Kevin22

I am a huge fan of power pro 4lb braid on my UL rods. Talk about sensitivity! The stuff is listed as <1lb diameter, it is like hair! I tested the breaking strength and found nearly 7#! The stuff is strong as heck and very very very sensitive to crappie up-bites when throwing 1/64-1/80 jigs.

14# mono is the all around line IMO. You can use it for anything.

I have tried the original fused many times and just did not care for it. I would take power pro braid over it hands down. If you have never seen power pro, go take a look... walmart carries it. It is very round, very smooth, and very sensitive. Only downside I have found is that it loses its color quick, which does not make any difference to me. I sharpie the last foot of the line usually.

I have some and really like them! They are a simple design and simple colors but there is something about them that makes them just flat out catch fish. On your c-rig, try wacky rigging them. I know it sounds crazy right? give it a shot and you will be surprised.

Heck yeah, I used to do real well with some smaller custom made buzzfrogs on smallies. Also, don't tell anybody... but I caught several off of a banjo frog I found floating down the river.

First you need to realize, sponsors do not care about you unless you can make money for them. They are not going to sponsor you just to advertise on your shirt, they want a staffer that can sell product. You need to make them more money than they spend on you, A LOT more. This is ALL about money, nothing else. A big company does not care about someone who posts about them on facebook, they want a big name that fishes BFL, FLW, or BASS and can get their logos on camera and in front of thousands of people. Anybody could post good things on facebook about a product. Also you need to realize there will be more to it than just saying good things online and wearing their logos. You will need to go to trade shows, outdoor shows, product demonstrations, free fishing clinics, and various other events. All of this on your dime working for them. I don't mean to be disrespectful but most companies do not want a young kid to represent them at events, thus they have no need for you. What you need to do at this point in your life is get a good education and do some fishing. In the mean time, shoot for the smaller guys and build yourself a reputation online with videos and reports. Take all of the English classes you can from now through college. You will need to be very well spoken or sponsors will not even consider you. You may start asking companies if they have a junior sponsorship program, some do. It is mostly for the young guys who fish youth tournaments and highschool tournaments. But be aware that a handful of free baits, or a $20 gift card is about all you are going to get from them. They do it for "charity" and to get their name out there. Most of them will be dropped like a hot rock as soon as they get out of the junior divisions unless they go directly to BFL, FLW or BASS. A good example is a local guy here. He DOMINATED the local tournaments for years, won FLW tournaments as a boater and is one of the best fishermen I have ever seen. You think he is fully sponsored? Not even close.

Welcome! I am also from Iowa. What area are you from?

hemostats to spread the band?

Try this, like I said.. on 6# fluoro. You will catch those shy fish a lot of the time. It just looks so natural in the water that they have to pick it up.

Make sure you are not "editing map" but are "adding favorites". That is the way it is on android. Edit map will put it on community layer for everyone to see, it is for adding community spots and hazards. Adding favorites is just for you.

I fished those last year, worked good. A few tips I have... 1. use two split rings. The one closest to the hook eye you tie your line to, the end one you put your weight on. This will let the weight free swing without catching your knot and the hook will lay flat. 2. use two different split rings. The one you will tie your line to (connected to the hook) you want a heavy duty x-strong stainless split ring. The one for your weight you want a light wire easy to bend split ring. 90% of the snags are your weight pinched between two rocks, this will allow the weak split ring to bend out and you will get your hook and bait back. 3. Use braided line. 30lb+ 4. drag it, don't jig it. Fish it like a football Here is a 4/0 5/8oz rig.

We use double rigs for white bass and crappie with two lures on one line, don't know why it would not be effective for drop shotting bass. Like previously said, check your local laws and tournament regulations if you are fishing a tourney.

If you can see them, then try going super finesse and slow fish them. Try a small weightless hook and small 4-5" finesse worm wacky rigged right in the center. Throw it 5-6 feet in front of the fish and let it sink to the bottom, then a little micro twitch to get the bait to move. He should come and inspect it, keep doing a very slight little twitch every few seconds until he picks it up. Spinning rod and 6# fluoro. Also if they are wide open banks (no tree cover behind you) wear light clothing, dark clothing and standing right on the bank is not good. Dark clothing will cast a shadow and let the fish see you long before you see them. Wear light colored shorts/pants and a white or light gray shirt.

