RSM789

I have always preferred dawn, not only for the more aggressive action from the fish, but because it lessens the number of people on the water. Depending on the season, a.m. can be more or less productive. Historically, I caught my PB at 6:30 in the morning, my 2nd PB close to noon & my 3rd PB at 4:00 in the afternoon (no, not all on the same day)

I am by no means insinuating that smaller baits are the key to bigger bites, I know that all things being equal bigger baits will equal bigger fish. My question was about a slight difference in size (4" vs. 5") and if my experiences were unique to the lake I fish or if others had the same results. If I spent the day throwing a 10" Senko, I would expect to get maybe 1 or 2 bites if fortunate (on my home lake). When I balance that against catching 30 - 40 fish for the same amount of time throwing smaller baits (including senko's), I prefer the action. I am not trying to catch a lake record, I am out to enjoy myself and on my home lake, grinding out a couple of bites in 8 hours when I know I am passing up action does not fit my definition of fun.

I don't think "normal" bass fishing with artificial lures lends itself to music listening. Even if you aren't getting bit, there isn't any downtime from focus. You are having to pay attention to a lot of things, which keeps my mind pretty active. Still fishing or trolling, where you are passively sitting waiting for a strike, is another matter. I realize now that I have listened to music or baseball games while fishing off a dock for catfish.

Agreed.

Very true, unless you decide to own the place. Steve Jobs, Bill Gates and Mark Zuckerburg are extreme examples of folks who don't have a college degree but were financially successful nonetheless. One of the problems with most college paths in regards to business is they teach you how to be a corporate employee, not an owner or a smaller company manager. The huge number of unemployed college graduates with BA's or MBA's show that these colleges are providing a product (a specific education towards a certain career path) that is obsolete. I believe more students would be better served to get a more rounded education of basic business principles from accounting to marketing to operations. Don't waste the time getting a degree in those subjects, but learn how they apply in running a business. Even though I had a B.S. in Marketing (cue joke about Marketing being BS), I ended up learning more by actually starting a business than I was ever taught. What did help was a basic understanding of solid business practices. The most secure job you will ever have will be working for yourself.

Has anyone here ever been on the B.A.S.S. Elite series Marshal program waiting list? Since the Elites are coming out West this year, I decided to sign up to be a Marshal for the Lake Havasu tournament next May. Even though I signed up minutes after registration opened, I am on the waiting list (I assume the lifetime & Bass Nation members who were allowed early registration filled all the available spots). I am probably going to book the trip to Havasu trip even if I don't get to marshal, but was curious if anyone has ever had the experience of being on the waiting list & then actually making it to active list.

I own a Home Theater company & some folks ask if they really need a quality surge protector/line conditioner for their TV, receivers & other A/V products. Your neighbors experience is an extreme example where such protection would have taken the hit and saved all of those electronics.

Where did you hear that? His story is that he didn't do it deliberately and his actions (disqualifying himself from World Record contention) match his words. Plus there was no reason to deliberately foul hook her. He & his friends had caught her legally a couple of other times, there was no reason to think they couldn't again.

None, but not because I don't like music. In fact I usually have a song stuck in my head the entire time I am fishing. I don't use earbuds because I want my ears available to hear everything else that is going on, from fishing revealing themselves to someone trying to get my attention for assistance. With even 1 earbud in, you are making yourself deaf to other sound from that direction. I don't play music through speakers, even at a low level, because the vibration goes to the water, alerting the fish of your presence. Doesn't matter if it is built-in speakers in your boat or a small radio sitting on the deck, that creates additional vibrations. I don't care if other people listen to music, but I do expect folks to show common courtesy. I am not trying to enforce my silence on you, please don't force me to listen to your music or meaningless conversation. Worst example I witnessed of this was on Lake Mead a few years back. It was minutes after sunrise, the lake was like glass & I was on the main lake off a point fishing striper boils. I hear some music and it takes me about 30 seconds to figure out it is coming from a yellow boat that I can barely see, I'm guessing it was 2 miles away. It was some people skiing and as they get closer, the volume of the music they were playing was ridiculous. When they were about 200 yards away from me, it sounded like I was at a concert. At that distance, I could see they had some kind of "rollbar" across the top of the ski boat & there were 4 huge speakers mounted to it. Luckily, the person they were pulling was a good skier and didn't fall, so in a matter of minutes they were far enough uplake that I couldn't hear them anymore. I just wonder how many folks were asleep in their houseboats as Music Boat cruised by, waking them up and making them wonder what was disturbing the peace in this National Park.

Is the kid your partner in the tournament this weekend? Good story.

