Tatsu Dave

I just got done an evaluation of weightless stick baits on M/F spinning set-ups with finesse reels. Weighed all 5 brands of stickbaits I use along with weightless 3/0 EWG hooks. stickbaits went from 8.5gr. to 11.4gr. Hook and screwloc added just over 1gr. with 6 1/2ft-7ft. M/F rods casts were 30-35 yds.....then with guide and spool sprayed with KVD conditioner distance jumped to 40-43yds. Rattlesnake stickbaits with deep rings on them lost 5-7yds on average. Lure weight averaged about 3/16oz and line was .010 dia. 10# tatsu flurocarbon line. Pretty much windless however into the wind and with the wind would add or detract some. I was surprised at the distance with an unweighted plastic bait myself. Its my most fished lure and I was interested in weight and casting distance, with my digital scales it was pretty easy. Senko's were the second heaviest behind ocho's then followed by tricksticks ,dingers, and last was XZone true centers.

Weightless on a swimbait hook with an owner screw-loc to secure stickbait. I grew up where the Dundee flows out into the upper bay, near Joppatown. Didn't care for the clear drinking water lakes that required electric motors only (liberty lochraven prettyboy) launch at the dundee and you could fish nice size tidal largemouth and pick up stripers during the late summer. Found memories but where I live now is many times better for bass with lots of smallmouth thrown into the mix Been up here over two decades now and love it! Heres a pic of how I rig......

Sounds close to Watermelon candy or half of crime scene without the darker laminated back. I think its the green flakes that make crime scene work so well for me. My son thinks it looks like pumpkin pepper green which he likes a lot.

Thats where I first discovered the color myself, up here the small brookies are a desired forage fish most places I fish. When I discovered stickbaits I went looking for that Slug-go color and found GY senko's and yum dinger's, Funny sometimes they want the dead stick fall like dinger's and most of the time they want that senko wiggle more. Pickerel and bass both tear em' up so I keep at least 50 or more all the time in the box. Rainbow Trout and Junebug have accounted for all the big heavyweights over the last four years.....way I see it big smart largemouth should be listened to

Just tried a bag of Plum/Apple ribbontail worms the other day, got to say they did catch bass pretty steady. That color really looks good coming thru the water.

Fish all the time in grass choked lakes and rivers that are shallow, T-Rigged stickbaits on a 3/0 EWG texposed hook kept just above weeds twitching and darting back. First cast will show you how far to let it sink, fish will come up to it in 10ft or so depending on clarity. A large 4-5" grub rigged weedless and weightless will also be noticed. Right at daylight a black buzzbait with a trailer (back flippers of a RI sweet beaver in blacklite) will either work or not, that been my experience with them. Grew up fishing Maryland Tight Lines! Dave

Don't matter what you use in plastics, what are your five favorite colors you have confidence and sucess with. I started with basic blk/blue, pumpkin, watermelon, and junebug years back. As I fished I found other colors that seemed to out produce the stand-by's. Still use some but have some others that seem to be more what the fish want, in the eighty's everything was chartreuse and pearl but hardly ever use them now. Maybe we change and not the fish I suppose Here's the five I always have on deck when I go out...... Rainbow Trout (that pink belly is magic) Junebug (never stopped with this color from way back) Watermelon Gold Flake (better than the red flake for me) Crime Scene (this one always seems to work) Trophy Hunter (this one is a Grandebass color/combo of GP and Junebug DEADLY) Honorable Mention Okeechobee Craw (variation of blk/blue and tan) 309 (new XZone color) I knew I wouldn't be able to stop at five

Good to see! I'm the "Dad" in the fishing trips now with my son. Never know how many more hunting and fishing seasons are ahead of me so I make the most of both. I remember the trips that I took with my Dad.....should have been more. Boy that salami and cheese board looks good also noticed you got some tackle there.......its not the fish, its the FISHING. Nice pics and good post. Dave

I think you will find they are hitting well at that temp, I regard low sixties as the point where fall feeding is going well and fish are active. I watch the wind speed and fronts closely however, but regard 60-64 as prime feeding temps. Tight Lines!

