the reel ess

Yeah, this buddy of mine could catch 10 tiny bream to my 9 bass and still try to rub that in. LOL. But he's my best friend and that's just how he is about everything. I remember once we went in my fish & ski boat and he caught about a 4 pounder early in the trip. He stopped fishing nad started sending pics of the fish to every contact in his phone and drinking beer, all the while talking smack to me about how much better he is at fishing than I am. I caught a bigger one right before we took the boat out. He was mad. I told him you can't catch fish without a lure in the water. And besides, I'm just better.

They don't exactly mop up on my favorite lake either. I've had a couple good outings with them wacky rigged, but most of the time they get ignored. Actually, during the dog days, almost everything gets ignored. I also wacky rig other worms occasionally.

I own a bunch of frogs, but the Booyah Popping Pad Crasher stays tied on my frog rod. You can spend more but you don't need to.

I don't like the jointed sunfish swimbait either for the same reason mentioned in the post above and, though it's 5/8 oz. it's hard to cast without helicoptering and getting the line in the hooks. I ended up using a spinnig rod to lob it, which is not optimal. Also, I really don't like the hollow body frog. The body is hard like the old SPRO's and it's difficult to walk because it's flat on the bottom, just like the old SPROs. I have a lipless crank that cleaned up on bass one day, but the next time out my buddy wore me out with a Super Spot so badly I switched over. The lipless I bought was in the gold pattern and the gold finish didn't hold up well. After two uses there are spots where it flaked off, exposing what looks like a silver finish beneath. I'm guessing they took some chrome ones and gave them another coat of gold that didn't adhere well. Either way, it kinda looks like a beat up gold shiner, which could be a plus, but doesn't speak well for the quality of the bait. I get the feeling there are several companies making these baits for them because the quality is all over the place with them. Even so, they're so cheap and I'd give others a try. The popper looks good for half the price of the Pop R. They ahve a couple baits that are knockoffs of Lucky Crafts that look great.

Give him a Trick Worm. He'll catch fish. If it's windy, make it a weighted T rig. If it's deep, make it a C rig. If it's shallow, weightless works. That's what I give my buddy when we go kayaking and he catches fish on it most trips. I have the opposite friend. He'll always buy the (cheap) beer. But he doesn't know anything about fishing and isn't into it like I am. So if I want to hang out with him fishing I have to outfit him. He can hang with me on bream though. But I usually still have to rig him up. He won't have hooks, bobbers or split shot. Then, of course, he'll talk smack if he catches one more than I do. At least I don't have to bait his hook and take them off. And he brings the aforementioned beer. That's because i usually don't take beer fishing, so he has to if he wants some. But I have another fishing buddy I go with who's on-par with me as far as equipment and knowledge. He has a better boat than me and I'll go with him when it's cold or just when he offers.

I tried mine yesterday evening. It ran near the surface. I couldn't reel it slowly enough to get it down. I took the swimbait trailer off to see if that was the problem but it didn't help. I think the jig is too light for the blade. I'll put the blade back on the black one for now. Maybe I'll just get a replacement skirt for the black one.

I'll never hear the phrase "Can I vent?" the same again.

I have a place like this too, but maybe 25 acres. I've caught probably 6 or 7 bass over 6 lbs. there. My last two PB's came from there, the latest being 6.92. I have lost one larger. There aren't a lot of people fishing there. I'm usually alone. I doubt they see many baits at all and the ones they do, not often enough for it to trigger a negative response. My best fish there have all been on different things. Jig, spinnerbait, lipless crank and Trick Worm are the ones I can remember. There have been a lot in the 5 lb. range caught on topwaters - Pop R, Chug Bug, Spook. One big gal on a wacky rig. Some of these are "big fish baits", some are "little fish baits" and some are just baits. I keep going because there's always a chance at a PB there. I used to have to go with a buddy, but the landowner with the gate gave me a key recently.

LOL. I've never seen the anus referred to as a vent. Learn something every day.

Welcome! Nice city, Portland. I went there on my first honeymoon (the one that didn't take ?). We spent a few days there then rented a car and drove up to Bar Harbor for the rest of the week. I'd love to revisit the state. A great place to go in the summer.

DING-DING!!! After looking it up I think you're absolutely right.

