deep

I bought 2 Pinnacle Perfecta MH cranking rods last season, and still have one of them. It's difficult to lose a fish on these rods. These are 7'8" long, and suitable for .75 to 1.25 oz deep-divers, irrespective of whatever the lure rating says. Retailed for $170 when I got them.

Good show buddy. Next you might want to get some rattle-traps (if it's not too snaggy), a few spinnerbaits, and a couple of topwater poppers. If nothing is working, pick up a bag of GY senkos or a bag of GY Fat Ikas and fish them slowly.

Anything and everything works for me, so long it's not flashy or translucent. I fish stained waters a lot, and have little to no confidence in those. If you want just one color, it's gotta be "sexy shad" though.

I'll start with some of the books I enjoyed. KVD's book: A general bass fishing book. I love it how he breaks down everything methodically. Ike's book: More of a personal journey in the fishing world for the man, he's sort of my hero. Sowbelly: Stories of the hunt for the world-record bass by some very contrasting characters. The BBZ, Bill Siemantel: You gotta buy this book even if you have no intention to catch a really big bass (who doesn't?) Murphy's book: Same as above I'll confess that I'm not the person who likes to learn from books. I'd rather buy a few different bait types, and fish them in different ways to see how they work, and how they can be worked (bit of a difference there). With that said, whether you are just starting out, or a seasoned bass angler, the articles on this site would be of great help to anyone. So I'd recommend starting with those.

It's the bite for me. I fish plastics and jigs a lot, mostly on slack line. The line jumping or moving off, or that subtle tick is what I fish for. Of course, it doesn't help that most of the time I catch only little 12" to 15" bass. Even with rattle-traps, which is my favorite bait, feeling the bite just after I ripped it through some grass is hard to beat IMO. Besides, I read that 90% of bass fishing is finding the right location. Getting the bite confirms my choice of location, whether I land that fish or not.

Bill took me out today on Lake Monticello. We started at 10.00 and got off the lake by 6.00 in the evening. Bill must have pulled out at least 30 bass, most in the 2-3 lbs range. I caught an even dozen of bass, and a pickerel too. First pickerel I ever caught! Once again, thank you for your generosity Bill. I enjoyed the experience a lot. It's the best fishing I had this year.

Update: I just didn't dig the translucent green, especially on the right side of the mouth, so I dabbed some red spots on either side, and sealed it in with mend-it. I took it out to my local lake to see how well it swims. I was pleased with the action at low speeds, but anything faster than a agonizingly slow bottom-bouncing retrieve would cause it to swim slightly sideways. I threw it along with a new ultimate BG to confirm that. That turtle and my subsequent repairs definitely killed some of the swimming action. It sits on its nose perfectly though; even when I jerked it off the bottom, it came down and settled like it should. I think I'll use it more for a jigging sort of retrieve, which is more or less the idea with the ultimate BGs anyway.

Don't match your set-up to your quarry. Match it with the cover, and then your lure. I have caught my share of 5+ bass on a light spinning rod, and contrary to popular opinion, it's not any more harmful to the fish (ask Fish Chris). I have also caught more than my (fair) share of dinks on MH casting rods.

A fortnight or so back, a turtle decided to chew on a brand new ultimate BG. This is how the bluegill looked after getting a bite taken off it. I shaved off some green plastic from a Berkely Chigger Craw, and superglued and mend-it-ed the strips bit by bit and reconstructed the mouth and redid the eyes. I got the profile more or less correct, and the lure sits nose down like it's supposed to, and swims more or less okay, at least in my bath-tub The problem I have is the mouth portion is now translucent, and of a very different color than adjacent areas. Any ideas how I could fix that? Any other ideas? Thanks.

When I had a PQ (sold it), I had one centri brake on, 5 off, and the mag brakes at zero. I never throw anything less than 0.5 oz on a baitcaster though. When I'm shooting for distance, I use the sidearm cast. Makes it easy (for me at least) to shoot the bait 50-60 yards out. When accuracy is what I want, in the 25-30 yards range, I use a sort of lob overhead cast. The direction of the rod swing throws the bait in the precise direction, and the thumb controls the distance. P.S. Don't do much pitching or flipping.

I have a Powell Max 7'3" M/XF that I use for those techinques, minus the spinners, and plus finesse jigs. It cost me $170. I wanted a light and sensitive rod. For the reel, I have a cheapo Shimano Sonora (less than $50). It has a decent drag though, and I haven't faced any problems with it. I didn't see any need to put a 100 dollar reel, since the bait is sitting still most of the time anyway. The total comes up to a little under $220, and you can buy a pack or two of senkos with the leftover

This is my local lake, so I fish it a lot. IMO this lake has a severe problem of overpopulation and stunting. There are a lot of bluegill/ crappie fishermen, and I've seen them carry away HUGE stringers. I've never caught any bass out of this lake that can be remotely called fat, and only a few that I'd call healthy. Out of the several hundred bass I caught out of this lake last year, there was only one 8 pounder, and a couple of 3+. All three were quite skinny. That, I believe, says something. If the bigger fish can't find much to eat, I can guess that the smaller ones are starving.