All that and more, You can get up and walk around, carry lots of tackle, equipment and 6-8 rods and reels. A fishing buddy to help net fish, talk, and enjoy the day with, a livewell............wouldn't be a hard decision for me Just sayin'

I look for rocky or gravel bedded rivers that exit lakes that hold smallmouth, if the river is big enough I look for where I can put a boat in and check it out (the real test). Also if any of these waterways are dammed along their routes it will create a little mini deep water area that can hold bigger fish. I'm going to fish one of these tomorrow that we found a couple years ago. Good Luck

Was out this morning for a while, water temps went down couple weeks back and went back up during the warm weather end of Aug and first week of Sept. Now its back getting cool at night and water temps are falling again, water temp was 63 degrees today and fish are starting to hit again. Heading to one of our smallmouth rivers tomorrow if the wind will just die down a little. Crazy year drought has lowered water levels everywhere and now we can't get the fall pattern going smoothly either. Hope you get some good trips in before end of the month, after Sept I shift to Deer hunting mode and don't look back till next spring. Takes a couple days to get the boat all cleaned up and ready for winter storage also. Dave

GY 5" Senko BBB 5" Trick Stick 4.8" Keitech Fat Impact Yum Pulse Yum 5" Dinger Berkley Pit Boss BBB Kriets Kreature Kalin/Zoom 4"-5" Grub Grandebass 4.75" Rattlesnake Grandebass Snake'O

I guess I look at this durability issue with plastics as you gotta pay to play. Everyone wants the really soft plastics and lots of salt content and the durability goes in the trash bin. Keitech's - ochos - senkos - XZone - a lot of crawfish imitators and paddletails catch fish but don't last. I just would rather catch fish then have heavier made harder plastic lures that last better but get less bites and hence fish. Action usually results with thinner weaker tails, flippers and flappers. I'm willing to put up with less durability for more action. Fish a senko and a dinger side by side...........action catches fish. Dave

Well I've studied the suggested line's and considered what I would lose compared to the tatsu I use on every rig now. I will gain some stretch (I don't want that) I will loose some sensitivity (I really don't want that) it will in most cases be larger diameter (not a deal breaker but not desirable either) will the line sink like the fluro? (not as fast). OK I will save money and get a tad less memory but many guys still use KVD on hybrid lines as I do now with tatsu. I use spinning gear and the fluro works really well for me, never had a knot slip and abrasion resistance is awesome. That was the deciding factor for me.......we fish wood and vegetation solid up here and pickerel teeth do a number as well. Don't want to compromise on the abrasion factor at all. Price is always going to be the top negative, but for me it don't seem like that big a deal, I00yds on each spool and I use 5 reels so that's three 200yd spools every two years. About $45. a year for line that looks like I can't improve on or even equal at this point. I guess Tatso really is the Bomb for finesse fishing with spinning set-ups. Braid users wouldn't use it as a leader if it wasn't what they wanted the fish to see.........or in most cases not see. Thanks to all for opinions and experience's....I think I'll stay where I'm at for now. Dave

I've tried megastrike and JJ's clear dippin oil as well as tuna fish oil that we used to use to attract smelt when I smelt fished commerically. For some reason the megastrike gel didn't seem to make much difference but the tuna oil and JJ's make's a real noticeable difference that seems to last longer (instead of 20-30 casts, several hours) I believe you have to safeguard with JJ's because high temps and full sun can cause expansion and leaks, use a metal cap that will seal better and keep in protective plastic box out of direct sun. A cheap one tray tackle box with tray removed and a piece of florist foam cut too fit will keep bottles shaded and upright for dipping and will contain if you have a spill or leakage (never has happened for me using it 30 or more trips a year) for quite a few years. A spray bottle of anise or garlic oil lubes the plastics well and gives you slide when weeds are heavy in late season. Attractants and Oil.....Use it or don't, it will depend on your own personal experiences but I sure don't think it ever hurts. Dave

