AlabamaSpothunter

Gents above me nailed it, and if you want to watch some of the craziest Bass fishing videos on YT, check out his youtube series called Off the Grid IIrc. Or just check his channel out. The places he takes a Bass boat is unimaginable.

Amazing how much more enjoyable Bass fishing is to watch with diversity of techniques and locations. Gonna be really hard to watch the Elite Series after seeing this format and then getting to watch pure Bass fishing with the NPFL. Sure hope BASS changes next year.

I have zero doubts that the luck is going to change for you NC boys! Never fails, the longer you go without having a banger day, the bigger and better that banger will be when it comes. You and Pat will have lots to post soon enough, if not the world has ended 😁

Oh no doubt, with or without a scope, both of those guys would be in the top 5 greatest Bass pros alive. Drew Gill on the other hand is the guy this new change should effect the most. He crushed last year during his rookie year on BPT, so it'll be obvious how much of an effect this has by the end of the year using just his case.

Wheeler, Connell, and Gill. Gill is arguably the best scoper on the BPT. ETA: Only savant scoper not at the top is Alton Jones Jr

This is about to get really interesting.......the best scopers on the BPT just happened to be in 1st, 2nd, 3rd. Here shortly we'll get two periods where those guys don't get to use it, what are the odds others are able to overtake them?

This sucks, they should be allowed to all shake a minnow in a 100 acre location.....I mean who doesn't like watching paint peel 😁 This is the first year I'm watching the MLF, and have it on in the background right now. I doubt they lost any viewers from last year, meanwhile I'm sure there's many more people like me who decided to tune in for the first time because of the limited FFS usage.

I'm back in the game Katie, I just dropped one on your post......good thing they seem to refill after a few hours 🤣

Beautiful fish @N Florida Mike! There's gotta be a monster Bass in that lake that you're always posting these big BGs from, and now seeing the monster Shiners. You should chunk that 12" Shiner out there on a hook, and see what lives there for real 😎

They do make micro A-Rigs and I think my lightest micro rig without any hooks or swimbaits is 1/4oz. I then add five 1/8th heads and five swimbaits so it's well over an ounce at that point. The Hog Farmer Tactical Bassin Micro Flex rig rigged with 3 jigheads and 2 dummies is the lightest a-rig setup I've heard of, but I don't own one. I think it's under 1oz. Either way, I would just throw a spinnerbait verse throwing a 1oz+ a-rig on a sub 7" MH rod.

Out of reactions, but Amen Eric!!! @Eric 26 We're here for the full paradise experience 😀

Agree fully with @Eric 26 sentiments. While it's honestly tragic what these dang Otters are doing, the reason I love this thread has very little to do with the fact Bass are living in the pond. I've said it a few times before, but Bob is living a dream. Rural beautiful property, a pond, and perhaps most important a tractor....that's paradise! That said, we've got to kill or trap these Otters. I wanna see feed trained 5lbers eating out of your hands 😎

Really appreciate the kind words friends!!! @FishTax I was too busy hooking myself to fall in the water, it's definitely still on the table if I ever catch another one like that though 🤣

Valid points @Team9nine, and one that was the main counter point in a FB thread about it. While there are no doubts folks specifically move into Alabama to professionally fish, or go to college like MN native Easton Fothergill, it's still hard to understand why the anglers aren't moving to Texas, FL, or TN who have every bit as good of local trails and fisheries as Alabama. The amount of non Alabamians that have moved to Guntersville alone to pursue professional fishing is significant. It would be great if pro fishing could figure out a way to incorporate western states more into the mix. It's a sport dominated by the eastern half of the country, and even moreso the southeastern portion of the country. It's impressive how many top level pros come from northern states that are iced over half the year as well.

We could all throw in some money and hire @TnRiver46 to do the needful.......we wanna see Otter heads on pikes 🤣

The worst thing about those Otters is that I believe they'll kill just for "fun". It's one thing to have Herons or Cormorants that eat what they need to survive, but having a critter that is just out there killing for fun or sport would be hard to swallow 😢 Can you put up some game cameras in the areas you think they are accessing the pond? I've found many critters are creatures of habit, you might be able to dial in a better time window when those suckers are murdering your fish. I look forward to the day those Otters gets what coming to them! I can only imagine the feelings of frustration and anger. To me they're killing your pets.

