AlabamaSpothunter

I use something similar in Lake Fork's Live Magic Shad, not nearly as detailed and doesn't have the fins. To me the money spent on the fins and eyes with those are going to waste. You can likely get that same awesome action from ZMAN's Razor Shads or my preferance while softer less durable, the Live Magic Shad. I'd fish those on an Underspin or Scrounger head to take advantage of how nice, and detailed they are.

Absolutely. Perfect blend between the two. You are the only one that seems to post meanmouths on the reg. I get it, they are controversial, but in many ways it's the perfect Bass if I was drawing one up from scratch. If they could reach the DD threshold, they'd be the perfect Bass. What's the biggest one you know about being caught?

Compare the size of this reply with mine right below....it's normal it seems

Naw I've never noticed, and figured it was just doing that because it's used to posting huge strings of awesome Bass in the Latest Catch thread ?

Very true, happens on every hobby forum I've been a member of. At least they are easy to spot after awhile. The only way I can make my posts look like yours with the big white space below is to keep hitting enter after the last sentence.

Beautiful couple:) Here's why I love A-Jay's video far beyond the beautiful kino he produces along with world class sized Brown fish.......he's illustrating a respect for the fish all anglers including myself should take notes from. You can brag on YT You can promote and shill on YT OR You can teach and just share exciting moments of your life with your community and friends on YT I think this site's CoC has no problem with doing the last one, or really even the first one to answer the OP's question. It seems to be a somewhat nuanced policy but shilling for sales or subs seems pretty cut and dry no go. Personally, I won't post any YT video other than ones I make myself for a non-monetized channel. I love the TacticalBassin videos, but only mention that I watched xyz on their channel, not link it.

@Bluebasser86 Just watched those videos, awesome stuff man, and yeah that sucks in the manner in which you lost that bait. You are just like my fishing mentor.....dude would push it up to the limit or boundary wherever he found one. He gave me my love for Dams, but equally taught me how dang scary they are. What an absolute champion your pupper is in that first video......I didn't even notice it until mid video ? Nothing has ever intimidated me in all of Bass fishing outside of big Swimbait fishing, since a kid reading about folks like WRB and the like on Castaic I remember thinking this is epic, but never in a million years could I see myself undertaking the challenge. Doesn't seem to be something you can half donkey, it's a full send technique. The cost, the actual labor of working these baits, and ultimately a whole new skillset to master is a commitment. These baits excite me, watching you guys fish them, knowing they give you a fantastic shot at huge fish, that's what it's all about besides catching the actual Bass. It's the pursuit of challenging yourself to learn new techniques that will ultimately result in more and larger fish. The Chatterbait was a revelation to my fishing game not just on the macro level with the bait itself but opening my mind to the things out there that could be improving my success by orders of magnitude. Alpha Angler Wide Glide is arriving today. WA to AL in 3days.....not to shabby. Really loving this company right now, nice to be able to talk with the owner of a rod company.

Got to resize the image to under 1.46 mb. That sucks because I use a lot Project Z weedless series with brush guards.

Tag. I need to create a system for my Chatterbaits

"Nantucket Sleigh Ride".....that's epic. Moby Dick is still one of my favorite books. While the Whaling industry was tragic, it was full of daring and exciting stories. It's no surprise that Herman Melville wrote a book that touched on this. I currently hunting my "white whale" "Yeah I'm kinda of a big deal around these parts, I got a IGFA World Record" "Wow, what species" "That's my phone ringing, I'll see you later" ?

Great stuff brother.....look forward to watching the videos. Looks FREEZING lol

Nice brown piggy! I'd love to Musky fish! Honestly with your amazing results, I wouldn't change or add a thing. That said, it's too fun to tickle the tackle monkey to not always be trying new stuff. I'm the same way with your whopper plopper, I intend to try those this summer. So many lures, so little time haha

Nice quality fish, and beautiful leaves. Never thought a moving bait would be my confidence bait, but then I threw a Chatterbait. I learned another new retrieve today from watching a Tactical Bassin video last night. Slow roll half a dozen cranks, then a couple hard cranks, repeat. It worked amazingly well for drawing that reaction strike today.

Haha, Mako Sharks were my favorite "animal" growing up. Talk about an amazing fish. Do you ever target anything besides those beautiful Maine Bass? It's all but impossible for me to target fish other than Bass when freshwater fishing. I love to catch every type of fish even Carp and Gar, but you know this better than anyone perhaps in this thread......Bass get ahold of your soul, and make you beyond obsessed. I don't go to bed dreaming about catching a PB Crappie, Catfish, etc., but I do for every species of Bass.

