supposed to do. I wish I had a nickel for all the times I though I had found "perfect" water and conditions and got no strikes, then moved to a place that should have been barren and loaded up. Then again there are times when you just have to stick with what you know will work and wait until the fish move up and feed where they are supposed to. Worm fishing lake points in the summer can be this way for example. I usually start with 6 rod & reels everywhere I go - 1 spinnerbait, 1 plastic worm (Texas style), 1 jig and pig, 2 crankbait, 1 swimming grub. I keep a flipping and a pitching rod on top in the rod box if I think I may have found a pattern that fits. That means that even if I find the lure the fish want, I may change my fishing style to make sure I hook and land the most fish possible.

1- I absolutely love rain, especially thundershowers. A gust front (that big blow just before a thunderstorm hits) may yield you the biggest fish of your life, as its always accompanied by a sharp drop in barometric pressure and the fish will go into a feeding frenzy. The downside is you may get hit by lightning. I once was in a big fish area when a gust front came up and in a span of about 5 quick minutes caught 3 fish over 7 lbs. and had 20# line broken several times. For that experience I will risk lightning. If there is enough rain for run off, Raul is correct, the fish will move into shallow water to eat the food washed off the land. Everyone should experience once in their life fishing a rice ditch when the rice field is being drained - anything you throw will get bit immediately and often fish will intercept your bait in the air. I have seen fish over 5lbs. actually jump up into the discharge pipes like salmon going up waterfalls. I also have a creek channel in a lake I fish that has a waterfall of about 4 feet into a pool about 6 feet deep that is always connected to the main lake pool, but the creek only flows with rain run off. When there is run off, bass will stack up in that pool like cordwood. 2) I'll fish shade vs. unshaded water of the same depth 100% of the time. Except in really clear water lakes, once you get about 10-12' deep, shade no longer makes any difference. 3) I never fish a topwater for schooling fish. I will fish a swimming grub that matches the baitfish they are feeding on. It easy to cast, has a single exposed hook that hooks fish easily and you rarely lose a fish, and if it doesn't get bit quickly it sinks down to where larger fish usually are lurking. If they don't want the plastic, a small chrome rattletrap will usually work. Good Luck!

You are very lucky! Finding fish is by far the hardest part of the game, and following fish are a strong indication they want to bite and a good indication there are many fish nearby. Here's a few other ideas: - switch between a rattle and a no rattle bait, - following fish generally will hit a bait if you stop it dead, suspending baits work best, - try a bait that dives deeper and floats, then use a retrieve that sends it down and then lets it float back up. Keep in mind that there may be many more fish observing what is happening and since they can see in the water at least twice as far as you, you won't see them. If you hook a small fish let him flop on top of the water at the side of the boat for about 30 seconds; you may have his big momma come try to take his meal away.

The original metal billed Bomber crawfish works well in brush. Rather than remove the front trebles or cut hooks on trebles, try removing the trebles entirely and substituting a single large hook pointing up at the rear. Many plugs made in the 20's, 30's and 40's had single rear hooks and they work!

Let's see - A 5 and 1/2 lb. white crappie on a crankbait (Yeah just under the world record and on the same lake), Lots of 8-15 lb. drum on plastic worms during bass tounaments. An alligator gar estimated at 250 lbs. on a plastic worm. A 10' alligator on a crankbait in southern Arkansas where I didn't even know there was alligators. Snagged a Manatee on the St Johns river. Like hooking a whale. Lots of bullfrogs on plastic worms. Snakes, birds, turtles, a duck. Every kind of salt water fish imaginable (in the salt marshes they mix it up with bass). One nutria (a big one). An then there was the 8 lb. channel cat that somehow managed to sink a large treble hook so far into my thumb that I had to push it out the other side of my thumb point first. Believe me tyhere's noting like having a twisting beserk 8 lb. catfish on one end of a lure when the other end is sunk solidly into your thumb.

In my part of the country we have flood control lakes where the water levels can vary 25 feet between winter (at full drawdown before the spring rains) and levels at prime fishing times. I will take my boat out in the winter and take photos of the areas I like to fish and when these places are under water, its easy begin seeing what they look like on the graph with the photos in hand. then when I go to a lake with a constant level, I know what the graph is telling me. Up until I got my first paper graph in 1983, I did the same with flashers.

