Cgolf

I have fished a kalins 5” on a slider head for years and never had one swallowed that I can remember. I generally let it drop to the bottom, then either pop and drop it or a slow steady retrieve. I generally don’t let it sit too long on bottom though. How are you retrieving it?

So this will be my last comment on this;) For the disappointment in TW. Back before BPS bought Cabela's I had a spreadsheet on items I use regularly comparing the prices between the 3 stores and TW was the lowest across the board by a large margin, and therefore they recently have gotten a lot of my business. Fast forward to know and the margin between other shops has gotten smaller or they are more expensive than some. Not sure what got them to change their pricing model and that is where the disappointment lies? TW is just another shop now and I didn't want to believe it when others have pointed it out from time to time recently. It was nice when I could one stop shop and be a smart shopper lol. As far as shopping my wife will often split groceries between two stores to save money, they are in very close proximity to each other or on her way home from work so no extra gas costs and we almost always buy the store brands. We also shop an Amish bent and dent store and can get some amazing buys on groceries as long as we watch the dates. Siebert will most likely get our Rage order and when I lose some bass jigs I will try some of his. The Morel Ned heads are my current favorite Ned head. The sale thread has been a great help, because others find the deals for us:)

I guess you are missing my point. My wife has me on a bait monkey limiting yearly fishing budget. No real complaints with that. For my budget if a lure I previously bought a lot of jumps in price by 25% to be one of the more expensive plastics on the market, I will take my money elsewhere. Seeing Siebert’s post tells me it may be the shops getting greedy not Strike King. I am all for folks that can afford all the tackle they want (I don’t attack them like I have seen a few low budget anglers do), but cut those of us with a more limited budget some slack when our eyes pop out at prices. Heck a lot of people called out Googan for being expensive, now some Rage are more than Googan.

I think this counts as a fishing purchase. Native Slayer 12XC

Aren’t Zoom and Yum American poured plastics? Yum has my #1 plastic of all time the do nothing crawbug. Curious how many othe4 plastics are poured in the US? Crankbaits May be a different story.

That is smart shopping. Ridiculous how much they mark them up. I personally only order sale items online anymore. Only time I pay full price is if we are traveling and stop in a local shop. I have found a couple of well stocked shops when we travel to the quad cities area I will support whenever we visit. Wish we had shops like that around home.

Trapper tackle is closing out remaining stock and are then done. As as far as tackle prices go, if companies see people willingly paying Megabass prices, they feel they can raise their prices too. This has been going on awhile and will likely get worse. Also be interesting to see what companies that source from other countries do with their prices.

Thanks and we got really lucky, as the closeout price was below the shops cost. I was really surprised how maneuverable it was on flat water. I will find out soon how it handles on my local river.

This is similar to when Lucky Craft became hot and I watched Rapala raise prices across the board once they realized some anglers were willing to spend a lot more money on baits. Time will tell if that is what is happening here or not. The Ned Baits and small punch bug were 6.99 on another site, but the mag menace and baby structure bug were like 5.29 and 5.49. Also curious where SK baits are poured, maybe there is an increased cost now? I know this is a site sponsor brand, but I am curious how many truly would be fine consistently dropping 7 bucks a bag for the menace or structure bug. I can't be the only one that would stop using them, but I could be wrong, my wife tells me I am all the time;)

So I guess I will answer it this way. Of the places I have ordered from over the last 10 years TW had the best selection and the best price (sounds like a jingle). I have heard others recently complain about some of their prices going up lately, but hadn’t noticed it. Maybe the Rage thing is being driven by Strike King and not TW, who knows. If that is the case Rage plastics are out for me. As to the Price match thing, since I would order on Black Friday, not sure they would apply the price match and then the 20 percent and hopefully the extra percent off like the last two years, I could be wrong. And yes it is a pain to try and do an order online and have them price match stuff, can take quite a while depending on how many items it impacts. If they keep the Menace at 5.29 and stack a 20 and 15 percent discount on it I would be crazy to pass it up. I guess the frustration is centered around Rage prices, and the dramatic increase. I had a FB discussion with someone from Rage tail and I got the impression they didn’t expect it. So I probably overreacted and maybe blamed the wrong place lol, but am frustrated seeing a 25 percent price jump in a brand I have come to like over the last 2 years. I will just shop around more like others do, I probably relied on one store too much anyways.

Not at all, doesn’t fit my fishing style anyways. While my budget isn’t crazy small it isn’t unlimited, so I am careful what I spend my money on. So that is why I don’t fish Megabass stuff either and watch the sale thread constantly. My wife and her frugal ways put down the bait monkey in our house;)

The only thing I could find is it needs a red flag if it overhangs by more than 4 feet. Doesn’t give a maximum overhang for WI.

Awesome and that is great news for this weekend. We knew we were going to get a couple as a Christmas gift, we never expected now. Just couldn’t pass up the end of season sales.

