king fisher

I'm not caught, but I have to admit I might have temporarily been hooked. Besides I'm sure that bass was caught on a spinnerbait, and the guy is just trying to sell $300 swimbaits.

What a bass. Of course the Monkey had me Google 3:16 lure company. All their hard baits are over $200 and most of them are sold out. Has any one here used them? Does any one know what model the bait in the picture is?

If someone else cleans and cooks the fish, I will eat them. I like to catch them.

I'm 61 and find it difficult to do simple house hold chores, go to the grocery store, or wash my wife's car, but I have no problems loading my kayak, driving for 4 four hours, fishing for 12 hours, setting up a small tent, sleeping on the ground, waking up fishing for 12 more hours, loading my kayak, and driving 4 hours to my home. As soon as I get home I definitely start to feel my age again.

Do you want to be bored or broke. Your choice. Be warned, once you start buying crankbaits looking for that perfect one for you situation the Bait Monkey will climb on your back and never let go. Maybe fishing the same boring bait isn't so bad. I will say, buying and catching bass on crankbaits is a fun way to go broke.

When fishing plastic worms I only throw Junebug, green pumpkin, and Watermelon Candy. I also throw black and blue seven inch Senkos, but that is only becasue I can't find 7inch ones in Junebug anymore. All other colors of worms I don't catch anything with. The fact that I never fish any other colors may be a contributing factor to my lack of success.

That is the same kind of out of the box thinking the Bait Monkey uses when he is trying to max out my credit card. Are you related to him?

Thinking about fishing all of the time is why my parents were not able to put a bumper sticker on their car that said their kid is on the honor roll. They could have put a bumper sticker on their car that said their kid landed the biggest bass ever caught out of rock creek, but I guess they didn't sell that sticker at the PTA meetings. I sure hope God wasn't too offended when as a young boy, while watching a baptism at church I wondered how many bass could live in the baptism tub, and how much better it would be to check out the action of my new lures there rather than our bath tub at home. I am certain that no where in the good book does it say it is a sin to day dream about bass fishing during church, but I'm sure my mother would have not approved and at that time of my life there was not a big difference between the power of God and the power of my mother.

The crappie also eat a lot of smaller bait that the bass eat. Until the bass get to a certain size, crappie and bass are in direct competition for food. It may or may not help the bass if there are less crappie, only time will tell. Forage that doesn't directly compete with the bass for food, may have a bigger effect on bass populations, if there is a drastic decline in numbers. If you like to eat crappie, a 30% decline in population of crappie makes for many empty frying pans.

I still have my Heddon Mark 1V I bought in the spring of 1977

I had planned on spending any free time I had this summer to fish, chasing only bass. A friend called and wanted me to go fish for Rooster Fish south of PV with him on his boat. I tried to tell him I only bass fish on my free time, but he is a good friend and insisted, so I broke my promise to myself and agreed to go. I'm glad I I did because I have fished this area for 17 years and this was the best single day of fishing for roosters in my life. We landed over 40 including this giant. Fishing was fast and furious, and I hadn't run a busy cockpit like that in a long time. The other angler was not experienced and I ended up having to be a full time deck hand. It was just like riding a bike, it all came back after the first big flurry of bites, and I had a great time.

I have tried over a dozen braids. I fished Power Pro for many years. Now I use gray Diawa J Braid 8 for everything, except for my big game reels which get Jerry Brown hollow braid.

One rod to many, but 1,000 short of being enough.

You are around so many bass they just jump in the boat, and you can't catch one on a spinnerbait?

If I only needed 10 I wouldn't own 1,000. That is my story and I'm sticking to it.

