fishwizzard

That gets heavy if you are fishing on foot. What got me to buy the scale was getting into jigs/chatterbaits. A "3/8oz" chatterbait, once you account for the skirt and blade, often weighs a bit north of 1/2oz. Throw on a trailer and you are north of 3/4oz. Trying to fish that on a rod with a printed max of 3/4oz, who's real upper limit feels closer to 1/2oz, was incredibly frustrating. Knowing what my lures really weigh and learning what my rods really cast best with is something I would rather do in my yard with a beer next to me then 3 miles from my car in the woods.

Yes, I have never broken a shroom head hook on a fish, but have broken dozens of them on snags with 6-8lb line. I guess I would rather break the hook and not leave a lure in the water, but I would prefer a hook I can bend back even more.

I would buy this reel; http://www.ebay.com/itm/Daiwa-Alphas-Finesse-Custom-105HL-Left-Handle-Baitcasting-reel-Made-In-Japan/352161098534?_trkparms=aid%3D222007%26algo%3DSIM.MBE%26ao%3D1%26asc%3D46087%26meid%3Db040623907a74b94b1a1afbe776c1c73%26pid%3D100011%26rk%3D3%26rkt%3D12%26sd%3D172849217823&_trksid=p2047675.c100011.m1850 It will be great for light lures out of the box and a simple bearing swap will make it better. If it is too wild, a $60 DIY spool will tame it down. If you decide you don't want it I bet you could get most of your money back out of it. If it were RH I would have added and removed it from my cart a dozen times by now.

I did try that once, but couldn't tell if it was doing anything. It is also incredibly awkward to do so with the rod tip in the water, trying to do it with the tip up got hot in a hurry. I am really really digging the technique though, so I have to figure something out if I end up wanting to use straight floro.

I am new to dropshotting and am trying straight 7lb Sniper to start with. I am about 15 trips in and the line twist is just enough to be noticeable. I am using weights with both halves of the swivel exposed (per Rick Z's blog), so maybe that is helping? I am fishing it from the bank so far and often have the line semi-slack as I pop the weight over the bottom, so I am loving the straight floro so far. I backed my spool maybe 1/2-3/4 of the way with 15lb braid, so when my main line gets too short I am going to give braid/leader a try.

Very nice! Despite living around here, I have never taken my kayak into the tidal Potomac. Something about that river makes me wary in a way the northern tidal rivers dont. I gotta just do it some day when there is a big televised sporting event on to hopefully cut down on the traffic.

I cheat and printed out a fractional ounce to decimal ounce chart and hung it over my little fishing workbench. Buying a little scale was one of the best tackle investments I have ever made. Nothing weighs what the package says, rods don't seem to have accurate weight ratings, so the only way to really tell is to test stuff in the yard and weigh stuff on the bench.

The hooks on the Zman shroom heads are pretty brittle. I used to use the VMC halfmoon jighead and they had the same issue. I prefer softer hooks that bend but don't snap for finesse stuff.

I wear one all the time too, thus "fishwizzard". My buddy never gets tired of that joke.

I never really confront people, other than people who let their dogs thrash around in spawning beds. 99% of the time the owner has no idea and will immediately stop their dog once I point out the beds and explain what they are. The 1% blows me off and gets DNR called on them for having an offleash dog. The "Catch a Poacher" hotline seems to do nothing, but the Natural Resources Police seem to come running if you call about an off leash dog. I have called them in when I see guys poaching too.

I don't really worry about residue, at least for e-tape. Even when it is years old it comes off very easily with alcohol.

An RI Skinny Dipper w/ heavy hook weighs in right around 1/2oz as well. I will most always fish one with a 1/16 or 1/32 steel weight pegged. The weight acts as a bumper of sorts to prolong the life of the plastic and makes the lure more weedless.

I thought about plumbers tape, but figured it would be too slick. I have a single roll of "nice" electricians tape I use for spools. It has less adhesive and gets less sticky than the cheap stuff. I also use it to cover my backing/mainline knot, I use braid as a backer and floro as my main line on most of my casting reels and a little tick of red tape becoming visible is a good reminder that I am coming up on my backing.

I am really curious about the 7'6" Neko rod, but don't know if I could deal with a rod that long. I would love to make a few casts with one, but don't think I could buy one blind.

You can find older Alphas reels on ebay for sub-$200, add some bearings, DIY Spool, and maybe new drag washers, and end up with a very nice reel for not a ton of money. The prices on Pixys is really low as well, I have seen a few right around $100. I will second the Major Craft rod recommendations, they have a ton of options, just keep an eye on the actions, they have a lot of Regular/Moderate action rods in their lineup. I have a Phenix Recon 2 6'8" L/F that I use. I like it a lot (other then the reel seat), but I have not held their newer offerings.

Every time I get a more sensitive rod I set my hook about every third cast until I get a few hours on it and calm down.

Yes! It is a much better fishery then it looks like it should be. I had another great day there Saturday. I have been fishing there for a few years and only this season have I really started doing well. The bass in there seem to be a bit larger then normal for the other little ponds around here, I thought maybe the trout stocking could be the cause. Do you fish the Bowie/Crofton ponds much?

Just this saturday I had a guy, unsolicited, give me a tip that turned the day around. It was a small pond, so I am sure he saw me trying for an hour to get the bass to eat what they wanted all last month (pink robo on a dropshot) and as he passed me just said "throw a lipless out like you are trying to lose it and reel it in nice and fast". Sure enough, I did it and bagan catching almost immediately. I got about 5 in an hour and walked over to thank him. He said that he had been there since 6am (I arrived around 9am) and had "wasted two hours with a damm pink worm" as well, so he couldn't stand to see me waste my time too. It turns out that I had turned him onto the pink worm weeks ago and he was repaying the favour. He had a fly rod the first time and a pair of baitcaster the second, so I guess I remember gear more then faces, but my kindness was repaid and I ended the day with 8 bass all between 1.5 and 2.5, which is great for that spot.

Yea, it amazes me that people will spend money on the booze and then mix it with store-brand mixers. Tonic especially, spending a buck or two more a sixpack makes a huge difference. As for liquor, if you like bourbons/ryes, check out High West out of Park City UT. They do blends and are all pretty interesting at the very least. I keep a bottle of their Campfire (a blend of bourbon, rye, and a little scotch) around as it is pretty unique and people seem to get a kick out of it.

As long as there isn't a 5 gallon bucket at your feet, I will tell you exactly what I am catching on and even offer up a few plastics if needed.

Found it! River Rock Fat Sticks; https://river-rock-custom-baits.myshopify.com/products/2-3-4-fat-stick No idea if they have any wiggle to them.

This is not super helpful, but I saw some floating short stickbaits that were made with the Ned in mind. I cannot for the life of me remember the name of the company but I think it was a small-midsized producer and I found them while looking at tubes one night, so many someone known for them?

I have tried that with the 1" cut off ends of some Hula Stickz. I called it the "Ed Rig". Never even got a single hit the two times I tried it.

What lure did it hit? I got a smaller one on a J-7 Rapala of all things a month or so ago.

I have used 6lb braid on my panfish/perch reels before and like it well enough, except when trying to tie on a new leader in any kind of wind. It is so thin and limp that it drives me crazy trying to get a knot tied. I tried 4lb braid once and that lasted about two trips, my fingers cannot deal with it. I fish a lot in brackish water for white perch. As bycatch I get pickerel, small stripers, and sometimes small blues. I will sometimes run 6lb braid to pretty heavy floro, like 8-12lb. It seems to help get my little spinners deeper and the perch don't seem to care.