That and his Morel Ned heads have become my go to since the demise of gopher tackle.

Honestly for me I generally don’t get too picky on price differences, unless it really adds up across many products, but I also don’t pay a premium for soft plastics. I thought 5.29 for the Menace was a lot and I stocked up when they were on sale. I know there are some on here that agree with that, and others that would willingly pay more. The 6.99 for me is a deal breaker, I have many other plastics that catch fish that I can fall back on that are cheaper. I have been using the Spicy Beaver for a while now and it seems just as durable and had been catching fish too, so that is definitely an alternative for me especially at 4.99 a pack. It is just weird that other well known sites are pricing them cheaper and had them in stock earlier.

That is insane, that is more expensive than Googan Squad stuff. Sadly if this is true my current stash of Menace will be my last.

Now that they are in stock, the Magnum Menace and I assume the other new Rage baits are 6.99. The Magnum Menace on sites that can’t be named is the same price as the other Menace sizes. What is is going on with TW, are the other Rage baits going to go up now? Overall very disappointed in the site, found stores like Fleet Farm have better prices on some tackle which I had not seen before this year. Black Friday may be my last TW order. When I called them on the Rage prices a while back they said they would price match, but what a pain.

We pick up our new kayaks Saturday, a wilderness systems aspire 100 and a Native slayer 12 XC. 30 minutes home from the store. After that are current longest drive to a spot is a 20 minute ride. Closest is 2 minutes. I have a Tacoma with a 6 foot bed. We have seen many transport them strapped in with the tailgate up, is this an ok way? Not sure we have the time or budget right now for fancy contraptions. I was thinking of slicing one side of a pool noodle and put it on the top edge of the tailgate to protect the finish on the yak. Then put the yaks in topside up and run the tie down strap through the handles in the front of the bed and one around each in the back. Does this sound like a good plan? would welcome pictures of how you all truck you yaks.

So I got my Yak today and pick it up Saturday. You all were right I found 1 decent Emotion SOP kayak for sale at Farm and fleet for 500 but couldn’t find a lot of info on the brand. Ultimately the the place I tested them had an old town topwater 106 and a Native Slayer 12 XC that I got to try out. The Native was the easier paddle and was on sale for a very low price so I went with that one. I got lucky to find a great kayak at an insane price. Thanks all for the help.

The perception sit in I felt casting and retrieving were a little awkward, I felt boxed in. Part of that was because I was carrying my 3500 size tackle bag in my lap. I also felt a bit to low in the water, I think a sit on top may give me a bit more vision. Casting angles are very different yak vs boat. The kayak my wife likes and used extensively has been at the cabin we rent for a week each year. She has a lot of seat time in it and long trips were very comfortable, was why she was hoping we could still find that model. As far as one rod goes, most of my fishing will be on a small river, and I have used a spinning rod for everything for a lot of years. Not ruling out multiple, but I would be surprised. Really depends on what type of structure/cover I come across. We will make a trip to the shop before it gets to cold here. They have some nice looking yaks there, just a bit out of reach of the gift range. I wish they would carry some entry level yaks. Thanks everyone for the advice so far, and please feel free to chime in with more.

My wife and I have an opportunity to get a sub 500 new kayak as a gift, but are trying to figure out how to find a comfortable one. We both have back issues, so the wrong seat angle or padding could make or break it for us. My my wife is looking for a recreational yak and loves the perception sunrise 10, but of course it is no longer offered. I am going to call perception tomorrow and see if that design is still available under a new name. My fishing yak will be a sit on but I only plan on carrying one rod and limited tackle. I tried fishing out of the perception listed above and it didn’t workout well. Our main aim problem is we have one store that allows someone to demo yaks, but almost all of theirs are over 500. Not sure DSG or farm and fleet want us sitting in their display kayaks for a while.

In the past I have found a big difference in different cranks and what the fish will hit. There are times they will crush anything, but I had my eyes opened when an xcalibur xcs 200 Sb was the hot bait and man that thing plows water. After two cold fronts I couldn’t buy a bite on the xcalibur SB and switched to a much more subtle Bandit 100 and picked up 16 bass in a short amount of time. This really surprised me because I didn’t think it would matter that much, but taught me a lesson for sure especially when dealing with cold fronts which are very common in N WI.

When we travel, if we see a small bait shop we will stop and spend a small amount to support the independent shops. Found R&R sports in Bettendorf Iowa and was very impressed with what they had. Was able to find the spicy beaver, potential option if Rage prices go up, and a blade bait I think I read about on here. Tried the spicy beaver this morning and got a largemouth and a fairly big smallmouth with it, along with two grabs I missed. The bait seemed no worse for wear, so hoping durability will be good since I know it catches fish now.

The problem I have is the last order to Amazon was months ago and was a pest screen for our lint trap, I didn’t want to wait on that one;). Seriously though we rarely order stuff online.

Nope, that is the only way I could convince her to get them. Figured having to wait is better than no baits.