aj88kc

Went to the one by me today. They have senkos for 6.49 plus 25% off. A few other odd ball items but nothing I was interested in. I did happen to grab a live target wake bait for $ 10 though. Everywhere else has them for $20 around me. So I feel i got a little bit of a deal anyway. The fishing section is pretty lame in the store closest to me. I will stick with academy and some of the crazy deals they have.

Another wake crank to add to the supply. Between academy and the deals at dsg right now I'm going to be in the dog house for a while.

Use Circle hooks or Kahle hooks. Since switching to one of these hooks I have not gut hooked another cat. You can get circles in just about any size you want if you look for them. I use them for catching my bluegills in size 10. I would get a size 3/0 or 4/0 circle for the smaller cats.

What I need to improve on is jigs,weighted t-rigs, spinner baits,(basically anything other than some top water) seeing how I have never thrown them before. I have stocked up on them and plan on using them a lot this year. I just need to find me a pond or lake full of dinks to learn how to use them. I have only used top water baits like weightless t-rig worms and lizards, spooks, wake baits, and hollow body frogs.

My flathead set up is a MH tiger with a penn fathom 25 lw(30lb drag) with 30 lb big game. It is a beast of a setup and is pretty over kill but where i fish for flatheads there has been multiple 50-60 lbers caught. If I was to buy another setup it would be a penn squall 15 or 20(15lb drag) on a heavy tiger lite. I have the heavy tiger lite with a 70 size ming yang and it handled a 45lb flathead last year. Do not discount the 2015 7000 abus I have heard very good things about them. I have several 5000, 6000 abus and if you set the drag right and dont try to over power them big flats they will handle anything you can throw at them. Its all about having your drag set correctly and having the right line. If you are trying to pull flats out of heavy cover then i would be looking more towards the 50-80 maybe 100lb test braid and a little faster reel. As far as rods go I am a big fan of the tigers but you have many good choices out there. I have heard very good results coming from rippin lips rods. Tangling with catfish rods are always a staple. Just get something that you will have confidence in for your area. Not every waterway holds big flatheads. In some places 20lbs is a huge flat. In places like I am at I know there is a good chance that there is multiple 60lb plus fish swimming around. If you are looking for distance I would probably go spinning on a 10-13 ft rod. I am not the person your looking for if you are talking distance though. I can get 60 yards with 3 oz of weight and a cut gill but if I am using live bait I am not lobbing the bait more than 30 yards. Hope you can make a little bit of sense out of my rambling.

It sounds a lot like the ponds that I fish. Usually they have water run off inlets from either parking lot run off or street run off. Mud bottoms with little to no cover and bowl shaped. No dam really just an out flow tube. 10-12 ft max in the middle and usually highly pressured. One thing the ponds have around me usually have is boulders all the way around the pond for erosion control. A few trees around the edge here and there but nothing in the water as far as laydowns or brush piles. The first thing i focus on is the banks. I start off fishing as close to the bank as possible early morning and late evening. The bass will move to the boulder banks and pick off the bait fish that are there feeding on the bugs coming off the rocks and out of the grass. I will throw shallow cranks and weightless worms or lizards. (top water can be fun as well. spooks,frogs,or my new favorite wake baits). After a good hard rain the first place I am heading is the run off areas where the water is coming into the ponds. The bass will stack up there big time feeding on stuff washing in. You can throw just about anything in there and catch them when that is happening. Go to there is a weightless fluke or plastic swim bait. Also weight less t-rigged worms. Mid day Focus on the deepest part of the pond. Throw a mid range 6-8 ft diving crank or 6-8 ft diving jerk bait. If there is a fountain or oxygen lines definitely hit them in the warmer months as it will stir up the water giving more oxygen(also usually the deepest part of the pond) Warmer months faster retrieves are better, cooler months slow as you can possibly go. Google earth can be your best friend. You can roll back google earth a few years and see the different water levels. When I am looking at the older pictures I am focusing on the images when the water was the lowest looking for any variations in the bottom contour. Even if it looks like a dig out that is even a foot lower or higher than anything around it the fish will key in on that spot. Also look for any trees, stumps, logs, trash cans, anything that may look like structure. Most of the ones I fish have about 2ft of visibility so I will throw natural colors, ghost colors and white colors up close to the bank and as i get deeper the darker the colors get. Hopefully this helps you out a little bit. Tight lines and stick a good one.

cell phone on the right?