I haven't really fished jigs since last summer. I'd rather use a T-rigged weightless plastic where other people would use a (casting) jig. With the water quite cold, the recent front and everything, and the price of senkos as they are, I decided to try my hand at jigs the last three days at my local lake (fishing from the shore). Setup: 3/8 oz Stanley finesse jig, came pre-rigged with a craw trailer, Powell Max 7'3" MXF spinning, Shimano Sonora, 6/30 Daiwa Samurai mainline with 10 lb Stren Fluorocast leader. Caught about 10 fish on this combo over the last three days, including a 3 pounder. Nothing big, but then I was fishing from the shore. I'd guess a lot of the big ones are deeper now. I fished the jig almost like a T-Rigged plastic; cast it out, let it sink, let it sit for 10+ seconds, give it one twitch or a gentle pull, and let it sit some more, repeat. That simple technique caught most of the fish. I got them on the deeper side of a creek-channel drop in a cove. A couple of the fish were caught while swimming the jig. Actually I was fishing it like a spinnerbait really. Yo-yoing, or jerking the jig, and letting it sink. I also caught a little 12" guy on a 1/2 oz Booyah Boo jig with a Yamamoto flapping hog trailer. And I thought jigs caught bigger fish only

Good show man. Keep at it.

Not sure if this is relevant, but I had a quantum PT superlight MHXF spinning. It was very tip-heavy.

According to the huddleston website, that bait is 1.5 oz. With a regular MH bass rod (not MH swimbait rod), he might not have the hooksetting power.

First off, I like really limp lines, mono and braid, Sufix Siege and Daiwa Samurai to be more precise. I had 17 lb Siege on my swimbait setup. I spooled mono because I wanted to fish both bottom bouncers and topwaters on the same setup. It worked for me for a while, although I lost a few hudds and a couple of Mattlures. I fish swimbaits in a very rocky lake. Very abrasion resistant for a mono, and very strong (I once pulled out a 7 feet tree stump with a hudd, and bent out hooks on two baits), at the end of the day, the leading few feet of the line would be rough to the touch. Not fraying, but just rough. On Randall's advice, I switched to fluoro. Not because I lost confidence in my Siege, but I wanted to play safe. I figured that the water is still cold, and I throw soft baits 90% of the time anyway. The last 2 swimbait trips, my Curado 301E was spooled with 20 lb Spiderwire Ultracast FC, which has the same stated diameter as the 17 lb Siege. The revelations? Initially, out of the box, I found the Ultracast to be very stiff. Remember, I like limp lines. A bit of KVD L&L took care of that. Now it's still stiff compared to mono, but not to the extent that I'd absolutely not fish with it. I need way more thumbing on casts, but still get great casting distance. The plus points? The rocks didn't even scratch the line at the end of an 8 hour day. I'm in contact with the bait, always. I had the same feeling when I was using Siege, but it's like 10 times magnified now. And I haven't lost a single bait to snags the last 2 trips. (I haven't caught any bass either, but that's another matter ) I hate the Spiderwire braids, and I never tried their monos. But IMO they have a winner in their fluorocarbon line. My finesse setup used to be rigged with 6 lb Ultracast FC (now it's Samurai + leader). I settled on Ultracast FC for a while after trying a bunch of FCs, including Invizx. Not ultra-manageable like Invizx, but not uber-stretchy either. Just the right combination of sensitivity and manageability, for me anyway. When I was looking for a FC for my swimbait reel, I tried Ultracast FC first, I haven't been disappointed. P.S. I'm not sponsored by anyone, including Spiderwire, in any way. I don't see too much love for my favorite FC on the forum, and I thought I'd share my recent findings.

Just to clarify, the original post was made in half jest, half frustration. I was just PO-ed that this happened on the third cast with the new bait.

It hasn't got a mouth at all, and it doesn't sit on the bottom like it's supposed to, just flops over; and swims on its side. I got a couple of old really beat up trout baits. I'll try to cut off the mouth from one of them and glue it to this one, and see how it works out. That turtle already ate one of my original soft bluegills. If that didn't kill him, I wonder if this little piece of plastic will.

It swims on its side, probably due to its present non-aerodynamic nature. It doesn't even sit properly on the bottom, it just flops on its side.

First read the first post in this topic: http://www.bassresource.com/bass_fishing_forums/YaBB.pl?num=1299975720/2#2 Jumpcut to this afternoon at almost the same location. Set hook on an ultimate bluegill bite, I get this back: The ultimate bluegill looks like an ultimate piranha now. I contacted Matt, and this is what he said. "Hi Maiti I have seen this before and I am posative I know what caused it. You had a turtle bite the face of the lure off. That type of clean half cilcle cut can only come from something cutting into it and I have seen several that look just like yours. Guys have actualy seen turtles bite them like that." This turtle has already made me lose 40 bucks, and I'm a poor man. I want revenge!

T-rigged with an weighted hook? If so, what's the weight on the hook? I'll be using this in/ near the back of coves with a bunch of grass and weeds. The water depth is probably 5 - 10 feet max. One of the reasons I like weightless is that a weighted hook gathers up all the trash on the bottom.

I picked up a bag of these in 6" on clearance from Walmart. I thought I'd give YUM plastics another try. If anyone has used this particular bait, some tips would be great. I was thinking about weightless T-rigging, which is my go-to with worms. Is it heavy enough to rig weightless? Pitching or drop-shotting might be good options too, what do you think? Also, should I use a swivel to cut out on line twist? I don't use a swivel with senkos, and it has worked out fine for me. The only baits I actually use a swivel with are zoom flukes. Of course, I'm throwing these forked dingers on a spinning set-up.

Good show buddy. I still remember my first BC bass, came on a spinnerbait. I was just practicing casting, so I was burning the SB back without working it. I was hugely surprised when a little bass, not much bigger than the 1/2 oz bait, ate it.

HAHA I tasted mine too! Actually did a taste comparison and they tasted pretty salty haha. And of course they swore they were the original baits its highly illegal to conterfeit goods! For a price that cheap I would be highly suspicious. I should have worded that differently. I bought 70 senkos (or senko style baits), all of the same color, and they came in a ziploc bag, and I paid 20$ shipped.