Why are you trying to get sponsors? To help save money on lures? If you do not fish big tournaments and just want to promote them on facebook/youtube... then go contact the custom lure guys and ask them. But first go pony up some cash and make some very good youtube videos showing off your skills and some various products. You can then show these videos to the companies and tell them if they put you on their promotional staff then you will show off their lures and some fish caught on them in your videos. If they give you 10% off consider yourself lucky. Later on down the road the free lures will start to come in.

Lots of ways to make cheap 2 piece molds, but they will not be the quality of a good aluminum mold. Videos on youtube will show you how.

4-6" finesse worm on a 1/16 head. Fish any holes you can find, behind large rocks, undercut banks, under low hanging trees, and longjams/logs. Always try and fish downriver, throw upstream at a 45º angle and fish it as its coming down stream.

I have navionics for android. Its well worth the price. I bought it for $0.99 on sale, but it is well worth the $10. I have a cig lighter adapter and USB cord for my phone, I then mounted a holder for my phone on the dash. Now I can hook my phone up and not wear down the battery while using it as mapping software. If you do not do it that way, make sure you only turn it on to check something and then close the app. It drains about 2% of my battery per minute on my galaxy s3 if it is not hooked up. To add a waypoint on android you drag the crosshairs to wherever you want and hit the "?" icon next to it. Then there is an option to ad it to favorites. Not sure if it is the same on IOS, but it has to be close.

I have fished in both MN and WI many times. I would hope they write tickets for fish over the limit! BP was not over his limit. The no-cull rule was put into place way back before livewells when guys would put their limit of walleye/crappie on a stringer and then if they caught a bigger one they would toss the smallest dead one back. Like I said, if the DNR cared BP would have a ticket right now.

Bookmark it and put the bookmark on your home screen.

Ducks, doves, and geese are my passion. I also like to creep through the woods for some squirrel and rabbit between waterfowl seasons.

I just use a backpack and throw in whatever boxes I think I will need. I keep most of my stuff in clear 3700's.

Like others have said, its different with every brand/model. I have tested a couple. An easy way to test is to tie off the braid to a stationary object like a fence post and then tie the other end to a digital scale. Pull on the scale until the line breaks, not the knot but the line. Power pro 4# red broke at 6.9# average Power pro 10# yellow broke at 14# average Power pro 30# green broke at 43# average Power pro 50# red broke at 62# average Stren super braid 8# yellow broke at 9# average That is all the braid I had on hand to test, I did 3 tests for each one.. on all the tests the poundage was about the same so there was not much averaging to do.

This might sound like an advertisement, but I'll try to keep it simple. I had one of my best days of the year today. Got out to the little lake I have been fishing and evidently the wind picked up last night and blew my mats loose and all to the crap side of the lake. So I had a bunch of coontail weeds with 3-5’ of water above them. Started with a 5” GP stick bait and caught a couple right away, I noticed they were actually hitting it when I moved it instead of on the drop. So down went the senko rod and out came the spinning rod. 6’6 ML st. croix spinning rod 6# seaguar fluoro #BB split shot about 12” above a #4 matzou sickle octopus hook. Green pumpkin 4.5” drop shot worm hooked right in the center wacky style, worm made by a friend of mine. I tossed that sucker out there and twitched it above those weeds and WOW…. hold on. Had fish almost every cast, everything from 6” dinks up to nice solid 15” fish. It was a heck of a day, some fish I sight fished and some I caught just fan casting around. I would imagine I could have upped it to a 6” or 7” finesse worm and caught just the bigger fish, but it was just too much fun having hits every cast. I haven't had that much fun in a long time. Maybe next time I will rig up another rod with a bigger worm and fish them side by side. Sorry I don't have any pictures, was having too much fun catching fish and didnt even think about it. Probably went through a dozen worms, and each worm was lasting for 5 or 6 fish.

Don't know anything about the coosa river, but I do know midwest rivers. I would start with a lipless crank and see if you can find some active fish. I say lipless because you can fish it in 6" of water and down in to deep holes and back-eddies. If they are not that aggressive then I would suggest some sort of craw or creature imitation fished slower on the bottom. Look for swirls and back flows, or any type of structure (log jam, downed tree, old bridge piling, etc) those are fish magnets in current.

My suggestion is that if you do not feel the tap tap tap of a fish hitting it then you are not fishing it correctly. You should be able to feel the fish suck it in and start to swim off. Drop shotting is a tight line game, at the very least semi-slack with braid. My guess is that the fish hit your senko on the initial drop and by the time you got tight and went to fish it they had sucked it down. If they are feeding that aggressively there is no need for a drop-shot, rig that sucker up on a 3/0 hook and start casting.