There is a all year jig bite in the mid-south where I live. Winter - I like to find stumps or wood on creek channels 6-10 feet deep. Pre-spawn & spawn -Creek channels with 1-3" feet of water over the banks fishing the shallow water to the dropoff -looking for migrating females. Immediate post spawn - right on the bank in the outer 1/2 of creeks, for some reason lots of females will hug the bank when exiting a creek after spawning and they will run it back and forth until the water gets too warm. Summer - heavy shaded cover back in the jungles of wooded creeks. Fall - repeat the pre-spawn pattern. Anywhere there are cypress trees at any time of the year drop the jig as close to the trunk as possible and be ready for a strike at any time at least until the jig is 10 feet from the tree. Trees in deeper water are better in winter.

This is simple, the more sun the bass is exposed to the darker it will get. In many man made reserviors where the water color varies from place to place and day to day or the fish can get well out of the depth of light penetrating the water then you will get a mixed bag of fish. I have caught nearly white largemouths feeding with nearly black ones, the lighter ones just recently left deep water to feed and the dark one may have moved up a month earlier. And some bass get accustomed to staying in muddy water. Near my home is where a large muddy farmland river meets a clear mountain source river; where the two mix is an exceptional fishing hole. The muddy water holds the bass, but they love to jump out in the clear water when a baitfish slips out of the muddy water cover or just where the muddy gets diluted to reveal the baifish.

Before Bill Dance started telling people about the thermocline (where the water temperature falls dramatically in deeper water) in the late '70s, he revealed that the first question he always asked someone comining in at the ramp was how deep were the fish. His theory was that most of the fish that could be caught would most likely be between the water level that the light penetrated and the thermocline. How deep does light penetrate? Stick you rod in the water and if you can see the tip until its 3 feet deep then the light is getting a liitle more than twice that deep, say 7 feet. Light penetration warms the water deeper and the thermocline will be deeper. Most of the likes I fish the light penetration is less than 2 feet and the thermocline is usually about 10 feet. The fish will be somewhere in between. My rule on when fall fishing starts is when you want the jacket on in the mornings and evenings.

First year of fishing, 10' foot leaking jon boat. Please be very cautious. I wouldn't use that boat in any water bigger than I could easily swim across and back again using ny legs alone - say 5 acres max. Forget about a raised pedestal seat unless you weigh less than 80 lbs. I suggest you scull paddle the boat from the front seat and put an ice chest in the back to keep the back of the boat from lifting out of the water. At one time I always kept a heavy duty 14' jon boat with 18" sides (a 1418) with a deck and a single pedastal in front and a 10 hp outboard for fishing small waters. You reall need a 15' boat for two people and a 16' jon boat with a 48" wide transome is much better. There are always deals out there, the trick is to spend you money on what works best for you. My father passed away a couple of years ago and I sold his 14' jon boat, 10 hp Johnson, trailer, 50 lb thrust Minn Kota, battery and a eagle graph fishfinder for $400 total and threw in life jackets, minnow buckets, etc. The young man that got it was thrilled.

I've fished worms since 1972 when they finally could no longer be ignored by us spinnerbait and plug fishermen. I put my hardbaits down and fished them and nothing else until I learned how to fish them (I also fished 20 or 30 tounaments in 1972 and 1973 as a no boater and learned something about worm fishing from eveyone I fished with. Bythe following year I was winning tournaments worm fishing. There are at least a dozen different ways a bass will take a worm and when you have experienced them all enough you will know what each means. I always have the line between my finger and thumb when worm fishing and know what the worm feels like when no fish is present. When that feeling changes, it may be a bass. It could be a single heavy thump (very good, likely a larger fish), line suddenly going slack, a mushy feel like pulling the worm through molasses, a tick that you can barely feel, several sharp taps (very good - actively feeding fish and likely many competing), a steady pull or even a huge jerk. I use only flourescent blue Stren when worm fishing (I like 14 lb.) so I can see what the line is doing at all times. After a cast, the line will stay reasonably taut until the worm hits the bottom, then the line will go slack, You need to be watching during this time especially as a slight tick in the line at this time usually cannot be felt, but can easily be seen. That tick is a bite. Here's a few hints that will help you catch more bass while worm fishing - 1) fish at least twice as slow as you think you should, 2 stop and let the bait sit in the same place for ten to fifteen seconds at a time after every few casts, then see if youcan move it less than 6 inches, and 3) while the worm is where you think the fish are try no to move it more than 6" at a time (most will move the worm 3 to 4 feet) and 4) in water less than 2 feet deep flipor pitch the worm gently so that it makes a very quiet entry into the water.