Do you believe that applies in shallow water, less than 2 ft. deep? As I mentioned, I usually only use Senko's to skip under docks, so when they are sinking, it is often in 6-24 inches of water, depending on how far I was able to skip it back. Most of my strikes on these casts are as soon as the lure stops skipping, (although one bass did catch it mid-skip) as opposed to it sinking for a few seconds. I'm not sure if that is enough time to identify the difference in sinking speed, but that also could apply to not enough time to tell the difference between sizes. I should also note that my home lake has a retaining wall around the entire lake and typical of any concrete structure in water, there are a lot of undercuts where baitfish hide. I am pretty sure most of the bass under the docks are facing shore, watching the undercuts up against the retaining wall for the dinner bell to ring. My senko comes skipping in and either triggers a reaction strike or looks like a baitfish trying to get back to a hiding place. I have also seen bass pinning baitfish up against the retaining wall many times, and a quick, accurate cast will usually be rewarded with a strike. A side note on these fish under the docks is their coloration. Many of them are darker, almost a smallmouth brown, I am assuming these are "dock fish" who have set up a permanent home under the dock. A fewer number, like the big one I caught yesterday, are lighter and may have just been visiting the buffet. None of the ones over 5 lbs. looked to be "dock fish", and the docks they were caught from were fairly close to deeper water.

It is interesting how bass from Maine to California will all act as if they are living in the Florida everglades.

I went thru the Senko topic list and didn't see this discussion. My apologies if it is there & I missed it. I know that as a rule, with everything else being the same, bigger lures will result in bigger fish. However, my experience with Senkos is that the largest fish I catch are always on the 4" model instead of the 5". As a background, on my home lake, I typically only use Senko's wacky rigged to skip under docks. I use 4" & 5" models, in light pumpkin, green pumpkin or red shad laminate depending on what the fish tell me they want. I like the action of a 5" model when it sinks wacky style more than the smaller 4", it seems to have a bit more wiggle. If there is very little wind & it is pretty still, I'll often start with the 4" model for a quieter presentation. In windier conditions, the heavier 5" model tends to cast more on target without creating too much disturbance as it skips under the dock. Today, I caught a 7lb 6oz bass with a 4" green pumpkin model (picture below). It got me to thinking that all the bass over 5 lbs. that I have caught on Senkos have been on the 4" models (different colors). The numbers of fish I catch on both the 4" & 5" are the pretty much the same, but the 5" models have never produced a bass over 4 lbs. My question is do you think this is a "match the hatch" situation where on my lake a 4" model is the more realistic lure or have others had the same experience?

I have said for years that every time I go fishing, I see something that I have never seen before or have something happen that has never happened to me before. Well today was no different. Late morning, I skipped a Senko under a shady dock and felt a telltale thump the moment it stopped moving. I set the hook, wrestled the fish away from the docked boat and watched him zoom towards open water. I turned him and he came to the surface, mouth open & shaking. Now I have seen bass in this situation spit up minnows or crawdads in an effort to escape, but this bass had a special treat in store for me. Right in front of my eyes, he spit up a partially digested small swallow (the birds that return every year to Mission San Juan Capistrano). To be accurate, he spit up a bunch of feathers and the partially digested carcass. I sat there and watched these little bird feet sink to the bottom as the feathers floated to the top. I wasn't quick enough to grab my phone to take a picture, I was trying to figure out if I really saw what I think I saw. I know bass eat birds, however I have no idea how this 2 lb. fish caught a swallow. For those of you who haven't seen them, swallows are best described as mini jet fighters. They are little speed demons, zipping over the surface of the water eating gnats & other bugs. While they are small, it still would have been a mouthful for this bass. I don't know if he intercepted one mid-flight (which I would have paid to see) or if he was just in the right place when one crash landed in the water or knocked it self senseless against a dock. Either way, this bass was both a stud to catch this swallow and a pig to eat my lure with a bird in his belly. Then, about 30 minutes later, I caught a bag of grapes. I released the grapes & kept the bag...

Years ago, there was a satirical book published named "The Happy Fish Hooker". I was 15 at the time I got it, I had to convince my mom it was really about fishing. Anyway, I remember a portion of it where they analyzed this saying and gave the following explanations (this is from memory, so it is not verbatim): "When the wind is from the East, the fishes bite the least" - This is a reference to the Least wooly bug, a fly sold in the new England states, that is absolute murder on trout when the wind is blowing from the east; "When the wind is from the West, the fishes bite the best" - This is actually a typo, it should be "beast" instead of "best". This is a warning for all people to stay out of the water when a westerly wind blows or else they will be bitten repeatedly by extremely hungry fish. The rest of the book was just as silly...

Nothing major with my bass, although he (she?) did follow a dragonfly around for about 30 seconds the other day. The dragonfly was about a foot off the surface, zipping around & must have caught the fish's attention. He followed along under the dragonfly, apparently waiting for it to get lower to take a shot at it. Lucky dragonfly went up to the waterfall section of the pond to dip into the water, so he lived to see another day. He is getting bigger, almost the size of the largest koi. I'll see if I can get a picture of him, I don't think it will turn out. He really blends in with the natural colors of the bottom, he doesn't stand out like the koi do.

