Airman4754

Fish as far from shore as possible. You have the whole lake to yourself and the number of 4+ pound fish you catch will increase to dramatically it will blow your mind. Also, launch the boat after 10pm. You have the lake to yourself again. Anyone can catch bass in that 2.5lb range and under. When they grow into true apex predators you have to fish where the high value targets live. That's usually not hugging shore. Pre-spawn and spawn excluded.

Think like a living predator. If it's been cold and you have a warm day, where would you be? If it's been hot all day where would you be? Could you ambush in open water with no cover? Would you rather be in stagnant air or a breeze? Would you look for food where there is no food? These are dumb beasts. They're like electricity; easiest path.

I 100% disagree with that. I live in one of the "Mecca" areas of bass fishing now and I would take Oregon back in a heartbeat. The bass being non-native, living in deep water, and handed trout every six weeks most people there just don't know how to fish for them once they are over 2lbs. It also has minimal pressure outside of Tenmile and compared to a real bass lake Tenmile has minimal pressure. In Oregon if there are fifty boats are on a lake fourty of them won't be fishing for bass. Oregon is an absolute gem if you aren't a bank beater.

Ned Rig. It will fix your problem.

For about half the year we won't put a boat in the water until it's dark. I don't change anything with my approach or colors. I never have more than four colors of anything anyways. When the bite is in they're at all their normal hangouts doing their normal stuff.

We had supposedly the coldest winter here in decades and the first time I hit a pond on a decent weather day there were already fry swimming around. It kind of blew my mind as the water wasn't anywhere near 60 degrees. The air temp hadn't been above 55 in two months. We are still hitting some females on the river but it's slow going.

We were on Wheeler last weekend and the square bill bite was awesome. The guy I was with had a 5.5 and a 2.7 in the boat already and I had one stretcher. Then it hit. I thought I had a giant, and I did, but it was a drum. They will disappoint you like no other.

Buy living rubber straight from the source. It's a guy in southern Oregon right by where I grew up and lived forever. Keep the skirt on the inside short with living rubber so it's stiffer and it pushes the rest of it out to give a huge profile. I actually just tied this PB&J tonight and the craw colored one is in water. You can dead stick them and get a ton of action.

If you're line watching with a drop shot you might as well not drop shot. There is rarely ever an actual bite that you can feel, if you do it's usually a tiny fish. This is for cast and retrieve. Vertical drop shot fishing is totally different and can be done with anything. You're just free spooling line and are in direct contact with a tight line. For retrieval you need to be able to feel the bottom, not sensitive, just feel and be able to feel right when the weight of the fish picks up. The more your tip loads up the less you can do that. So, a stiffer tip will perform better across the spectrum of wind and depth, trust me on that one.

If you're barely going to fish it then it doesn't really matter. If you drop shot constantly you'll figure it out really quickly.

Get something with a stiff tip. You want a rod that you can feel 1/8oz with that doesn't turn into an overloaded marshmallow when it's windy and 20' and you need to fish 1/2oz. Usually a ML/F will do the job. You don't really need sensitive, you just need to know you're on bottom and can feel the weight of the fish. Anything more is total overkill.

I've been lucky enough to fish or own both ends of the price spectrum from most of the major brands. The thing most people don't account for are how many d**n rods there are in each of these lines from both casting and spinning in a myriad of lengths and actions. If you think all 25 NRX models are awesome for how you fish you're kidding yourself. If it's not a custom rod you might not like the handle set, material used, length or whatever else. Depending on what you are fishing and how you fish it there are $180 rods that will perform better for you than a $400+ rod. Expensive doesn't mean better. It just usually means lighter with better components and some nicer looking aesthetics. Generally it will have better craftsmanship, but that's not always the case. If you can find a high end rod that fits how you fish it is awesome, but not all of them are going to.

I know this has been a few weeks but I kind of let my gear decide what is best for the way I fish. Having moved to Bama and fishing grass a lot I use my M1 for lipless cranks now. The soft tip loads up really well so you can cast a mile and it has more of a natural release when you rip it through the grass. I throw Keitechs/soft swimbaits on two different rods. I fish all swimbaits the same, rod down and tucked under my arm pit so the handle has to be a certain length to be comfortable. Is slop I throw is on a 7'2" MH Johnny Morris Sig and out in open water I use the Duckett 8' swimbait rod. I believe it's the White Ice line and it's Velvick's signature rod. For Phoenix rods I own a ton of them and have never had the slightest problem. However, any time I hear the word tungsten and broken rod I already know what happened, especially on a drop shot. Tungsten is one of the most dense things on the planet. You've got it tied on your rod and it's on the deck or propped up somewhere and that sinker slaps into into the rod in the same spot a few times and very soon after it breaks on a cast. No brand of fishing rod is immune to this. An extremely dense object hitting an extremely frail object is just physics. You usually don't know when or where you did it either so it's easy to blame the rod, and it could just be a bad rod, but there is a real good chance it wasn't.

I have two of the most recent version Aldebarans and they are amazing.

Hey dad, I want some bass gear.

The litter thing ticks me off to no end. What person goes to a nice little spot on a piece of water and thinks leaving garbage is an appropriate action?

The castability is better especially when you go down in lure weight. The leader knot is smaller adding to casting distance. It also handles better.

I fish Phenix almost exclusively. The M1 line is a lot softer than the UMBX and Recon lines. For moving baits with treble hooks the M1 line is really good and very parabolic. The Recon line is very comparable to the UMBX line, only the rod diameters are a little larger and a little less dense.

I have noticed a down tick in production from the areas I normally fish with it. I have always believed the amount of forage present is the biggest factor in getting consistent bites. Like down here this time of year you will have a 50 yard wide creek with a school of shad as wide as the creek and there is a different one every 75 yards. You aren't getting much to bite when the food supply is endless unless you either drop it on their head or fish at a stitch pace.

If they are biting it will catch any bass you put it in front of regardless of size.

With the water shortages in southern California and DFW all but stopping the trout planting mixed with an old gene pool the magic is just about over out there. DD fish will still be caught, but the true giants will be very few and far between. We seem to be in the era of giant smallmouth and spotted bass though.

It depends on the location, the pressure, the time of year, and ultimately my mood. Sometimes I just want to catch a ton of fish and sometimes I want to catch good fish.

I just want to say Thank You to everyone involved with this. Kent told me I am the first one to receive one of these. What a work of art it is. It's almost too pretty to fish. I served 16 years in the Air Force and work for the Army as a civilian now. I've never had a day pass in my adult life that I wasn't serving in some capacity and it will probably stay that way until I retire for good. I will definitely be contributing to this project as well as a pay it forward. There is no way I would have the memories, friendships, education, and what I consider an amazing life without the military. Again, Thank You all so much.

I will mark a waypoint then vertical fish it with a drop shot the first time I find it. When you are off shore you're normally in schools of fish and similar sized fish normally run together. Dangle a worm down there and see if they are the right fish.