It's not even a close race in terms of which state produces the most pro anglers

@10,000 lakes Bassin I'm not sure it would helicopter on the fall because of how lightweight the swimbaits are compared to the head size. The streamlined head makes it sink pretty fast and in a more vertical manner. I'll be sure to pay more close attention to how it falls next time I use it and will report back. @woolleyfooley No fair, I wanna catch a Peacock 😁 In regards to knowing if your working it right......I continually watch the last several yards of a retrieve to see if the bait is 'winding' properly. I totally understand what your saying, but after awhile you get confidence in the fact that the bait is dancing back and forth. Just focus on those nice smooth 12 oclock to 3 oclock rod pops. To me this bait is an "active" fish one, meaning I think its action is a bit too aggressive to trigger bites from fish that aren't that fired up. To me it makes total sense that the colder the water, the less likely this technique is to work. The only time I've got it to work in water temps below about 55d is on schooling fish which are obviously very "active" fish. I caught some fish on it in early January, but since the water temps have been well below 50d since, I've put them up and have been fishing a jighead minnow in its place. I expect this bait to crush them once those water temps get above 65d or so.......basically once the spawn is over with, these things should be money. I'm sure by later March/early April you'll be hammering some fish on them.

Thanks a bunch Scott!!! I can't tell you how many times I've thrown that red blade bait at the location I caught her at since then 🤣 I surely appreciate it Eric!!! It just never felt like a complete catch until I got to share her with folks like you pal. Outside of this place very, very few people in my universe "get it", it really is great to have friends to share these moments with 🙂

Thanks so much Katie and A-Jay!!! Seeing her swim away healthy and unharmed was my favorite part as well. I know if we ever cross paths again, she's likely going to be well north of 10lbs. I suspect as I type she already is.

Many thanks Eric! Expect to hear a teenage girl screaming and fumbling around 🤣

24 days later I can officially announce a very happy ending to my lost GoPro data saga. While I wasn't able to recover the entire cast to catch video, or other ones from that day due to not wanting to spend more money, they were able to recover the one video I wanted most which starts the moment the fish is in the net. It's total amateur hour with me being in half a state of shock hooking myself 50 ways from Sunday so don't judge me too harshly 😅 Jeremy at Recovermyflashdrive.com is truly a magician and miracle worker. He's extremely fair with regard to pricing. It should have been a flat rate to recover the full 128gb, however GoPro files require more extensive work. If he would have recovered everything on the card, it would have cost about $1450 which I just couldn't do. @Bluebasser86 It might worth sending your card to Jeremy, especially if you think you might not need everything recovered and you can help him home in where exactly the data is you most want off the card. Lastly, a huge thanks for all the love and support from my friends here when it happened......I was crushed and you folks made me feel better! Katie was even checking in to see how the progress was going.....everybody should be so lucky to have a pal like Katie in your corner.

To be fair I'm talking about the top level pros.......like the top 50 guys in the world. There are a ton of guys in the pipeline of the BASS Opens, and MLF Invitationals and Toyotas that are close to being there. I don't consider those anglers average joes. I also don't consider anybody on a forum dedicated to catching Bass to be average joes for the most part either. Nobody who has posted in this thread is an average joe. Haha, that's exactly who I was using as the example. I could fish a hundred more lifetimes and never be on Walter's level. Whatever the thing that Wheeler, Walters, Fujita, Mckinney, etc. have is something I don't personally think can be taught. They have next level instincts if I had to guess.

I struggle to comprehend the skill level gap between myself and the average Elite Series pro. It's like we're doing two different things lol. Your right about casting, one of the easiest ways to see the massive difference b/t folks like me and the pros is casting. It's not edited at all, you can watch the BASS Live during the events and see the guys go down a line of docks and make perfect skips under every part of the dock they want to hit. To me the ability to find, pattern, and catch winning bags on lakes across the entire country is what really defines the top level anglers. Imagine being able to win on the SLR with 100lbs of SMs, and then winning on Lake Fork with 100lbs of LMs. That's insane.

0% The ability of top level pros is downright magical.