FishDewd

If you don't mind, absolutely.

Yep it'll work great for that, I like to use it to catch various species of panfish.

You can use it in muddy water. I've caught all sorts of fish with basically 0 visibility with DS. Key is PATIENCE. You can use live bait or plastics if you want to go for bass. I've had luck using small finesse worms or something else with a scent to it. Helps if you know where the fish ate holding too.

Don't lock your drag down... one high stick with the wrong force and POW! Your rod could break. You should have your drag set lower than your line rating, but that's not 100% a perfect measurement. Pretty much, if I set the hook and the drag doesn't slip at least a little then I consider drag to be too high and bump it down a bit until it does. Proper drag can not only keep you from breaking the line and rod, but also prevent the fish from getting the leverage needed to pull itself loose. Better too low than too high imo. Plus the fight is so much better. With BC reels you can always use a thumb to apply more friction thus faking drag if needed. Sometimes it's better for the fish to get a little tired out before you get it in, other times now. The situation varies. Me, I don't fish tournaments so I enjoy the fight. I like giving the fish an equal footing so when I get it in I feel I earned it. It's about how you work the fish more than anything, but this is just my opinion.

Hey a 4 lber sounds good to me... I've caught one close to 2 but that's best I've gotten thus far lol.

I never go fishing without a set of high torque dykes. Its the one tool I hope I never need. So far I haven't been stabbed with a hook and hopefully I keep it that way.

I use the VMC swivle hooks for Ds after much trial and error. Yes, you can use the regular DS hooks... tie a knot, pass the line through, then tie a weight on... but it has disadvantages. The ones with two eyelets (spinshots) don't have those disadvantages. They move around with the fish and allow you to tie a lighter weight leader in case of a snag- I use crappy berkley vanish for this- pop the weight off, but keep the hook. Retie a weight with a figure 8 knot, pop on a new weight and off you go DS'ing once again. It works in murky water trust me... I do pull it out every now and then when really, really desperate and it does catch bass. I just try not to use it for bass. I work it slower than a texas rig. Slower than a ned rig. It's by far the slowest presentation I have, but will get bit eventually. Not very exciting but it does work. It's pretty easy though. Cast out, let sit.... give some twitches every minute or so. After 5-10 minutes, drag in a few feet and repeat.

Well the worms I fish are only 5" or so... maybe I should try a bigger one sometime! They say bigger is better...

Just keep in mind that they don't allow hooks to be used in the rodeo when lassoing.

I've seen it in stores... not sure I would be willing to try it tbh lol. It's like a jelly worm... huge and cumbersome looking. I'm sure it works, I just wouldn't know what to do with such a monstrosity.

For BC reels: I just use a small box with a hole in the front to feed the line through, run a pencil through the spool, and add a few spools on either side to help the one I'm winding ride in the middle to keep it mostly level as I wind the line on using my hand pressing the line against the pole with a sock while I wind in what I need. Cheap and simple. For spinning reel I just lay the spool flat on the ground and use the same sock pressing technique to line the line on. Again, cheap and simple. Both have worked just fine for me lol. I don't need no stinking, newfangled, fancy thing-a-ma-bob gizmo line winding station!

That makes sense to me, a 2/0 is what I had in mind since 3/0 seems a tad too big. What gets me is the bait keeper on the shank and the overall gap size of the hook after I stick it in. Seems like too much. It'd work for a biffle bug or something that size though, but I haven't fished that yet since it tends to float. Requires a swinging head iirc.

I picked up a few straight shank hooks this morning from DSG. I couldn't quite find what I was looking for so I went down the road to Academy on the way home and didn't have any luck there finding better. Here's what I ended up getting. 1 pack of Owner 4/0 Flipping hooks. I wanted 3/0 but didn't see 3/0 at either location. I think these are going to be too large to use for most of my plastics. I also got a pack of Gamakatsu 3/0 straight shank heavy cover worm hooks. But these also seem like they're going to be too large for my smaller plastics based on where the keeper sits. What's the right size? I saw Roboworm Rebarb hooks mentioned but they don't carry those in stores. I do agree that based on me playing with the hook types that a straight shank may be the way to go. But what's the right size to use? Cause I'm thinking I'll have to order some for online. Baits I use a lot: baby brush hogs, senkos, finesse worms, rage craws/other craws, curly tail grub. Is these one size that'll work well for all of these since they are similar thickness?

Glenn was practicing his lasso skills for the next rodeo!

Thus is the Walmart way: replace things that people like with things that they don't like.

