Bluebasser86

White cats have a pretty limited range but a lot of people around here call blue cats white cats because they're usually really light colored when they catch them out of the rivers. White cats can be caught using similar techniques as you'd use for channel cats, blues will big better on fresh cut bait instead of stinkbait or liver. I'd suggest catching a couple gills and cutting them up for bait, you'll catch either kind of cat with that.

Pics not uploading for me either...

Big flatheads and blues will eat tiny baits. I caught a 23lb flathead on a Yo-Zuri Killifish crankbait fishing for crappie in a pond. I think they're 1 3/8" long? A friend of mine caught his PB 60+lb flathead on a 3" sunfish fishing for channels. Most guys that use the wad of nightcrawlers are fishing in areas with lots of small channels/bluegills/drum or other bait stealers. The big ball of crawlers is to prevent you from having to reel in constatntly to rebait. Plus the big ball of nightcrawlers will appeal to bigger flats more often than a single one will.

Nice fish! I'll be happy to get a 42" (legal size) fish when I chase them around next month!

Depends a lot on the spinnerbait too. I'm not going to use the same rod to fish a 1/4oz spinnerbait in tight quarters around standing timber as I would if I was making long casts with a 1oz bait along a point or flat. If I had to pick an all purpose spinnerbait rod it would probably be a 6' 6" MH fast action rod with a 6.3:1 gear ratio loaded with 15 or 17 pound test.

We used to catch big bullfrogs on purpose with grubs on a plain hook. They fight great on a light rod and frog legs taste great! Those big ones like that do have a smell to them sometimes though.

I make crawdad traps out of milk jugs. Cut just under the mouth of a milk jug and bury it in the mud. Put a fish head or chicken livers in it overnight. The crawdads can't climb back out and it's hard for them to swim back out the small hole in the top but it's big enough for even the biggest crawdads to get into. Poke some holes in the bottom so the water drains when you pull it out of the mud and you're good to go!

I use thin craft wire to wrap mine. You can get several yards of it from craft stores for a couple dollars. It probably rusts eventually but I've never managed to keep a jig long enough to find out

If they don't replace the rod you could put a new tip on it. Figure out what size tip would fit your rod (there is a special tool that makes this really simple). Get the right sized tip and some rod repair glue. I would remove that last guide because it's so close to where the new tip would be. Just use a lighter to carefully heat the wrap on the guide until the epoxy gets soft enough to remove the guide. Use pliers because the guide will be very hot. After the guide is gone you should be able to peel away the rest of the thread and epoxy. They just heat the rod repair glue and set the tip. It will be a few inches shorter but still fishable.

A fluke can be deadly on a C-rig also!

I think that depends where you come from. A 5 pounder is almost half our state record, and even though I've caught a bunch of them, when I catch one I'm going to be bragging about it

Great baits but for me they seem to either really want them or I can't buy a strike. I like them around weeds and docks fished pretty quickly. White with a chartruese trailer or black and blue with a black trailer are my favorite colors.

I like the Bomber Fat Free Shad and Strike King Silent Series 5. I liked the 6XD but so did a snag that was too deep for my lure retriever to reach.

Johnson Silver Minnow, I just push a single or twin tail grub onto the wire weedguard and hide the hookpoint a little. They come through weeds and timber great for me.

For the most part the people that catch big fish are fishing for big fish or at least in an area where big fish may be. You can go out and fish a standard sized bait, beating the banks with the crowds, and still catch a big fish once in awhile. The guys that catch the big fish study the lake, study the fish, and know the perfect storm of all the variables that equal success, and prove it time and time again. Bigger baits can help, but it doesn't take a footlong worm to catch a 10 pound fish. It's a different mindset too. You may not get as many bites if you decide to go fish for big fish but when you do get bit it's usually worth the effort!

Man when my wife says I have long nose hairs and starts to come at me with the tweezers I run and hide like the dog when he hears someone say "vet".

They're actually putting a plan into action to start using them for food at homeless shelters from what I've heard. I guess when it's ground up it's supposed to taste similar to canned tuna? I really can not imagine that but I think putting them to use at homeless shelters is a great idea, except most places they live you aren't supposed to eat the fish. They're thick in the rivers around here but the state says not to eat the fish from the rivers. I could see it now, someone at one of those shelters getting cancer and it linking back to the fish they've been feeding them and sueing the shelter

@Bird dog-I'd guess that the coal pits in OK are pretty similar to the ones in KS. The nice thing about the ones in KS is that my brother-in-law goes to Pitt St so I have a free place to stay when I go down there. I've fished Cedar Bluff a couple times but the lack of water out there has really hurt that lake from what I've heard. It used to take 20+ pounds to win out there, last time I fished it took 13. We ran to a spot to fish a brushpile on top of a rockpile that I'd done well C-rigging in the past. We looked and looked and I looked on the shore for anything familiar. I found something familiar, my brushpile was 10 feet from the edge of the water! I don't know if it's still that far down but I know most clubs around here stopped going out there because of the low water. I looked at Hudson lake, looks pretty good from what I can tell. It might get my intrest up enough to make the drive down there. @retsgm-sent you a PM about Hazel Creek. I'll probably be out there in September sometime so if you're interested in meeting me out there I might be able to share my limited knowledge of the lake.

I know what you mean about the muskie fishing! It's hard enough to fish a bucktail or weedless spinnerbait with them hubcap sized blades for long but then they had to go and put 2 of them on the same bait?! The bad thing is how well they work so you really just have to deal with it or maybe not catch as many fish.

Fish them like you would any other plastic worm, it's the action of that big tail that gets them!

Very nice smallmouth, and a ton of fun on topwater! My wife is the same way, she has to approve a picture that she's in before I can put it up. I always have to remind her it's fishing, not a beauty competition.

For me it depends on the lake I'm fishing. Most of the lakes that are within 30 minutes of me if you catch a 3 pounder it's a big fish. For the lakes that I go to on my days off that are around an hour away it's pretty common to catch at least one 4 or 5 pounder a trip. I wish I had some good lakes with more big fish close by. Some days I start to think about going fishing for a couple hours close by but when you know that chances are all you're going to catch are 10-15 inch fish it just doesn't seem worth the hassle of loading and unloading the boat.

Why can't I ever find any deals like that around here? Oh yeah, because all I have around here is BPS and Cabela's and they never put big name reels on sale.

If you don't have wire or wire ties some braided line works in a pinch.

There is a decent number of them in Table Rock, at least I've seen enough of them to seem like there is. I don't think there is any documented cases of them getting that big though, the Missouri record is listed at 4 3/4lbs as far as I can find. Don't know why a hybrid couldn't get that big since both parent fish get bigger than 8 pounds. Here's a picture for reference. http://www.google.com/imgres?q=mean+mouth+bass+pics&hl=en&safe=active&sa=X&rlz=1R2ADFA_enUS427&biw=1280&bih=792&tbm=isch&prmd=ivnsfd&tbnid=KPixQITFIFw8IM:&imgrefurl=http://bellbucksnbeards.proboards.com/index.cgi%253Fboard%253Dbass%2526action%253Dprint%2526thread%253D1669&docid=b4CxfxmXvMF6qM&w=620&h=494&ei=rktOTq26Goqhtwe_iYWxBw&zoom=1&iact=rc&dur=469&page=1&tbnh=147&tbnw=165&start=0&ndsp=23&ved=1t:429,r:2,s:0&tx=64&ty=87