I fished with the Jacksonville Bassmasters for a while when I lived there in the early 1980s. The club went to several lakes where there was no ramp, just drop your boat off the side of the bank - not good. I had stuff stolen from my boat several times at club tournaments, so I dropped out. Things may be much better now. I have fished with numerous clubs over the past 35 years and here's what I recommend. Join a club with a lot of members, including many without boats. Clubs exist for club tournaments and the only fair ones are where boaters and nonboaters are drawn immediately before the tournament. Not having enough no-boaters is a frequent problem. Unless you are a big stick (a proven tournament fisherman for at least ten years) consider going to tournaments as a no boater, even if you have a nice boat. You will learn a lot from some and a little something from everyone and you will make some friends. No boaters rarely last more than a year or two unless they are consistently lucky in the draw for boaters, but some are lucky and when they draw the right boaters who can put them on fish they have a much better chance at winning than the boater and will win every time they are of equal skill simply because they don't have to take care of the boat all day (after the second time a no boater won a tournament from the back of my boat I started making my no boaters take care of the boat for 50% of the time). But then there's nothing worse than drawing a dud boater (and I was good at drawing duds. Here's a tournament story, the club and members names are withheld to protect the guilty - a tournament is coming up at a lake known for large fish and one where I have done well in previous years. Anyway, one of the real legends of the club calls me and asks if I will go as his no boater and prefish the day before as he has never seen the lake. I accept immediately even though I know all he has a commercial jon boat with a 20 horse Merc and an old Pfleuger trolling motor hung on the side, not half as good as my rig at the time. Anyway, we find the fish in a shallow stumpfield where I have caught fish before and we rape the fish the day before the tournament - catching and releasing well over 100 bass and both of us would have had ten fish limits close to 50 lbs. that day. The next day I draw an old guy in a big Tidecraft that must weight 4,000 lbs. and we can't get within 3 long casts of the stumpfield where the fish are and by 7:30 AM his trolling motor battery that he forgot to recharge after his last trip is dead and he insists on going to the Marina to recharge the battery. Anyway we sit there for 3 hours waiting for the battery to recharge and then find it has a bad cell and won't hold a charge and he won't buy one from the Marina because they are too high and insists on just waiting at the Marina for the tournament to end. Anyway, I did catch two fish early that got me like 40th place, but my prefishing partner won it with 47 lbs. I have some even worse horror stories than that too. Never fish for money in a club tournament unless its chicken feed to you - lots of cheating happens and a lot of bad feelings can result. If you're a no boater, bring a small tacklebag, your own life vest, no more than 4 rods, and your own food and drinks. Insist on fishing half the day where you want and how you want, but let the boater have first choice of times - a good guy will let you have the front end during your time, but will probably operate the boat while the outboard is running.

The Superfrog is not hollow, its a foam that floats so that just the top 1/3 of the frog is out of water (like a real frog). The downward pointing hook has an excellent weed guard and it rarely gets hung up.

To fish the edges of canals where fish are known to be, I would have 6 methods to try - 1) flip a 1/4 oz jig and pig (full size pork frog, I prefer blue), 2) pitch a 6" worm with a 3/16" oz weight (blue again), 3) a floating, deep diving (6-8') crankbait (blue and chartruese with an orange belly, and 4) a white 3/8 oz spinnerbait with a single chrome colorado blade (or a tandem gold and chrome), 5) a noisy top water and 6) a quiet topwater. Between dark and the time the sun comes up use the top waters. If there is some wind or chop in the water use the noisy one, other wise use the quieter one. keep the bait between the bank and the point where the drop off into the channel occurs. Try the spinnerbait and crank baits first (they're faster to fish) by throwing as close to the bank as possible. If it looks like you're spooking fish or not getting any strikes more than a few feet off the bank, switch to the jig&pig or worm. Look for shaded areas or the shady side of the canal when the sun is fully up. Sometimes fish have there nose right up at the edge of the bank and you have to throw onto the bank and pull the bait slowly into the water to avoid spooking them. I have caught dozens of fish off a canal bank by throwing on the bank first when I couldn't buy a strike on the same lure softly flipped into the water.

You are not rigging the bait quite right if you are getting hung up frequently and you are not checking your bait often enough. If the water level fluctuates, the pad will grow to the highest level the water reaches so that at high water the pad is not under water. Thus, when the water is not at its highest level pads will someimes stick up out of the water, especially in water less than 3 feet deep where the lenght of the pad stem isn't enough to give it flexibility. Where water levels fluctuate, high water and rising water is generally the best time to fish shoreline cover like lily pads.

