galyonj

My first thought was a floater like a YZ crystal minnow with some suspendstrips or dots. Another trick that has worked really well for me is a regular 6' suspending jerkbait, but I snap the rod tip upwards instead of laterally once I feel like I'm at the depth I want.

Honestly fishing with live bait feels like more work to me. As @TnRiver46 explained, simply keeping minnows alive to fish with is a big chore because they're so dumb and fragile. There's generally less to do after the cast, but it's not a lot different than soaking a ned rig or drop shot, and there are a whole mess of people here that happily do that (including me). I think he just doesn't want the word getting out that ponds are magical places.

Or salmon fishermen in the PNW.

No but that'd rule. That's my mousepad. It's awesome.

Yeah, dude.

That's how it goes. I've seen a few guys on here talk about it, but I first learned about that (now seemingly-obvious) relationship from posts by @WRB. I look way harder at diameter when I'm deciding which line to use on a given presentation/combo. Like YZH is way strong-for-rating. Note that it's also a fat line compared to its test rating, too. So if I want to use 6lb for the leader on my finesse rod I can probably go down to 4lb, get a smaller diameter, and still have close to a 8lb real-world test rating to base how brave I wanna be with what I cast into.

We need to find a barrel.

I dunno what you're talking about – the bite's always perplexing for me. That's why I carry the kitchen sink with me from spot to spot. ? I was about to say that I don't know how useful a presentation like this is for covering water in search of fish, but then I realized that's exactly what I do with it a lot of times. Last time I went out with @TnRiver46 I basically spent all day switching between lazily hopping/swimming a ned rig and doing the exact same thing with a weighted wacky rig because literally nothing else I threw was getting attention. So yeah, there's no reason it isn't at least worth a shot.

There's no reason a finesse jig wouldn't work just fine. However, I usually use a 3/8oz arky-style jig (my favorite is Siebert's dock rocker), and my cold(er)-water jig presentation is cribbed from some of Tactical Bassin's videos: I cut the skirt down and then my trailer's usually a Sweet Beaver that I've bit the first four or five ribs off of to shorten it. Then I just slowly drag and pause. If I bump into something during the drag, I stop, shake the rod tip, and let it sit for a beat before I resume.

USPS brought me a bag of jigheads from Mule Fishing, plus a bonus koozie and a nice little note. It's funny how anti-finesse I was last year given the huge amount of my catches this year that have come from some kind of finesse presentation. Go figure.

Cats are good for that, too. The dog sleeps in a crate, so my wake-up call is a cat walking across my face.

Thanks @ArthurLK11. I bought a cheap Lew's combo for it, then that rod broke, and I got one of their Mr. Trout rods on a warranty replacement. I like it, but now have the bait monkey whispering in my ear that we need more stuff. You know how it goes.

Reckon I skipped that chapter. ?‍♂️

Word. I'll be getting more UL stuff because it's so fun and I really want at least one more combo. Might hit it up later on.

Caught my biggest jig fish doing exactly this and shaking the rod tip if I bumped into anything. Finally I gave it a shake and something shook back. lol

The vast majority of the times that I've got a wacky rig tied on, it's tied on with either a 1/16 or 1/8 weighted hook. First tried it with a slip sinker and wasn't really feeling it. Picked up some weighted wacky hooks from one of the sales that Woo! ran, and it became a lot easier for me to understand the presentation. Seems like I get bit more often, too…which is nice.

I can dig it. Just doesn't work for the places I fish to the point that it's not even worth keeping them on me.

Yup. I have precisely 3 lures that dive deeper than 5 feet. I've thrown each of them no more than a handful of times. Just doesn't fit the way I fish. If I'm in a situation where I can go deeper than that, I'd just as soon have a paddletail or a swim jig tied on.

I dunno about you, but I know exactly why I'm so addicted to fishing topwater: The feedback from the lure is so much better for me. The vast majority of the water I fish is pretty murky right up to chocolate milk. Many underwater presentations are almost an act of faith for me. I can't see the lure doing its thing, so all I can do is hope I'm doing the things I need to do to get bit. On top, however, I can immediately see if a walking bait is walking the way it should, or a popper pops just right, or whatever. I'm sure – again, this is just me – that more time on the stick will help me better intuit those other presentations and not fret so much about what I'm not seeing. But seeing the feedback from properly working a topwater presentation is very rewarding.

Little meatball of a rock bass yesterday at sunset on the French Broad. Hit a gulp minnow sitting still on the bottom while I was picking out a stupid wind knot.

Yeah, I'm really pleased with how they did me.

I think too many is subjective, and that the decision really comes down to bottom composition and available cover. There are places I fish here that a ned rig or a shakyhead will either a) never get seen because of all the muck and trash in the water, or b) will just get snagged and break off in the rocks. And that's most of the places I fish. Honestly, if I'm slinging a finesse soft plastic, 99% of the time it's either a wacky rig (and most of the time that's weighted), or a neko rig.

I was gonna say that all you gotta do is ask each pike to say "lawyer."

TVA lakes are trash cans full of water.