I like to go over the point and mark cover, bait fish and or bass with my down imaging. Once I find what I think will be the best spot, I throw out a marker buoy. If the place I marked was 15 feet deep or less, I may have spooked the bass while going over the top of them, so I will leave and come back later. I am fairly stealthy in my kayak, so if it is 15 feet or deeper I will assume I didn't spook any bass, and will back off and make long casts at my marker from every angle with a crankbait. If I catch some fish and the bite stops I will switch the color of the crankbait. Before I leave I will drag a Carolina Rig to pick up a few more bites. If I catch some quality bass I will fish the whole point looking for a few more. If the C Rig produces more than the crankbait, the next point I will start with the C Rig, and follow up with the crankbait. If the point produces well I will leave my marker, and come back later to try again. I am fortunate enough to fish lakes where I can leave a marker buoy out for a three day weekend and not worry about someone fishing the spot. I know I can just put a waypoint on my plotter and forgo the marker buoy, but I prefer to cast at a visual target. One time I put out a marker on a small hard to find place. I landed some bass off the spot and left to fish another place. A commercial gill net fisherman saw my marker and thought he would do my a favor. He picked up my marker and rowed across the lake to give me my buoy, he thought I had forgot. I thanked him and later that day spent a half hour trying to locate the small piece of cover again. Even with a waypoint marked on my fish finder, it can be difficult to find a single rock or other small piece of cover peddling a kayak in the wind.

I never see the pros try to catch the difficult bass in the same places I do. Like on top of a dock, high up in a tree, 30 feet up on dry land, or on the back of my outboard. They always seem to cast for the easy bass in the water.

I have marks on my kayak for a quick length measurement. The first mark is 23 inches. Anything over 24 inches I will weigh. If it is over 7 pounds I will take a picture. Any bass under 24 inches gets released immediately. I don't get to fish very often, and there is only so many hours in a day. I try to not waste as little time as possible. I even fish while eating my lunch. When I do catch a big bass I immediately put it on a lip gripper, attached to a line. I put the bass in the water while I get my camera and scale ready. If the scale hits over 7 pounds, I take a quick picture, then release the bass. I believe as many fish die from a camera, as die from a frying pan. In the past I have been guilty of letting a bass go that may not survive because of my efforts to get a better picture. I have learned from my mistakes, and am confident that the bass I release have a good chance of surviving.

I carry four in my kayak. 1- 7 foot medium fast bait caster, Top water, shallow to mid diving crankbait, jerk bait 2- 7 foot medium heavy bait caster, T Rig. 3- 7.5 foot medium heavy bait caster, Deep diving crankbaits, magnum square bills, jigs, 4-6 inch soft swimbaits. 4- 7.5 foot heavy. C Rig, A Rig, large swimbaits. The A Rig and large swimbaits are to heavy for this rod, but I can get by. Some lakes I leave my heavy rod at home and bring a spinning rod for drop shot, and lighter moving lures. I do miss the days when I was young and only had one rod, maybe if I went back to one rod, and a few baits I would catch more bass.

I think the biggest controversy on FFS. isn't weather it hurts bass populations, it is weather or not it should be allowed in bass tournaments. Methods such as trolling, the A Rig, or using a net are not detrimental to the over all population of bass, but are not allowed by many tournament organizations. I personally like the idea of FFS being used in competition, but do believe those that oppose it's use have solid arguments against it. Water quality, habitat, bag limits, proper release techniques and some good luck will determine the health of a fishery,

It would be interesting to hear what you agree, and disagree with as a fellow biologist. I liked his honest answer I don't know to the question of how do bass see color.

I watchd this video, and thought it had lots of interesting information. It is a little long, and of course I'm sure that some of the opinions could be debated by other biologists or fisherman, but all in all I think it is worth watching.

I use the cheapest ones I can find. After loosing more than one Leatherman overboard, I learned to keep any tool I wasn't prepared to loose off of the boat.

Twitch an original floating Rapala minnow on the surface in the evening. Try a #3 inline spinner during the middle of the day. Both techniques will usually catch something, and can surprise you with a PB at any time.

Right now my fishing gear only takes up one corner of our condo, but the Monkey and I have bigger plans.