I usually just buy Calcutta sunglasses. Decent quality for a $22 pair of polarized fishing glasses and they look great. They last a long time and if they eventually get scratched you aren't out much cash. But I did recently buy a pair of Orvis bifocals with 1.5X readers. I'll be looking to take really good care of those. I haven't tried them fishing yet, but I will this evening if it doesn't rain me out. I wore them to the grocery store yesterday and they gave me a little headache. The readers made me feel like I should be stepping up all the time LOL.

I have some plain Arky heads with horizontal line tie that I could use for them as well, but I already had these gold shiner jigs and wanted to put one to use.

It looks as though I have quite the rare paint job on it. I can't find another searching the Interwebs.

When my dad and I used to catch schooly stripers they would come into the boat flopping around and wrecking the rods and tackle with trebles snagging everything in sight. The average one would be 5 lbs. We would want to get the fish off as quickly as possible so we could get more casts in and catch more. I had a pair of those Adidas shower shoe-type flip flops. I would whack the fish on the head with the heel end of that shoe and it usually did the trick. If not with the first whack, then with the second. You couldn't count on a school being within reach for very long so we would take that fish off and drop it in the floor, short term while we kept casting until they didn't bite for a few casts. If you're going to kill a fish, put it on ice, not in a livewell unless the water is very cold.

Go early or late if you can't go at night. My buddy told me lately that the bass were doing NOTHING at our local reservoir and he's been catching some crappie instead. I got on the water before 7:00 and caught 8 bass on three different baits, including a couple big'uns. 5 of them came on a Pop R. All but one were in shallow shade and the bite was over by 9:30. Even if bass are really not into it, there are usually a couple windows a day for some bites.

Well, I still use a couple Berkley Lightning Rods ($35 normally, but I got them on sale for $25 each) that I bought more than a decade ago. I have a 6-6 MH for spinner/buzzbaits and a M for topwaters and cranks. At the time I bought them I always thought I'd replace them with higher quality when they failed. But they never did. They're reasonable light and the actions are spot-on for the techniques. I have some higher quality rods for sensitive or specialized techniques. And I've eventually changed out all my reels to better quality units. If they do what you want there's no reason to change.

For starters, when you use a weighted T rig, you'll usually feel the telltale "thump-thump" so you'll know that's fish...could be bream though. For a jig it's different, and I'll admit I'm not the best at it either. But veggies still won't move. Bass will. Sometimes you feel the thump with smaller fish, but usually, for me, it's moving line that tips me off. Reel up any slack fast and set hard. I've found that some baits fish will hold longer than others. A Berkley Powerbait they'll carry around all day. This covers up a lot of fisherman error, giving you lots of time to set a hook.

I had success in early season with a black/blue chatterbait. That got me thinking, now that the water is clearer, would I have success with a baitfish color bladed jig. So i rigged up what you see here using @cadman custom gold shiner jig. Has anyone else tried this? Do you think the two split rings will have a negative effect on action? I'll use a gold swimbait trailer because gold shiners are present. I'll give a report after trying. I get a real kick out of catching bass on something I got crafty with.

It's a pretty good way to salvage a trip when the bass are hitting the bait so much they destroy the skirt and you don't have a replacement. But sometimes it just messes up the balance.

1. Right 2. Nah, not in my dad's tackle box, LOL. He didn't spend money on such frivolous things as custom painted cranks. If I know him it was a Walmart exclusive el cheapo. Don't get me wrong, I loved my dad. But he had different priorities than mine.

I just Googled it. I think you nailed it. But I'd never seen that color.

This was in my late father's tackle box. It looks very useful. I'd guess a 12' diver, max. 1/2 oz. and about 2 3/8". Thanks.

When you fish around docks and stumps, run the bait into them as you retrieve. Fish dig that.

There's really no weigh (pun intended) of knowing. I caught a new PB Saturday. My previous was 6.75, a long thin fish with no gut. Saturday I caught what I thought was going to shatter that PB by more than a pound. It had monstrous bug eyes and a gut that looked like it ate two softballs. I was so excited my hands were shaking. It was only 6.92 lbs. Still a PB, but still not even 7 lbs. No pic because i didn't have my phone and I didn't want to kill the fish transporting it. I was kayaking, so no livewell. Had I stopped fishing then to go get a phone I would have missed the 5.2 pounder I caught 20 minutes later. The 6.92 lb looked twice the size of the 5.2 lb. My best day size-wise in...well, forever. On a side note, my wife said "Why didn't you call me? I would have brought you your phone or a camera. Oh, never mind." LOL. Nice fish and I'm guessing over 8, less than 10. That's the best i can do.