Bluebasser86

The St. Croix Mojo 6' 8" M/F is one of the best wacky rig rods I've ever owned. I've had it since they first introduced the Mojo lineup and it's the only one that I kept of the several I tried.

I have the 7' 3" H/XF casting Victory and really like it. Caught one of my biggest bass of the year on it last year which also happened to be the biggest bass I've ever caught on one of my homemade jigs.

My wife has an older Quantum Energy PT 20 on her St. Croix Avid Pearl because she liked the holographic finish on it. It's been a good reel for her but it's been used less in the 10 years she's owned it than most of mine get used in a season.

Just like any other bait, a lot of variables go into deciding how I'm going to fish my glides. That's a lot of hardware you put on the front of that little bait, and no doubt is effecting how it works. The spinning on the cast is only going to cause minimal line twist and I wouldn't be so worried about it that I'd want to add a bunch of weight to a small glide like that. My best day of glide bait fishing this year, I was fishing the bait very fast.

Had a slow weekend, only caught maybe 10-12 fish with most being small, but I did get 2 nice ones. Biggest was 5.52lbs and excuse the background, prefishing for a tournament and there was some pretty distinct landmarks in the background. Tried real hard to get myself stuck a couple times too.

Doesn't matter how many times you change colors at a bad location, if there's no fish the bait won't make a difference. Put the wrong bait in a location with a lot of fish and there's still a good chance one might eat it.

Short staffed like every LE agency across the country. We're about 55 short right now. Those hours all break policy but they're okay with it because we're at "emergency staffing levels". I usually sleep a couple hours, go to work, come home and sleep a few more hours, go back to work, repeat until the weekend when I get a few more hours of consecutive sleep if I don't have OT.

What do your shifts look like? I worked midnights for 10 years and got a lot of time to fish then. I switched to days this year with a new position at work (almost 15 year LEO), and it killed my fishing time. I've had a lot of days that I work 9-5, come back in at 10pm and work until 2am, get back up and go back to work at 9. Now we have to cover hospital duty on our weekends. Got that a couple weeks ago, worked 9-6, slept a couple hours, came back in at 10pm and was out there until 6am. It's just so much more hectic.

Don't let it hit bottom and it won't get snagged nearly as often. The swim/shake/glide retrieve is what I use most and it rarely touches bottom then.

Junk fishing. It's really tough to get on a good pattern on most of our lakes, so being ready for whatever you run into next is important to catching fish here, so I'm already for anything.

Wish I hadn't bought the Ranger boat I had. It was a money pit that never ran. Sold it for what I bought it for after putting hundreds into fixing it and never got to use the outboard more than a trip without something going wrong.

I've been really impressed with how well the Booyah Melee comes through cover, much better than any bladed jig I've used. I think the head design allows it to roll over cover instead of into it like most others do. https://www.tacklewarehouse.com/Booyah_Melee_Vibrating_Jig/descpage-BYMVJ.html

Slider Pro head https://www.tacklewarehouse.com/Charlie_Brewers_Spider_Classic_Pro_Darter_Head_4pk/descpage-CBSCPH.html Not exactly the standard shakyhead, but it's a killer way to rig a finesse worm.

I already have an Avid 6' UL, but those look really nice too.

One of you flip a jig and one of you run a 130 plopper, I'd probably go with a black one. I like to get in the back of the arms around the dam but I don't fish LOZ a ton so take that fwiw.

I have some large cut rubber I use to get lots of flare from my jig skirts, kind of a mop jig look. They really like it at times. I like the flat cut rubber for spinnerbaits.

Mine is a locally made one by Black Canoe Balsa. The guy makes them in his garage and it's been a really good bait for me.

Clear JJ's. The smell sticks with the bait forever to cover up unwanted scents.

Overthinking things and missing the obvious details that are right in front of me.

Went on a short fishing trip with a good buddy this past weekend, Friday-Sunday. Went to a lake out in the western part of Kansas that he'd never been to but wanted to go to and camped. Friday started out pretty good other than the storms and 30mph winds. Then the storms passed and it got flat calm and hot, then more storms rolled in and it got really windy again, we just couldn't really get any decent weather, but probably had a 20ish pound bag for the day. This 3+ pound smallmouth had the 4.5lb largemouth follow it to the boat while I was fighting it, dropped a YUM FFS minnow on it and she ate that, so I gave Jon the rod with the smallmouth and landed the largemouth. Sunday was flat calm and tough, a buzzbait was about all we could get bit on until the wake boats started up, then nothing worked. We decided to pull up camp and go to a different lake about 2 hours closer to home. The fishing was tough there for smallmouth too, I only caught 1 decent fish, the rest were well short of being 15". The highlight of this lake was the catfish bite. We didn't have a campsite so we parked the boat on a gravel bar and slept there with the catfish rods out. I didn't really sleep because they were going off so constantly. Not sure how many I caught but it was all 3 species up to 20lbs. Sunday was flat calm and tough again. We were leaving at noon but today I put a dragging rod out for blues while we were bass fishing. It did nothing until about 11 when a little 5lb blue ate it. I almost didn't put it back out but figured I would anyways. Not 5 minutes later it slammed down and ripped drag for a good bit. The fish gave Jon quite the fight before I got it in the net. Ended up being his PB 21.5lb blue to end the trip.

I went on a plane 3 times with a Bazooka tube and didn't have any issues until the trip home the 3rd trip. They took the C clip out that holds the tube extended out and kept it I guess. Thankfully my rods were rigid enough that they supported the tube and didn't break or take any major damage.

Use to be some really nice ones from a company called Bass Craft if you can find any of those. They went out of business I guess so it will have to be from the auction sites or just get lucky to find one.

My MH Mad Katz rod is rated up to 10oz. It also weighs more than most of my bass rod and reel combos combined in just the rod. That Aird X is a great rod for the money.

I use straight flouro on my shakyhead rod. It's 8lb Tatsu and has been on there since last fall. 3000 size Tatula LT with 8lb Big Game backing.

Fished the Kansas River again Sunday. Was over a foot lower than last week, which it was already low. I'm thinking a lot of the fish probably headed down river to avoid getting trapped, I was plagued by turtles and gar all day. I started trying to catch bait at an inflow, caught 2 wipers and kept 1 for cutbait that swallowed the hook and died from the fight. I don't know how many good bites and runs I had that I thought were catfish until I finally realized they were gar, but it was a lot. Finally hooked a few, lost most of them, but I did get a gar double, it was better than nothing I guess.