Jmurphy87

Thanks GaryH hope you have a great day.

Near me I would say Rupert lake, I fished it quite a bit and didn’t ever catch anything till last year, although that lake is what started my obsession with mega bass jerk baits lol.

I just recently bought another shimano vanford 2500, I put that on my 6”11 poison adrena and it balances nicely. I run braid on my spinning reels, if the water is clear enough where I fish I will put a leader on. For reels I would recommend shimano or daiwa for any price point they make good reels. I like braid myself. I am sure that you will get better advice from some of our more knowledgeable members here but I thought I would try to help, have a good night.

Thank you A-Jay.

Hello long time lurker but I finally joined, yay. I am going to be 34 this year and grew up fishing Portage, Kalamazoo. Mostly bass and bluegills. My grandparents use to live on Austin lake in Portage in the 90s that’s where my fishing journey began as a kid. I fished off and on growing up throughout my life took small hiatus’s here and there and recently got back into fishing heavily last year due to some of our family friends getting us back into it. I fished Allegan county a lot last year, mostly dumont lake, big lake and the Kalamazoo river. I moved back to Kalamazoo last August and have been fishing spring valley park a lot and a secret little pond in the middle of town that has surprised me on what’s in there lol. I am enjoying helping my family to learn how to fish also. My collection of equipment has grown exponentially in the past year, now I own two kayaks and now instead of three rods I have 17 casting rods 16 bait casters and 4 spinning rods and 5 spinning reels and 7 3700 trays full of tackle. I just wanted to introduce myself and say hello, have a good night and I look forward to learning and talking to you guys.

My limited advice would probably be to try using some of the minnows that you have been feeding them or maybe a jerk bait. Sorry I couldn’t be more helpful but that is my thoughts, my guess is that they are use to eating live bait.

Of my 16 bait caster reels I have braid on 4 or 5 of them. My Lew’s pro ti has 30lb sunline plasma on it that was quite overall when I used it this past Sunday. My tatula elite has 50lb sunline plasma on it have not tried that one so I can’t comment on how it does. I also have a 13 fishing concept c2 with 40lb power pro and that was good for me last year no issues, then my tatula 300 has braid of some sorts on it I don’t know what brand it came with braid spooled on it from the store I bought it from.

I own the 7’1 medium heavy fast action, it’s a decent rod. I have thrown and caught fish on chatter bait and red eye shad I think it does ok. The sensitivity is decent not great not horrible, I have used braid and fluorocarbon. I think that 1/2 oz is the sweet spot maybe 5/8. I think the only place it might struggle is on smaller size treble hooks that is where the moderate would be a little bit more forgiving for smaller hooks and sudden surges from the fish.

I myself am new to fishing a chatter bait also, I have caught 2 fish on them so far. The first one I caught was on a cheap zebco omega medium casting rod with a lews bait caster 7.5.1 ratio with 30lb braid working a deep channel with weeds and lily pads to the side’s. That was just a straight retrieve. I caught a 15 inch smallmouth this past Sunday using a st croix mojo bass medium heavy with a lews pro ti 7.5.1, again with braid 30lb sunline plasma. This was letting it sink to the bottom and just raising it up with my rod tip reel in slack and rinse and repeat.