Brother you aren't hijacking anything, that's quality posting on your part. Really appreciate the pics. The Steez looks exactly like the pics, and one of the main reasons why I wanted to get it over the HD, the profile is so sexy looking, the way it tapers in the back. Love the cork handles on these Daiwa reels, did it on my OG BFS Steez. I'm gonna put the round cork ones on the Zillion HD. Great stuff man, congrats on the new beautiful reel. You'll find a use for it somewhere, a Basshead always does

Learned a new trick how to catch Bass 100% of the time today: GO CRAPPIE FISHING ? I went and bought 3 dozen Tuffy minnows because the last three days have been brutal for Bass. I made a deal with myself, I could take one Bass setup, and one lure. I took a Jackhammer, and three spinning reels along with the minnows. Caught half of dozen nice 1-2lb LGMs on the Jackhammer before the Live Magic Shad trailer gave up the ghost. In between throwing the Jackhammer a little bit, I was tossing these Tuffy minnows on a GL3 Medium Fast 6ft rod, and 4lb test around deep brush piles. Every single brush pile I dipped a minnow on, I ended up in a several minute fight with quality sized Spots. When I say I was fighting these fish for minutes, that's not a lie. I hooked 7, and 4 broke me off. Ridiculous amounts of fun, albeit moments of shear frustration. I did catch a beautiful hand sized Bluegill. Overall caught a number of Bass, and one Bluegill....no Crappie, yet that's what I was fishing for.....fishing never fails to make you look like a fool ?

Lol, that's why I want to buy from Digitaka more than anything else.....it's amazing how fast they ship these reels from Japan

Love it brother, your style of fishing is so exciting!

The reality is Economy is Scale crushes anything that's not truly innovative these days. A mega corporation like Bass Pro Shops is impossible to compete with. WalMart has been doing this for decades with every other mom N pop product or service. Just the world we live in. To me your focus should either be more innovative, or purely for enjoyment, and maybe cost saving on an individual level. Reloaders don't do it to save money, and most home tackle builders don't do it to make money is what I've found in both hobbies. Not to discourage you, just being pragmatic about it.

This the madman who I alluded to in my post regarding the member who night fished the Glades for lunkers. While this didn't happen to me, I witnessed it all first hand from feet away, and your story reminded me of it. One summer night I was admiring old salty redneck Shark hunters like rock stars at the end of an Outer Banks pier, and they'd lower a 25-30lb Tuna head down to a runner in a kayak below the pier where'd he paddle it out past the second sand bar. These guys fished year-round for sharks on the piers and would catch 500lb+ ones. Long story short, they ended up catching a big Ray on one of the smaller baits, and this old salty veteran in front of a large crowd of growing sight seers, non-chantingly placed his flip flop on the top of the Ray, then reached to remove the hook. It was at this time that the big Ray decided he'd suffered enough insult and whipped it's big poison barbed tail into this 250lb man's lower leg above the ankle region. Old boy couldn't be convinced to go to the hospital, shrugged it off immediately, but within about 20mins he had to be helped all the way back into the pier house where he was put in a chair and 911 called. Even when EMS arrived, he refused to go to the ER so the medics ran IVs and medication right where he sat. When I left that night, he was passed out with an IV in his arm. Sure as the sun comes up, dude was shark fishing with a 12pack the next night like nothing happened ? Man I loved fishing from those piers as kid in the summers, funny how your story brought back a flood of amazing tales and memories in my mind. I had to get a pic to complete my story lol. That polaroid was taken in the pier house from the story above.

Okay I'll pick some of that line up, what would you recommend in regard to 19 vs 22 vs 25lb sizes? My instinct would be the middle 22lb. Screenname checks out

Haha about the dinner plates......and going to look at that bait right now, got the TW page open in another window, the monkey makes me always have a TW tab open ?

"With a backhoe" I like your style brother.....might as well hit full send ? Thanks for weighing in.

The Gantarel Jr. is the first bait I'm gonna buy. That's the bait along with an A-Rig I already own I had in mind when deciding to go down this rabbit hole. I also really like the Mattlures Magnum Hardgill, but it's like $110 LOL Every Jackall bait I own has action that blows me away. I could just watch that Giron above for seemingly hours in amazement. Same thing with their Squidminnow 95. Also catch more crankbait fish on theirs than any others. Maybe confirmation bias, but they really seem to make amazing baits.

Yeah I'm committed for the most part already lol. I knew I wanted to fish the big hard swimbaits when I threw a Jackall Giron for the first time a week or two ago, caught a pig Spot on it the first cast. Then I realized that the Giron is just a miniature hard swimbait. Even though it only weighs 3/4th, the only rod I have that can throw it with any accuracy, and not have it create a huge splash is my new 7'2 Chatterbound.