I am going to try to hold out just a little longer but man I really want one of these. I have a pond that I know this will work very well in. It is where I learned to frog fish. It is really matted over and if that this walks even close to how it does in the promo video I know I can probably hammer them in there.

I have not used that exactly but have used plenty of jig heads with spinners on them that look a lot like what you have there. I used to put a big twist tail grub on or a small swimbait and tear up the little bass, bigger gills, and crappie in ponds on them things.

Clayton which jerkbait from academy is the one that suspends? Is it the $5.99 one or the $3.99 one? I have been eyeing them for awhile now but i did not want a floating one.

I do a ton of catfishing. I have a mh tiger (not the cheap white ones) with a penn fathom 25 that I run 30lb big game on it for flathead. I am throwing anywhere from 7-10 ozs of weight with bait and sinker with that setup. I tell you that just to say that 25 lb big game is some big thick stuff. I own 3 5500's as well and the biggest big game i put on it for catfishing is 12 lb. and it has good castability still. Anything past that you are really going to be clogging up that little 5500. If you wanted that breaking strength on the 5500 i would go with braid.

Sass, Clayton is dead on. It is a really good looking bait in person. I have been eyeing that houdini color for some time now. The main bodies of water that I fish are loaded with blue gill so I figured that it was a good color to imitate them. Thanks for the input Cole. I have never fished the chatterbait or jig so I am excited to get out and learn to use them. I am trying to read up on both baits as much as I can before I get them in the field. The only bass fishing I have ever done really only consisted of top water stuff mainly the old scum frogs. I have caught a few bass off of plastics but it was only weightless worms and lizards over mats. So I have a lot to learn in the plastics world with the trigs and crigs. I caught quite a few this last fall on some wake baits and some spook type baits and I caught my first jerkbait bass on dec 2. I was real pumped after catching a bass in december let alone on a bait that I had never thrown before. I am excited for spring to come and get back after it. Thank you for all your help guys.

Thanks Clayton. I will definitely give that a try. Bankbeater I have a a large bag that can hold 5 boxes. I just didnt realize I was going to have 9 boxes after adding my new stuff to the old. I have to get me a really good box or two built so I dont have to lug two bags worth of stuff up and down the bank with me.

Cavitron buzzbait white 3/8 oz Booyah spinnerbait double willow blade copper/silver 3/8 oz white Booyah boo jig green/watermelon red 3/8 oz Chatterbait elite Houdini color 3/8 oz KVD jerkbait 200 bluegill color Rapala shadow rap silver color Yum dinger 4'' green pumpkin Pit boss 4" green pumpkin/green Pit boss 3" green pumpkin Cabelas 4" finesse worm green pumpkin Cabelas 5" fat grub green pumpkin Cabelas 4" Tommy toad watermelon seed VMC trailer hooks 2/0 So I was hoping for a little feed back on what I got. I know it is not the best stuff in the world but it was within budget and it is helping me build my bass box after being away from bass fishing since I was a kid and not really knowing what I was doing. Also I was wondering what trailer would be best to put with the chatterbait? I have some zoom super fluke jr in white pearl that I was thinking about putting on there or the 3" pitt boss but I am not really sure what to do. Thank you for your time.

Thanks for the welcome guys. Clayton I have talked with you on the catfish site a few times. Man I forgot how expensive bass fishing is. Catfish I can go catch some gills and be set. I dont have to have all the lures, lines, hooks, technique specific rods and reels. I will slowly get it all built up but it is tough going into academy, cabelas or bp and not just buying a bunch of new baits.

Hey all. I stumbled upon the sight doing a little research on some bass rods and reels and I really enjoyed a lot of the content that I seen so I decided to sign up. I live in kansas city ks. I have been fishing my whole life but over the past 10 years my main focus has been on catfishing especially flathead. This past fall when my flatheading was slow i decided to get back into bass fishing. I did really well and that got me even more excited to get back to doing more bass fishing. Even though I have fished for bass I would definitely call my self a rookie in the bass world and I look forward to learning as much as I can from you guys. My home lake is wyandotte county lake, but I fish olathe lake and some other smaller lakes and ponds in eastern kansas. I look forward to meeting you guys.