the reel ess

No, but I wasn't prepared to and would have sunk up to my knees in the pond bottom. I was sinking standing on the ground. If I only had one, I might have considered it. Actually, this is it. And I got this off BPS and they still sell it! I was wrong! Problem solved. Crisis averted.

Yeah, they probably make them better now than they did then. I feel certain the hooks are better now. I had to sharpen the hooks on that old one. Back when I bought this one, there weren't so many options.

I went to my buddy's family's pond last night. I walked up to where I normally throw a frog on lilies. There was a clear spot near the bank and a 3 lb bass was in maybe 6" of water there. It didn't move though I was clearly in its field of vision and talking. I told my buddy "there's a 3 pounder right here." It was 6 feet away and seemed to be interested in me. So I flipped my frog about 5 feet in front of its nose and it slowly swam over to it, sort of stalking. Then it crushed the frog. I set the hook and pulled it out of the sparse lilies. I weighed it and it was the 3 lbs. it looked like in the water. that has never happened to me, even during spawn, where a bass has been that easy to catch or that eager to eat something, especially a good size fish. My guess is it had been chasing bluegill at the edge and saw motion and got interested. I asked my buddy if they feed the fish there and he said no. It was a cool sight to see. i didn't get another fish for 2 hrs and it was another 3 pounder, this one on a white buzzbait.

I was at a pond that the owner didn't want me using my kayak in. I cast over a stump and when I yanked the Spook to flip it over, it went into another cypress tree and wrapped a limb. The line was 15# Big Game. It broke off and I had no way to get to it. That's been a good lure and they don't make that color of baby bass anymore. It's more of a gold/black color now. Not that that matters much on a topwater. I still have an old sort of silver shad color one. RIP green baby bass Spook. You fooled many o' good bass and some schooling stripers. On the bright side, I did catch 2 bass around 3 lb. on a frog and a Hart Throb white buzzbait with the clacker thingy.

It's more weedless than you imagine. Of course it's not totally weedless, but was surprised. And the hookups are great with it. Apparently the fish take the bait head first.

In my younger days I worked in a manufacturing plant with some guys who, for whatever reason, had a hard time pronouncing my last name so they shortened it to a nickname. "Ess" or "The Ess". Then another guy came to work there with that same nickname so I jokingly called myself "The Real Ess." And since this is a fishing site, I changed the spelling of Real to Reel. Thus, TheReelEss.

Well, someone I use to work with 3 years ago gave me one root beer and two chartreuse metal flake. Since I was into Zoom, I didn't use any of the Mann;s until last fall when I started trying the nose hook method. There's one place I fish where they just love shades of gold. The fish loved the chartreuse this spring around the spawn. I still have one root beer tied on. I have noticed they aren't in every store, but I believe I've seen them at the local Walmart. I have some Zoom in bubble gum color that bass bite. If you have an Amazon prime account (my wife does) you can get them in certain colors with no shipping. I've bought a lot of baits that way. Just be careful. I've bought some the wrong size because I didn't do my research.

Hey, I like this! I'vebeen nose-rigging flukes for years. It helps the action out a lot by getting action throughout the entire bait and the hookup ratio is better. Plus you don't need to swing for the fences on the hookset. Just tighten up and reel. Have you tried the Mann's Hardnose jerkbait? It's extremely durable in the nose area. You won't need anything but the hook for it. But I understand brand loyalty. I've caught a lot of fish on the Zoom as well. http://www.tacklewarehouse.com/Manns_Hardnose_Jerkbait_/descpage-MHNJ.html

I started out with 65. But then when I was not using my frog rod for frogs (about half the year) I was using it for jigs and soft plastics. I didn't use any leader at that point, so it was hard to thread thru a bullet weight. I needed a mono loop to pull it thru. I went down to 50 and have never broken that, so I'd say 50 is as high as I'll ever be going. But I hear that smaller will dig into the spool. In fact, the higher tests dig in. Another reason I think 50 is right size for me. I read that braid is not rock-abrasion-resistant. I have no experience with that because I fish places that are full of lilies or old wood. Again, I have never broken straight braid. Not even 20#. I'm sure I'll get around to it someday.

Might I suggest you try a new Booyah Poppin' Pad Crasher? Out of the box, it's the best I've useed, but I did bend the hooks out a bit and trimmed the legs. If you want to walk it, it walks easier than most regular frogs, I guess due to the shape. But you can stop it every now and then and pop it, then start walking. It's two frogs in one. It's great o the pads, but seems to get open water strikes a little better. Frog hooks won't stay sharp forever. The roof of a bass's mouth is a pretty tough surface.

