Jar11591

I'm all for being polite and friendly, and certainly boats' paths will be crossed occasionally. But on an open lake, if your boat is within casting distance of mine for any extended period of time, it's kind of annoying. Especially when this guy is flinging his rubber worm so close that I could have caught it with my hands.

Last year out on the water my buddy and I were fishing a cove. We see a fisherman in a kayak slowly making his way towards us, casting towards the shore. We were not in his direct path, but eventually he was right up on us. He began to cast right towards our boat, literally taking away half of our fishing area. Not only that, but he struck up a conversation with us, all the while he is casting right under our boat, not concerned about us trying to fish. He lingered for maybe 20 minutes or so talking our ears off. I think its fine for fishermen to talk to each other while on the water, but maybe keep it limited to: "any luck?" and the appropriate response. But as far as casting under our boat? Absolutely not. Which leads me to my question....So for you guys, how close is too close?

Wind! Nothing ticks me off more than a windy day while I'm trying to fish. And getting skunked of course. But I would kill the wind if I had the chance.

I prefer my bass with a side of C&R! Lol

Wacky rig them! Put the hook right the through the middle and don't add any weight. It's hard not to catch fish!

No kidding. I'm gonna have to keep my eye out next time I'm there.

I had a beaver scare the ever living daylights outta me. He somehow swam up next to our boat unnoticed and smacked his tail on the water so loud it sounds like a shotgun. I thought a hunter was shooting near us. I think the beaver wanted us away from his home..,but too bad, there were bass to be caught.

As far as fishing pressure, I don't think it's the determining factor. Think about all the trophy bass lakes in Texas, Florida and Cali that just get fished nonstop all year and they still produce 10-20 lbers.

I fish these strip pits near my house and they're only a couple acres big, but routinely produce 4-5 lb bass. They are fairly deep though.

I usually use a 1/16 to 1/8 ounce weight but if I'm fishing deeper I go with 1/4.

Has anyone ever fished Black Lake in St. Lawrence county? I went there a couple years ago and fished it for a week and had amazing success. We absolutely hammered the smallmouth. They were all between 15-18" and 90% of them came on a Rapala DT-6. We had numerous accidental pike catches (not a bad thing), caught a few huge crappie which tasted great and got to witness a bunch of 50+ lb sturgeon jump 5' in the air next to our boat. I'm curious if anyone else has any stories from Black Lake. For me it definitely lived up to its reputation.

Simple? I wish lol. I have so many different sizes of bullet weights for different situations it gives me a headache. I was wondering about everyone's preference for some common situations.

I'm curious about what size bullet weights you guys use for T-rigging for different depths and structure/cover types.

Was there a recent temperature/weather change? Even a change in wind direction or speed can turn the bite off. Another thing you might want to try is trolling with tiny cranks to see if you can locate fish who are actually feeding. When you get a strike, post up and drop a small senko or dropshot rig. It could be possible as well that because the bright sun/clear water and the sparse cover that they were inactive.

I hate when that happens. Makes me question everything from my lure choice to maybe my scent is somehow spooking them. It feels like I am doing something to turn them off. But when fish aren't biting at all, I usually downsize my lure. I'll switch from a 5" senko to a 4" one, or use a really tiny crank or jerkbait, just to entice a bite from anything. If nothing is hitting the tiny stuff then you know the bite is off.

I think that would gain you a considerable amount of casting distance. Last year on one of my spinning setups i switched from 6 lb mono to 8lb mono and i noticed immediately that i didn't have the distance i had with the 6 lb line, and that's only 1 diameter size difference. 12 lb line will still hold up in most situations, so for me i would definitely downsize to 12lb.

You can't beat a small classic red & white DarDevle.

I dropped from 14 lb mono to 10 lb mono and its casts a lot farther and just seems to flow off the reel so much smoother. And it has a lot less memory in my opinion. Lighter line is just more comfortable to fish with for me.

15 inches is enough to keep me entertained as long as there is a prospect of a bigger fish, but to me a bass is a "nice" one at 17" and above.

Tipping my Coleman Crawdad is out of the question simply because I'm embarrassed about my girly screams should I ever end up in weedy, murky, pike-infested water. The hair on my neck stands up just thinking about it. I can't let it happen!

Rod: Daiwa MHF Strikeforce ($30) Reel: Abu Garcia Silvermax ($60) Total = $90 Looking to upgrade the rod soon though. It's not a very good one, but it's still a Daiwa and for $30 it's done an ok job.

I love the 7" fat max ribbon tail. Definitely my favorite worm to T-rig. And the incredi-craw or whatever it is also works really well also. Culprit makes great baits.

Uh...I think everybody who fishes would care about how much line their reel can hold. Kind of important.

Taking a trip to BPS in a week so I'll post when I get back. I plan on spending an obscene amount of money there. I've got a list of a few "necessities" that I need to purchase before this year's season starts up.

You could go to your nearest BPS and go fishing in their big aquarium. They always have giant deformed looking bass in them. I figure you can get 2-3 casts in before you're asked to leave...but I'm in the same boat as you (no pun intended). I've considered driving down south for a weekend just to get my fishing fix because I can't take this anymore. It's hard to take a 5 month break from something I'm so obsessed with such as bass fishing. The only issue I have with the south is their giant spiders. I'll take a few frozen months over a brown recloose crawling on me in my sleep any day.