Sphynx

I abhor tardiness, when I was a young private at Ft. Hood I was 5 minutes late to the 15 minute early formation for PT once...I thought I was going to get over on it too until my squad leader called me in to the office and decided to inform me that my punishment for being late would be to unload a truck full of supplies that had just arrived and would I mind taking my sorry, can't show up on time a$$ out back to the loading dock to get started? A quick yes Sergeant and I was running out the door, and to my complete surprise there was no truck...what there WAS however was 5 or 6 other NCO's who made d**n sure that I understood what on time meant and I spent the rest of the day down at the aid station getting stitched up, a couple of fingers and toes set/taped after being broken, and telling the officer sent to conduct the 15-6 that I had tripped and fallen off the dock due to clumsiness on my part, never been a minute late in my life since then, and I am known to get incredibly offended at others when they choose to be so when they are expecting me to give them my time.

That makes me want to push people off boats/docks/banks when seen lol.

If it hurts your probably doing it wrong, as far as engaging in behavior that may cause long-term issues, I don't really worry about that, the Army sure didn't mind tearing me up while I was one of their favorite toys so whatever fishing does won't even be noticeable by comparison...in fact even if fishing is the culprit I will almost assuredly have something hurt while in the service to take the blame, so I'll probably never know.

I don't know if I'd call that a universal truth, but they are well known to hit lures more softly, it's mostly a function of how bass eat, they create a vacuum and suck in your lure, smaller fish often dart out of cover, and take a hit or two in order to get the whole lure, then turns to go back to cover, a big fish can consume most of your soft plastic offerings in one shot, then they just sit there, so you won't often feel as much.

Sacrilegious though it may be I almost never use a trailer on a spinnerbait, a trailer hook sometimes, but I don't really throw any paddletail or anything else back there, for the places I fish all it does is add to the cost of a fish by burning up soft plastics that would have been better used on a jig head, because they bite the spinnerbait just fine without one.

If you want an all around you'll probably enjoy the 6 speed reel more if your going to be doing any cranking on it, if you don't crank get the 7 speed, you could use the 7 speed for cranking too, but it will be more fatiguing on you.

Once the fish strikes your spinnerbait the game is up, they aren't going to be fooled into thinking it's a fish after they hit it once, I imagine that while they may not know what it exactly is, they know well enough that it's no baitfish, and will move on, trailer hooks can be a great addition to the bait, just be careful around wood and brush because they get hung up a lot more with one than without one, if your fishing open water though there's no reason really not to include a trailer hook, it isn't as though it will hurt your presentation.

I generally don't enjoy having to slow way down and drag a tube, hop a ned rig, or soak a shakeyhead if it can be helped, not because it isn't effective or anything, but because I am unapologetically in the "I like to power fish" camp. Honestly with the exception of a few places I know really well I'd say that I catch more fish off finesse techniques than I do anything else but it's just not as much fun to me, so I stay tossing moving baits because except for topwater blowups, nothing gets my motor running quite like a vicious strike on a moving bait.

There's a debate I was having with a guy I know about a month ago when the bite was tough, it was post front, weather patterns weren't holding for more than a day or so, just generally hard to get anything patterned, his opinion was to just stay home until things settle down, my opinion was that the harder the conditions the more important it is for me to be actively paying attention to trying to crack the code, because I will learn 100x more by grinding through one tough day than I will by fishing on easy street, in the end I did crack the code, I found a couple of honey holes that were producing fabulous numbers and respectable size, but I had to slow way, way down and drag a tube to do it which is something I usually don't like to do. In fact, not only did it improve my results during the hard fishing period, it has also been key to getting 10-15 fish days to 15-20 once things eased back up.

Toledo bend all fished out eh? Boy they sure do like to blame anything but themselves don't they? I'd bet an awful lotta money that I don't even have that there's still a 20-30lb bag of bass on that lake for the guy willing to put in the work to figure them out on the Bend, it always treated me well enough.

Maxima Ultragreen or Trilene XL, I personally use the Maxima, but if I am at Walmart or wherever and they don't have any I don't have any reservations about grabbing the Trilene in a pinch.

Well, I guess the easy part is the hardware, 4/0 Owner Offset Roundbend hook, 1/4oz tungsten bullet weight, probably a Swagger but whatever is on sale works great too, the tough part would be the plastic, I like using a ton of different baits for Texas Rigs, Most of the BioSpawn lineup, Reaction Innovations Sweet/Smallie Beavers, Zoom Trick Worms and Ultravibe Speed Craws, Grande Bass Airtail Wigglers and Rattlers, Yum Dingers...every last one of them catches fish pretty well, guess if I absolutely had to pick it would either be an exostick or a plasma tail, the creature baits, curly tails and craws all have a time and a place, but stick baits and straight tail worms are pretty much year round winners anywhere I've ever fished and that is cross species as well.