Nearly all of my wacky rig fishing consists of skipping Senko's under docks. I use a shorter (5' 6") medium Ugly Stik with a Daiwa spinning reel loaded with 10lb Nanofil & a fluorocarbon leader. I didn't specifically pick this rod & reel out, it was a setup that I had for years. The medium is strong enough for hooksets since it is an exposed hook, is strong enough to get the fish out from under the dock and the shorter length helps with accuracy when skipping through a small opening under a dock. The Nanofil comes off the reel like butter, letting the Senko skip 7, 8, 9 times before stopping & its low stretch helps transmit subtle takes on the drop. Like I said, I didn't go out & buy these items to create this setup, it kind of evolved from what I had on hand.

I think his question has more to do with basic seasonal patterns. The default scenario for Fall fishing is to go shallow to the backs of the creeks because the bass will be following the shad. Like the OP, I would like to know what the default scenario is in the Fall for lakes without shad? Do other baitfish (minnows, baby carp, bream) also move shallow in the fall & go up the backs of creeks or do they do something different? Here is another twist to the default scenario - What about lakes without creeks? I know it sounds funny, but lakes like my home lake were built & are surrounded by homes and have no creeks or inlets (just houses, a couple of greenbelts & a retaining wall around the entire lake). What is the default scenario in the Fall when the lake has neither shad nor creeks? Do the prey baitfish still just move shallow as the temperatures cool?

Congrats on the boat. I have the 10 ft. Pond Prowler as well & have found all of the info & modifications written about the Bass Raider easily convert to the Pond Prowler.

Both times I did it was on topwaters. The first time was one a jointed Jitterbug, the second time on a Spook. With the Jitterbug, I tried to lift both fish out of the water by grabbing the metal lip of the lure. As I hoisted them, the bottom fish went nuts & torqued the bottom of the lure, snapping it off at the joint. So I ended up with 1/2 a lure & 1 fish. I saved the 1/2 Jitterbug and on future trips, tied a short leader with a small jig off the back of it & caught a few fish on it. The tend to hit the jig more than the wounded jitterbug.

I've had the 120 for about 3 years & have been very happy with it. Have used it on vacation on rental boats, from small johnboats to larger deck boats, & it performed well. I even used it a few times on a small pedal boat. It now resides permanently on my 2 month old Pond Prowler, but I can always remove it & take it with me on future trips if needed. My current lake is pretty shallow (12 feet at the deepest), but it has a 30 ft. setting that has helped me identify isolated structure on the lake. I have also used it on Lake Mead to locate schools of stripers suspended below schools of shad in 150 - 200 ft. of water. Even at that setting, the bait balls & striper schools were pretty easily identifiable. Keep an extra six AA batteries in your tackle box, that is what powers it. I typically get about 40 - 50 hours of use from the batteries (about 6 full day trips). You know the batteries are on their last legs when you go to power it up and it takes 2 or 3 pushes to get the unit started. Even at that low power, the unit will run for another 8 hrs. or so. The only negative is that the unit will rattle in the cradle at higher speeds in the boat. I have a 46lb. thrust Motor Guide and the 120 does fine at the first 2 speeds, but at 3, 4 or 5, I have to take it out of the cradle. Not a big deal, I only use those speeds when running from 1 spot to another on the lake, never when actually fishing.

Brent Chapman was once quoted as saying that he fishes his private lake (pond) "when he wants to go catching instead of fishing".

Looking at that 2nd photo, I would say you have to adjust your catch total to 62 1/2... Congrats on figuring it out

Darn it, you had to go and be nice just as I was about to respond to your other message. I had a couple of zingers to use as well, I really hate to let them go to waste. The best one was I was going to let you know that we are basically the same age (I'm 51) and am also in a technical field. I own a home theater company and am out in the field on installations 4-5 days a week, hands on. In other words, I spend a lot of time fixing the mistakes that engineers make when designing products . I think you may have misunderstood my initial post, that you didn't see the circuit board for the transistors. The point wasn't that those over 50 couldn't be technically proficient, but rather that they choose not to. I am in peoples homes everyday and can testify that the older a person is, the lower the interest (not ability) in using technical social mediums such as this forum. It would be exactly the reverse if that poll was in a newspaper. Since very few people under the age of 35 even read a paper, the results would be skewed towards the older crowd. It's not that younger people can't read, its just that the newspaper is not their delivery system of choice. The 50's is probably not the right breaking point for less use of technology, for you & I went through our teen years at a time that Asteroids & Space Invaders were group entertainment. It is those who are about a decade older, the folks whose first introduction to computers was programming with punch cards, that really have less interest (as a group) in current technology. Those are the people who try to print out a Youtube Video

I catch more from a boat, but learned how to fish slower moving lures by fishing from the bank. I also found that I can observe more on the bank if I am stealthy enough.