You should only go in winter if you like to catch large numbers of fish or very large fish. Here's some hints - 1) never go when its wet (snowing, sleeting or raining, no matter how light) and under 50 degrees as it will be miserable, 2) calm days with bright sunshine are best when the high is at least 35 degrees, 3) when you find one fish, there will always be many, don't keep looking, 4) feeding fish are just as agressive in cold water as in 70 degree water, they just won't move as fast or fiught as hard, 5) fish are more spooky in winter, be quiet in the boat and make your lure presentations quiet (pitching or flipping work well), 6) drop offs on creek channels is my #1 winter spot, 7) jig and pig (real pork) in black and blue is my #1 lure, 8 ) spinnerbaits work on shallow channels, and crankbaits worked slow and steady also will work, 9) a plastic worm in black with a flourescent red tail always works for me in small waters during winter, 10) look for fish where you find them at other times of the year, except big shallow flats with no close by deeper water.

If you want to fish with food, try a licorice stick. A closely related flavor, anise, was the most popular addition to fishing lures before garlic. Then of course in the 1970's there were the jelly worms sold in fruit flavors. And also in the later 70's was the Action worm that smelled of cinnamon. Of course, hot dogs would be illegal in a tournament and most of us prefer not to use anything that wouldn't be tournament legal.

Look at new boat prices, holdeover (prior year, new boats) prices, and used prices. Look at goegraphical availability. I have owned over a dozen bass boats and here's my take on fiberglass: 1) Ranger 2) Triton 3) Skeeter 4) Allison 5) Nitro 6) Procraft After that it falls off fast, mainly because of the local or regional nature of many manufacturers. On aluminum, my guess is: 1) G3 (Skeeter), 2) Tracker 3) Fisher 4) Lowe 5) Lund 6) Polar Kraft I have owned or fished in many good boats that are no longer in business, and I happen to place a lot of importance now on how long the comapny has been around. I once had a Venture that I loved and have no idea why they folded. I always had excellent luck with Mercury outboards, but then I never had any trouble with Evinrudes or Johnsons. Never had any in the shop. Because of numerous stories of how Mercuy's Optimax outboards were all in the shop, I bought a Yamaha with my last rig and I have had several minor mechanical problems with it and it has never run like it should. Plus, it was sold to me during a period when Yamaha offered an extra two years of warranty or a $1,000 savings bond - I never got either despite contacting the dealer and Yamaha repeatedly. I'll never buy another Yamaha. Right now it looks like I'll keep my present boat (a G3 HP190) and add hydraulic steering and a Mercury outboard if and when I have any more problems with the Yamaha.

I have a 1998 Chevy CK2500 LWB 4x4 with a towing package that is used almost exclusively for boat towing. My boat is a 2002 HP190 G3 on a tandem trailer and a 1/2 ton pickup just won't handle it. I sometimes use a 2005 Z-71 Tahoe with a towing package for short trips. On boats that need tandem trailers, a 3/4 ton pickup or bigger is the only way to go. You only need 4x4 if you don't want to get stuck and it will happen when there is no one else around to help.

You'll love this! I called Lowrance's customer service number and after 15 minutes of phone mail hell and holding, I get this customer service rep named "Josh". I told Josh the reason I was calling was to get a return authorization code and I had altready sent in an email a week ago trying to get a return authorization code but did not get any response and he said "Yeah, we're busy." and he hung up on me.

I sent Lowrance an email a week ago requesting a return authorizarion to get my LCX-15mt fixed out of warranty and they still haven't replied. This is a unit that still is still in their product line up that sells new for about $1,200. I am used to getting fish finders fixed and back on my boat in far less time. Is Lowrance going out of business, or is it that they just don't care about their customers? The website says to allow two days, its now been seven. I have already decided to switch to RayMarine or Furuno and right now I leaning to RayMarine.

Flyrod's advice was good. Keep in mind that at night bass don't hold as tight to cover for shade or to ambush prey. If you fish near docks with lights, the lights attract bugs and baitfish and bass will hang well out of the light to catch prey coming and going. If you fish soft plastics, do so with light or no weights. Expect to catch most of your fish at dusk, dawn and one feeding period during the night. I suggest that once it gets dark you swap out sleeping periods with the caveat that when the person awake gets a bona fide strike he immediately wakes the other up as it may be the only feeding period of the night. Fish are not going to roam all over the lake at night, they will be in the same area where you would find them in the day and you need to stay there so you will be where there are fish ehn they start feeding.