Bluebasser86

Sounds like a good one for smaller jigs/plastics to me. Would probably also be a good spinnerbait/buzzbait rod.

6 good reasons and almost 23 pounds of reason to fish a cavitron.

Like he said, pull up the motors and drift if you can. I won a tourny last year fishing shallow weeds. My trolling motor was dead from the start so I just drifted and fished the weeds. I only caught a few fish but it was enough to win in a tough tourny.

I've always had tougher days the day before and the day after a full moon. I've always assumed this has to do with the increase in feeding after dark. It might be a mental thing too.

I had it happen to me less than a month ago. I bought a spool of Yo-Zuri Hybrid 10lb from TW for my shakeyhead rod because so many guys on here use it. The spool I got was terrible, kinked up stuff that I couldn't feel anything with at all. Plus I thought it was supposed to be low visibility but the stuff I got almost glowed under water and I could see my line at least 10 feet below the surface. I took it back off that night and threw it away. I'm sure I just got a bad spool but it made shy away from it now because I don't want to get another bad spool of it.

10lb Mustad Ultraline for cranks, jerks, and topwaters minus buzzbaits and frogs 14lb Mustad Ultraline Thor for traps, spinnerbaits, buzzbaits 10lb InviszX for shakeyheads 12 or 14lb InviszX for finesse jigs, T-rigs 17 or 20lb InviszX for big jigs, pitching, flipping 8lb nanofil with 8lb InviszX leader for grubs, senkos, ned rig, drop shot 65lb PP for frogs, c-rigs, flipping grass 25lb Pline xtra strong for swimbaits, A-rig

I don't use trailers often, when I do it's a grub. Only time I use trailer hooks is if I'm using a trailer or if I'm fishing for smallmouths because of their tendency to run into a bait without opening their mouths. I like a 6' 6" M/F but the one I'm using is a St.Croix so it's closer to other rods MH.

KVD 1.5, H2O, Luck E Strike series 3, Lucky Craft 1.5, Bandit 100, Xcaliber 100, all great baits. I have both rattling and silent models for different uses. Rattling for aggressive fish/dirty water/weeds, silent for pressured fish/clear water/cold water.

Looks like a good time to me. I'd much rather catch a few solid fish than a whole bunch of dinks.

It might be post spawn or it might be from the fishing pressure you're putting on such a small body of water. The ponds we fish around here if you fish them a couple days a week for a few weeks in a row it will get tougher and tougher each week. You might want to make a rotation where you leave a pond or two alone for a couple weeks at a time and then switch it up and leave a couple other ponds alone for awhile. Make sure you wear clothes that blend in well with your surroundings and move slowly and quietly, fish in ponds are more in tune with their surroundings and subtle changes or disturbances can shut them down completely. Often times when I catch bigger fish from ponds it's after I've been standing still in the same area for an extended period of time and making repeated casts.

I'll be on my favorite smallie lake the 5th-7th. It has produced the last 2 state records within the last 10 years and I know there is another one in there, hopefully I'll find her this weekend Only problem will be I'm not sure how much night fishing my dad will be willing to do

They are amazing birds to see. We are starting to get a pretty good population of them around here. My dad actually works near the Missouri River and after the floods receeded last year there was tons of fish stuck in pools in the fields near the river. At one point he counted over 50 bald eagles I believe that were grouped around the pools were the fish were at. I think he got a couple pictures of them, if I can find them I'll try to get them up.

I got hungry reading that article..

Perry is almost always pretty muddy. Even at it's best you might get 2 or 3 feet of visibility. Dark colored baits that move slow are almost always the key for me out there. retro, I've had a couple of really, really good days with a zell pop this spring already and have caught some one a buzzbait and a frog too. I'm confident I would have broken the 100 fish mark at Miami Monday if I would have just stuck with a Zell Pop, they were hitting it almost every cast but the size was not there. Plus I was having way too much fun smacking them around with a swimbait It's pretty awesome when you're tossing a 5" swimbait and a fish eats it so deep you can't even see the thing anymore.

I've done it several times, it really hurts when it's an expensive bait or one you have high hopes for. I lost my first Spro Little John crank within the first 30 minutes and after only catching maybe 4 or 5 fish on it.

Not saying you shouldn't study the fish, you should for sure, but imo there is nothing that is more important than time on the water assuming you have some basic knowledge of what you're doing already. If someone is just starting out and has never picked up a fishing rod in their life then I'd agree that reading up is going to be more important too you. I'm sure it all depends on what type of learner you are. I have to do something to learn it, reading it does little for me.

Fish as much as possible. Reading about something and then actually making it work on the lake is much easier said than done in most cases. You won't catch many fish sitting at home reading about it or watching a tv show about it either.

If it's big enough I can't swing it in then I like to use a net. Trying to lip a fish with a faceful of hooks can be very painful. Mainly keep pressure on the fish until you get ahold of them or get them in the net.

I'll be at Big Cedar with my wife May 20-22 for our anniversary.

Fished Cedar Lake for about 2 hours before work today. It was a little rough with all the wind in my little jon boat but I managed 6 fish from 8 inches to 16.5 inches. 2 on a Havoc Pit Boss, 2 on a homemade chatterbait, and 2 on a H2O squarebill. Pit Boss caught the 2 biggest, squarebill caught the 2 smallest, chatterbait caught the two middlest

Hope they are still biting like that when I'm down there in a couple weeks . Sounds like you're getting them pretty good!

I had a PQ and two of my buddies have them and none of us like them. They seem to be a very finicky reel with their settings, at least the one I had was. I could cast the same bait 20 times with mine and it would work perfect, cast 21 it would blow up for no apparent reason. Both of my friends have the same problems. Other than that it was a good reel but more of a hassle and headache than I was willing to deal with.

Grubs, split tail trailers, half a trick worm, flukes.

I'm liking them more and more. That new pumpkinseed color does look good! I smacked some nice fish with it the other day.

I read a study somewhere awhile back that fishes mouths feel pressure but not pain. That's why if you're reeling a fish in and let slack into your line they will often swim off slowly because the pressure stopped. I couldn't see something like a crawdad being a very appealing meal if you could feel those pinchers and sharp legs stabbing into their mouth. I fish purely for fun and rarely keep anything. I see zero problems with fishing for fun as long as you don't mistreat the fish and you do what you can to get the fish back in the water and in good shape. Some fish you catch will die, no mistaking that. However, every fish will die eventually and some of them may not have lived much longer anyways. Who's to say a big flathead was sneaking down the log you just caught that 5 pounder off of and you pulled it away from danger?