I love spots like that... loves of juicy lures hanging from trees. When the fishing is slow, I just go back to the car, put up my poles, fetch the lure retriever and a have a good day saving lures that others were kind enough to get snagged up in trees for me to claim and later use! Isn't charity wonderful? :D

Don't think I've ever casted a lure off using any line, but I've had plenty of intentional break offs due to snags

Where did I say we were racing? We were cruising along and boater came up from behind us and pinned us. 100% his fault. Wasn't avoidable really. Iirc we went around a bend making sure we werent going to get run over and didnt see the limb until it was right there. Obviously we were throttling off to get room but was distracted by the idiot boater who almost ran us over and didn't see the limb before it was too late. I wrote that late at night so sorry if I wasn't clear enough. This also happened nearly 20 years ago so some specifics are a tab fuzzy. Or maybe its cause i hit my face on a limb and flew like a drunken acrobate through the air. Either/or.

That's certainly rude and dumb for them to do to you, I've been on boats quite a few times and I've never intentionally thrown waves like that at a smaller boat. In my youth my parents had jet skis and we often drove them down smaller canals and whatnot... one day dad and I experienced the bad side of a larger boat and I'll never forget it when I was about 10 years old. We were in Clear Lake, riding down a popular waterway doing about 50, not top speed but cruising good and having fun. A boat pulled up next to us going quite a bit faster and didn't give us room to move away from shore.... the wake wasn't the issue, the problem was that were close to the bank and the boat did not give us clearance. The boater ran us up too close to land and we were unable to steer out of it. There was this overhanging branch that stuck about 20' out from the shore. Tbh I was day dreaming about something else, I was just a kid... dad was not able to steer us out of it in time. Next thing I know I got whopped in the head and I'm flying through the air doing many flips. When I came to dad was holding me up in the water, my water shoes were gone, and the jet ski was on the land in the sticks. Apparently I hit the log head first. The jetski hull was cracked, my head was bleeding, and I was seeing stars of all sorts of colors. Somehow, by some miracle, the jetski got us back to dock without sinking. Some guy on the ramp said to me while dad was getting the truck and I sat on the ski, "did ya'll have fun?" I don't think he saw the damage to the ski at that point. I responded, crying "we got crashed!" and pointed to the huge crack on the opposite side of the ski. The guy walked around to dock side and looked and he seemed ticked after I told him what happened. We got the jetski repaired but it wasn't the same after that. Mom was always super nervous anytime we went out and it pretty much ruined out jetski'ing days. Wasn;t long after that we sold the jetskis, the kawisaki we were riding, as well as the seadoo mom had which had reverse. I really miss that kawi to this day... it was so fast and fun for it's day. But I also realize how close we came to being killed by an inconsiderate boater who ran us up too close to land. I take nothing for granted anymore, and that's a bad memory I forever have to live with. Safety on the water people. Please.

Another vote for sam diego jam. It'll work for all line types incuding fluorocarbon. Might want to make a second pass through the eyelet though just to help spread the load out more just for peace of mind if using FC.

I actually like seeing reviews on reels and whatnot, but maybe I differ from most.

I handled (fondled even) a Fuego CT today at an undisclosed location that was for sale for $62. Reason it was only $62 was that the box had been damaged, and it was a left handed reel- which is exactly what I prefer now a days. The Tackle Monkey is calling me hard. Was a nice little reel for $62. I might just have to buy it to replace a dinosaur round reel that's just too big and heavy for bass fishing.

Oh right I didn't mention. I was using a curly tail grub, not sure of brand, about a 3.25" on a 3/0 or 4/0 RB offset worm hook when I got hit. I watched Glenns videos a few times on the texas and I did leave a little slack. Maybe I'm just too slow or too fast or something.

I was actually using an offset shank version of that when I had the two missed bass hits because I didn't have any EWGs handy lol. I've never tried a straight shank. Might be worth a try. Anyway, barb never even moved its position after I set so I don't think the fish even had the bait. Think they just popped the unpegged weight for whatever reason. My drag slipped so I know I set hard enough. *shrugs*

So I tried texas rig today and I definitely got two solid hits from a bass. Both actually left marks in my weight. The first time I felt like I should've had it, I actually saw the line move. Dropped tip, reeled amd set- swing and miss. When I examined the rig I saw teeth marks like Catt was talking about on the weight, but no evidence it actually got the bait. So I'm thinking it just bit my weight and not the lure. Same thing happened again on second hit. Weight had more damge on it, but none on the bait. Both times I waited a second, reeled up slack, then set it real quick and hard. This is confusing me. Definitely bass, was just one solid thump and not perch hits since I doubt they'd put teeth marks in the weight like that. Ill upload pics when I get home to show that. Something about texas rigs... I just can't get one using it lol. Guess I need to try what thinkingredneck suggested and bury a treble on the end of the plastic to see if I can get one so maybe I can figure out what's going on. But seems like they aren't hitting the back of it. Edit: the weight was unpegged.