the reel ess

When they're shallow, I see them. When they aren't I don't. But the water's not very clear here.

I think you posted on the wrong board.

Check this out: https://***/outdoors/bass-fishing/Article/Bass-Fishing-Lure-Selector-Chart-105345056

Same here, but usually weightless tossed at every piece of wood cover I can find. Also, a frog in the lilies and weeds right before sundown.

Ned rig maybe. I like to really downsize in a creek. Their prey usually is very small. Try a crappie tube jig or a curly tail grub. They also like the tiny Rebel craw crankbaits, Crickhopper and Junebug. A regular size Beetle Spin is a good option as well. The smallest size Pop R, perhaps. Honestly, you'll probably catch more of them using bream tactics. Cork and worm or cricket. Try to wade upstream to them because they'll face upstream naturally. Make your presentation running with current. If you have a flyrod, the bream size popping bugs and tiny frogs might be good too.

Just before you jump in the car or truck, stop and take an inventory of your equipment. I don't know how many times I got to my destination and didn't have something I definitely needed (like a boat plug or battery or depth finder or kayak paddle rods or tackle box or...) I still do it

I say frogs, but I'm biased. I also fish places with a lot of vegetation. I've tried toads with less success. But, honestly, I haven't given them the time I've given a frog.

Apparently. My buddy has a pond that geese frequent and he even had some nest there. When they hatched and were growing the mother would walk them around looking for handouts from my friend's kids. My buddy's daughter grabbed one of the goslings and the mom attacked my buddy instead of her. They are quite a nuisance. It's funny how conservation and decreased hunting created this problem.

Fighting back against them will get you arrested here. It has happened.

Pescador Original (Not Pro). The old Wilderness Tarpon Mold, so it's a bit behind the times in technological advancements. Pros: Good entry level price. Gets you just about anywhere you want to go for about $500. Good Rod Holders Decent seat back support Tracks well Cons: Not stable enough for standing. I tried a stadium seat in it for comfort and it was way too tippy and moved me too far forward. I use a stadium cushion now. Seat is low in the boat. If I wasn't using the cushion, my butt would be wet most of the time (no cold weather use without a cushion) Lower seat is just a pad on the kayak form so the old behind is numb after a couple hours. Sometimes I get out and stretch my legs for a few minutes and resume fishing. I'm just about in the market for a new one. I might keep this one for fishing buddies and sell my daughter's. A stadium seat is a must. I'm considering if I want a pedal kayak. Some of the places I fish are mostly too shallow for the prop or fins. I know you can take it out, but that's a lot of money for something you can't use a lot.

I gave up on fluoro. I just don't like it. I either use all mono (for trebles) or braid with no more than a 5' mono leader. The water here has a permanent stain most places. I'll use all braid for frogs and maybe jigs/worms if it's heavy cover or really grassy or if my leader breaks and I'm out in the kayak. I've only broken 2 braid-to-mono leaders at the knot. I waited too long to retie it. I'm still not really convinced that fish here are shy of braid.

IMO (which is the correct one LOL) The faster, the better as far as getting bass out of the slop. You want to be able to turn the bass and get it to the top as quickly as possible using the rod, then skate it across the surface using the reel and the rod angle. But bigger bass will usually dig down anyway. As for walking the fog in open water, a little slower reel might work better. But I use a 7.5:1, which says it's 31 IPT. It gets the job done. I never looked at the IPT before right now. Before I bought a dedicated frog combo, I used a much slower 5.1:1, just because it was the strongest reel I owned. The increase in speed was good. I now have 4 reels that are at least 7.1:1 because I'm getting older and don't see any reason to crank more revolutions than necessary. It seems anymore, 7:1 is almost the average.

Right. Some are basically ruined by the minerals they've exposed. There's a granite quarry near here that has a good many chunky bass and very large bluegills. I took a hike there with my daughter and a cousin a while back and we saw them swimming. It looks like they've been fed because they rose to some Cheetos we threw in. I don't have fishing rights there though. It belongs to my cousin's boyfriend's extended family. Years ago, people could just drive down to it and swim. There was a swing rope hanging from the old crane and a ladder to get out. Back then I caught one bass on a small live bluegill.

We got Dish Network about 10 years ago and got the HD package. WFN was included because it's an HD channel. I DVRed a lot of shows on it. It was cool because i don't care much about hunting and I would sometimes just leave it on for background noise. Also, we had a small child then and it's almost all family-friendly, though she couldn't care less about fishing. They took it off our package about a year ago. When i called to complain, I was told it's part of a higher tier outdoors package and they'd be glad to add it for us for $10 more. Man, we pay so much for TV now I'm embarrassed to admit it. It looks like Outdoor TV has moved in and filled the void pretty well. Also NBC Sports has some fishing programming like Roland and Jimmy Houston.

Welcome to the board and to SC. The wife and I have discussed moving near there when our daughter graduates high school in about 5 years. I'm interested to know how the freshwater fishing is there.

I do that with all my frogs (mostly Booyah, of course). Just bend enough to get some daylight between the hooks and body. I have an older SPRO. It is pretty rigid material. I didn't know if they still were. The same can be said of the Academy H2O frogs. Those are also harder to walk. But they'd probably be fine in vegetation.

I'd fish the north bank (located by compass or Google Maps). That's the one getting the most sun in a day. Is that correct?

No, but my dad had a habit of letting catfish take his rods. He lost a couple before we put some cheap rod holders on the dock.

Friday just based on this weather report. But if I was going to a place that gets a crowd, then it would be Thursday. Lots of people make it a long weekend. I like the days in a sustained, stable warm weather trend in the spring. And a day like that just before a possible pressure changing front can be very good. No guarantees though.

You forgot to mention that rods just defect and break all by themselves without any help from the user.

What makes a bass's life more important than, say, a crappie's? If you own a pond, you better take a lot of fish or you'll have a bunch of 5 year old, 1 lb fish. My buddy has an overstocked pond full of 1/2 pounders and we take as many as we can catch. I have no issue whatsoever with people eating bass. I do always release all the ones I catch over 3 pounds and if I'm fishing from the kayak, I don't usually keep any. But I might give them to someone else fishing at the same time. It's a hassle to drag them around on a stringer.

Buy a regular size Pad Crasher and a Popping pad Crasher. In fact, buy two of each. All frogs eventually tear up. You can buy all the brands, but you won't get better than Booyah.

I had a gin clear pond near me that I used to walk to when I was maybe 13. I never figured it out. There were huge fish in it that would just turn and stare at me as long as I was there. It was open all around and I couldn't sneak up anywhere. I only ever got one to bite and didn't land it. Now I'd probably try live bait and be very still and dress in drab colors or fish-o-flage. I've read that fish have about a 10 minute memory unless they have a negative experience with something. Or go early or stay late for the benefit of low light. Make casts as long as you can to get your bait away from spooked fish. Make long casts parallel to the bank in each direction if you can. I'd probably try a Trick Worm, Finesse Worm, stick worm (Senko) and craw plastics in more natural colors. I second (or third) the Ned Rig suggestion. I don't do it, but a dropshot could be useful as well.

Let us know how you did. Conventional wisdom says that if they had been shallow (like, really shallow) they would head back to deeper water until some warmer weather comes along. They wouldn't go back to the deepest part of the pond, but the closest "deeper water" to the spawning flats. And it might seem that they're just gone, but more likely, they got lockjaw. We got the same weather pattern here and it was a cold front, small warming trend, then another colder front.

nm