Wow headlight and power accessory's even comes with its own lift Don't know Blue.........looks like you got the Lincoln Navigator of landing nets. Dave

So tell me guys......what size bass do you catch in southern Maine? Hard pressed up here to get to that 6# mark just curious if you top that. Don't worry I won't come south to fish as I get a twitch when subjected to busy ramps and heavy fishing pressure I like it quiet and tranquil. I believe we will break the 6# barrier but probably not much more and not very frequently. Good to hear from you, more Maine fisherman on here than I imagined.

Nice Fish! Well done they are a bit of a tussle when they get 3# or better

Got to keep moving around finding new spots that are off the beaten trail. Small boats that can fish tiny and or shallow-weedy spots have a bit of an advantage sometimes. Shallow river outfits can find especially smallmouth, that hit with abandon and don't see pressure. I agree with the fact that when you tend to use a couple lures like we do it will catch up with you if you stay on same water all the time, although after the winter lay-up they hit well the next spring like they forget over time. Covid has put at least 2-3 times the pressure on our regular areas as well this year, used to be weekends but now its all week, seems everyone is fishing and buying boats up here, most boat dealers are in short supply right now which says something. Used trader online list's and books are getting premium $ for small used boats, its a seller's market. Oh well harder to catch or less of them....... it still beats cutting grass Our real fall turn on for fish will begin in the next couple weeks and I'm ready!

I agree 100% the temps are dropping on the 10 day forecast with water temps sure to follow. Good Fishing Ahead!

Don't want to sound like a sales ad cause I don't really have anything to gain but if you read that link that A Jay posted it really does exactly what it says. Fish don't flip all around in it with the flat bottom and hooks have yet to get caught, its as fast as a normal net going thru the water (its rubber dipped not rubber mesh, they sell both) for fast scooping and you can extend it with one hand if by yourself (I found that out the other day). We got the extended version and I scooped up a lure my son had lost in a pickerel bite off in 6' of water. We had a frabil from Walmart as well till we netted a lively fish with a treble hooked crankbait in its mouth, finally had to cut the one hook out and needed a net that wouldn't do a repeat of that. I saw one in action on a u-tube video and we decided to bite the bullet and buy one. Not cheap but well made and replacement nets for it are available at TW as well.

Well its not that I'm not happy with Tatsu.......heck I wouldn't have used for last three years if it didn't work better than anything I've yet tried. I had a couple suggestions to try one of the hybrid fluro/mono line to see what I thought and knew that asking on a site like this would give me a fair amount of real experiences. My common sense tells me I would compromise sensitivity and the low stretch hook sets but pick up less memory and spend less, the diameter would have to get a little bigger for same # test, the abrasion would interest me as we fish heavy cover and deal with pickerel teeth roughing up the line near the lure. I read the comments and opinions on TW for both hybrid lines mentioned and found a lot of opinions on how tough it is for abrasion. Thank you for the responses and opinions.....keep em' coming. Dave

Thanks A Jay you beat me to it! Will post a pic of the net in action next week hopefully. Got ours from TW during one of their 15% off sales 2 years ago, sorry we didn't get one sooner. Dave

Well that warm weather trend we had end of August and first week of Sept really caused a shutdown in the feeding bad where I fish. Same everything but the water temps jumped about 10-11 degrees on home waters and it got slowed down. This past week things started to cool again and we had some pretty good fishing 3 days during midweek. Large fish are cruising and feeding better as cool nights bring water temps down and there's still ocean run baitfish in the area 6-10" that came up fish ladders this spring. Caught some heavy fish on plastics in the shallows so things should only get better. Posted some pics in the fishing reports forum. Keep a tight line and stiff drag for next couple weeks Dave