Pond fishing is very very different from the river I fish most of the time, and smallmouth are a different breed than largemouth too in a whole lot of key ways, with that said I fish a half dozen or so spots within a couple of miles of each other based on bank/property access, and I can catch 300-400 fish in 90ish days fishing about 90 minutes a day 4-5 days a week, the difference here is that a pond is not going to hold nearly as many fish as the Columbia does, and if your hunting bucketmouth they typically don't cruise as much as smallies do, so I doubt I'm catching the same ones for more than a day or two at a time, and occasionally you just have to accept the fact that there will be times that willing fish are not going to be within casting distance of where you can cast from the shore, thems the breaks sometimes, and you have to learn to have a short memory on those kinds of days and not let them bother you.

If they were testing for visible disturbance in the water I wholeheartedly believe these results, but I bet you would find a very different result if you stuck a sonar in that tank and measured the results, they make noise, and displacement is still displacement, visual or not.

Best part is you don't have to stop and buy bait every trip anymore, I still enjoy sitting with a worm or a minner under a bobber every now and then, but 99% of my fishing is lure based simply out of efficiency concerns, welcome to the world of artificial bait, now you get to spend the rest of your life wondering if these plastic contraptions hooked you or the fish more fully lol

Half a dozen casts? What's your secret, I am lucky to get a couple before I snag lol

I really like using EWG ned heads when the weeds are up, using the standard heads is a better hookup most of the time, but I get hung up so often I end up losing too much tackle to be worth the hassle until the weeds die back for the year, I find the original TRD works great, and the crawz and bugz work pretty well when you need something with a bit more action, I am enjoying the ticklerz for a finesse tube.

I can be reasonably accurate, but the thing that really makes me smile is when I can accurately present a lure and do it quietly with little or no disturbance of the water to spook away fish, and that is a thing I still need work on, there's also such a thing as being accurate with one cast, like a side-arm, but not with a back hand or off hand cast, both of which I have also identified as areas needing improvement. I will say that my skipping game has improved drastically this year, and the spinning rod has been the best tool I own for improving it without blowing up reels full of expensive braid or FC, maybe a smarter guy would just spool a reel with straight mono to practice with, but I can be the most incurably lazy devil to ever stand in shoe leather, so I just went with a spinning setup

Jerkbaits work year round as a category, but a given jerkbait might have one season it excels at in a given body of water, typically I find that the warmer the water the more aggressive you can get away with fishing them, and the less picky they are with regards to a lot of things like action, perfectly suspending baits, etc, and the colder the water temperature the more those little details matter and the slower you can work them with success.

Hardly meant as a criticism, more of a "if you want to be crazy like us, think of what you will potentially be giving up before you commit to it." Can't say for sure whether that sort of time investment is good for you or not because I don't know your situation, but you Hardly need to take a break on my account.

I have worked jobs that rarely took up less than 60 hours a week, I still fish nearly every day at certain times of the year, if becoming extremely good at bass fishing is something that is important to you, you'll make time for it, but just like with any decision, choosing to dedicate that much time to our hobby will invariably mean a sacrifice in another area of life, there are only 24 hours in a day and only you can decide how best to spend them.

Definitely agree with most of that, I never really fished a hair jig so I can't speak to that, but the rest of it pretty well reflects my own experiences too, great stuff.

I treasure any opportunity I get to chase smallmouth in the river, I am firmly convinced that this class of fish is the hardest fighting, most aggressive, acrobatic and fun to catch fish in a freshwater environment, haven't got a long history with the tube like some of you guys, but I have been trying to make it a point to fish one more often this year and it's paying dividends especially on days where they won't touch anything else, soon as coach says I can come out of the penalty box for a beer bug violation I think it will be time to go get reacquainted with the brutish bronzebacks on my favorite river point, I think I'll make it a point to wander over and read the tube thread you mentioned!

I think I'd put smallies on a Rat-L-Trap up there pretty high, doesn't seem to matter how many times I experience it, the adrenaline rush of a hard fighting river smallmouth smashing a lipless gets my motor running pretty good, I'd probably fish a jerkbait for them more if I were fishing water with less/no current, and were on a boat away from the bank more, but tossing a jerkbait from shore is a recipe for lots of lost jerkbaits and frustration and money down the drain.

Tons of options here, mostly season, species and water body depending...I throw very different things in springtime for Alabama spots on Lake Mitchell than I do in the fall on the Columbia River for Smallies, and something entirely different again in Texas or Louisiana for bucketmouth in the summer, if I were given my choice of what they would bite, I would say that topwaters and moving baits are preferred for a search bait, but if I am in an area I think might be holding a monster I am going to be tossing jigs and swim baits, during the winter I get my choice between ultra finesse techniques (ned rig, shakeyhead etc) or slow rolling a spinnerbait, or a jerkbait, though I have heard others have had success burning cranks I've got no confidence in that yet, so until I see it personally work or not I won't endorse or condemn it.