I want a pair with 1.5X readers in them. I'm not going to order any expensive ones without trying them on. So I'll just do without until I can find a place with some good ones. BTW I was in Sunglasses Hut the other day and they had no glasses with readers and didn't offer to get me any. But the did tell me there were "stick-on" readers I could try out if I wanted to give them a go. Has anyone tried these?

I have the exact same combo. I use 20# PowerPro braid. I use cheap mono as backing line to lower cost. I just think 6# mono is almost too light for bass if this is your only combo. There will be lures that you need to get a good hookset on and that 6# is going to stretch. You usually have a good bit of line out when you use a C rig. You're going to have to lighten your drag to avoid breaking line and it will eventually cost you a big fish. If you feel the need to go light for visibility, you can use a mono leader. I do this when I make a light C rig for this combo. I use an 1/8 oz. bullet weight and 10 lb. low vis green Trilene leader below the swivel. Then I'll use a 4" Zoom Finesse Worm. I would only ever use 6 lb for crappie or if I was in a place with extremely clear water. And I never fish a place like that. well, I also have a light combo I take to a pond with stunted bass and good bluegills that has 6 lb on it and I miss some bites because of the stretch factor. If you think braid is prohibitively expensive, consider that it lasts longer than you'll want to keep it on your reel. You can use cheap mono as backing to fill half your spool. Then if you reel it from one reel to another, the other end will be like brand new. It also has less line memory and less twist issues.

I ditto the 15# Berkley Big Game. I use a 6'6" Medium for this as well as other heavier treble hardbait presentations like lipless cranks. This is a pretty good all around line for trebles. It floats (at least for a while), it's cheap and reliable and it has some stretch to help keep the trebles hooked up. I think copolymer is a version of the same idea. I'm actually thinking of switching to it, but i still have hundreds of yards of Big Game to use up. I can see the braid argument though because there are some walking baits like the Spook that you can cast a country mile and not be able to reel up the slack enough to get a good hookset, taking into account the mono stretch factor. Especially when you're trolling along searching for fish. You have to consider that stretch of mono can be 10% of the length you have out. If you cast 60' and set the hook, that could mean you move the rod 6' and don't get any real pressure on the fish. You might even just take the slack out with your hookset.

That depends on the line. For mono, which is my choice for these baits, I use an improved clinch. I would assume the improved clinch would be a good choice for copolymer as well. But I think I'd use Palomar for braid/fuoro because that's the only one I know for braid. Not quite sure about the fluoro because I don't use it and there are other personal preference people have.

Here's a handy chart showing the difference between shellcrackers (redear sunfish) and pumpkinseeds, among others. And I understand shellcrackers get a good bit larger. They also have a different diet as one's name implies.

Yeah, I never caught one much bigger than 5" in my whole life.

My dad always did the opposite. He's use flip-up sunglasses over his prescription glasses.

Yes, I'm at that ripe age where I need readers to tie a knot. Is anyone using the glasses with reader lenses? What brand would you recommend? I'm a cheapskate, but not above buying a good pair because i know I'll use them a lot going forward.

I have seen them as a trailer on conventional bass jigs in an ad on my facebook feed, but I can't find it now. I see no reason it wouldn't work though. Anything's worth a try or two.

I think they're both bluegills, of the opposite gender. When one of the sexes gets large it turns very dark as you have there. Nice fish. It's very rare for us to see yellow perch in SC, but they are here. They just don't seem to follow the patters of crappie or bluegill so we don't catch them much. I bet I've caught fewer than 10 my entire "career" and never a good size one. When I was young, we called the green perch. Here we catch them on the smallest Rapala jointed minnow and Rooster Tails.

There's an outfitter that guides kayak inshore fishing trips fr $160/person. Black River Adventures. If you're interested. That's a lot cheaper than a guide with a boat.

This is a well-kept secret for wintertime trophy bass. My buddy trolls for crappie a lot and he has caught several big'uns on tiny jigs, including one over 8 lbs. I have a friend with a pond who says the best bait there is a pink and white tube jig. This kinda blows the big bait-big fish theory.

It's clearer water. I went striper fishing there once and was struck by how deep you could see your fish. There will be a lot of boat traffic since it's near the city. I would expect the offshore structure to be the best bet. Given a choice, I would choose either of the Santee Cooper lakes for largemouth. From what I'm told, you can just about put in anywhere and find fish in that area.

Yes. Hang around Dick's in the fall for some real deals on Live Target lures. They thin out the fishing gear to make room for hunting, at least at our local store.

I bought the 1/10 with the weed guard, but now I wish they were lighter and plain hooks. The bait weighs a bit like a Senko so it helps cast. The weed guard on a small bait doesn't look that natural and it's wire, so it catches weeds. It still gets bites though and I could cut them off.