ww2farmer

It's fairly new cutting edge technology where they bearings have bearings. I bet the box lid hinges on bearings too.

I use the Trilene Knot.............works for me, and I have never had it fail. I love the palomar knot for tying direct to braid, but I just had too many fail with fluorocarbon.

I have worked a handful of times within sight of the lake on some of our custom jobs.................it kills me, and I spend half the day worrying about how to GTH out of there and go fishing.............only to realize that if I suddenly come down with a case of largemouth bass virus and need to go home the rest of the crew will spot me on the way to the water LOL. Every boat I see coming and going from the ramp makes it worse.

@#@$#%&$## weather!!!!! I haven't gone back out yet. 2 days of 50 MPH gusts on a wide open lake in a 16' alum boat is not my idea of fun. And were heading into a pretty good cold spell for the next few days until the middle of next week.

I went from mid Nov. of 2015 to just this past Tuesday without catching one.....................of course I didn't fish one time during that stretch.

This..............^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ Mine are locked up out safely out of my kids reach. But every chance I get I expose my kids to them to take the curiosity away. My 11 year old daughter has shown zero interest in them, but my 6 year old daughter is daddy's little helper come time to clean them, or go out to the farm to shoot. She has shown great attention to detail when cleaning, when it's time to clean the AR's (NY compliant of course), while I clean the bore, chamber, and BCG, she takes care of the lower, buffer, and charging handle...........and I'll be darned it she doesn't get them spotless. When I sit down to reload, she's often right there with me handing me stuff............I often put her in charge of lubing the rifle cartridges before I re-size them and she does a perfect job. When we go out and shoot, she's already gotten bored with her Crossman BB/pellet rifle and her favorite is the 10/22 with a red dot sight on it, she loves to hear those 22 rounds bang the steel plate or break clay pigeons from 20-25 yards away. She's an even bigger brass hound while were shooting than I am, for every hand full of brass she finds, it's treat from the store, like an ice cream cone or something on the way home.

Fading? Washed up?................I doubt it. I think there are a couple reasons he hasn't dominated the past few years like we were used to seeing. #1...........Everyone has their strengths and weakness's. Quite a few of these tournaments the last 2-3 years have NOT been in KVD's wheel house, but those that have, he's been right up there.............like B.A.S.S. Fest 2014. #2................in the immortal words of the nature boy Rick Flair..........."to be the man, you gotta beat the man"....................he's had a huge target on his back for 20 years................it's not that he's slowed down (maybe a little?? IDK??) but that the others have caught up and closed the gap. #3............and this is just IMHO................maybe a little success "hangover". I don't know him, and maybe he'd argue against this, but when you have been on top for so long, maybe a little complacency starts to take hold in such little amounts here, and little there, that it doesn't show up over a short period of time, but after a couple years it will.................like the mouse who jumps up on the counter and takes a crumb off your nice apple pie...........you don't notice the first 5-6 times he's done it, but after there is a big chunk all of a sudden gone, you finally do something about it. I am .................as a 40 year man...............a KVD fan boy LOL. I have met in passing quite a few pros over the years, and I have never met a nicer bunch than Rick Clunn, Brian Snowden and KVD. I could tell you whom I thought were real jerks, but that's frowned upon here. Now for ww2farmer's "cool story bro" moment of the week...........I was at the BPS in Auburn NY a few years ago with my wife and kids while the Elite series was up here and all the Nitro/BPS pro staffers were doing a meet and greet. I watched the mobs bombard these guys with the idiotic "whats your favorite color" questions, and "what's a good spot on this or that lake" etc....I could see a bunch of them (the pros) kind of getting tired of the song and dance, but KVD rolled with it kept a smile on his face and was ever the gentleman. When I got a chance to speak with him, I said.............."I am going to ask you something that I haven't heard asked by anyone else today. You guys are on the water a lot............what's your favorite sunscreen and skin moisturizer? I need to keep my boyish good looks while not turning red or into an old leather handbag." I think I might have made him chuckle...............then we posed for pictures with my kids, and then life went on....................ahhhhhh the memories... LOL.

Yup...............

No use for them here. I throw everything on a MH rod..........from KVD 1.5's up to SK 5xd's.................Oh, and I crank with braid too. It's a wonder I have ever caught a bass.

I have lots of "go-to" baits............it all depends on the situation. I am not the kind of guy to go out and live or die with one bait all the time trying to force a round peg in a square hole. I know guys that do nothing but throw big heavy jigs all year........ I know guys that do nothing but throw wacky rigged senkos all year....... I know guys that do nothing but drop shot all year.......... I know guys that do nothing but throw frogs all year........ These guys all have their days where they smash a huge bag or two and look like world beaters, but they all have one thing common..........when they are not smashing huge bags, they are donating, there seems to be no in-between. On the other hand.......... I know a couple guys (and I'll include my self in this group) that roll with the punches, can catch them in the dirt with an anchor rope and a pool cue, can go offshore in 30 feet of water with sewing thread and fairy wands, and hold their own everywhere in-between. Long winded, pontificating reply to the point.............yes.......I have go to baits for all the situations I am apt to come across, I just don't have a go to bait that I am married to and fish blindly hoping for the best.

FWIW............you guys can keep all your "realistic" looking plastic craws. Even in gin clear water, I find that things that look nothing like a "real" craw out fish those pretty fisherman catching craw baits by a wide margin.

Non-issue in bass tournaments...........at least mine. For several reasons: #1...........If a boat doesn't have a working livewell, I won't even sign them up. #2...........dead fish are penalized. I take 1/4 lb for 1, and a 1/2 lb for every additional one up to 3............you got more than three dead fish, I DQ the entire bag and give you a stern talking to about fish care and possibly the ban hammer from all future tournaments depending on the attitude you give me over it. #3............dead fish are not allowed to be weighed for lunker. #4...............I been around long enough to know if your trying to pull a move on me. If I suspect a dead fish in your bag was caught outside of tournament hours......You WILL get embarrassed in front of everyone, banned from all future tournaments I run, law enforcement will be called, and I will call every other local tournament director to let them know of your shenanigans.

"Invest".............................that word doesn't mean what you think it means. "Investing" in fishing tackle is buying stock from a publicly traded tackle company. Stuff you buy to fish with is "buying stuff" to fish with. Few, if any consumer goods are "investments", with the exception of limited production items made and marketed to collectors first, and users second............but even then, those things take forever and the right buyer to ever make them sound investments. IDK why............but people using the word invest wrong always has been a top pet peeve of mine................and I'm just a dumb farm hand with $3 in my pocket............... Carry on.

This......................................

Water temp was 38-39.........................Weeds in Silver were gone last year around mid-late August due to all the farm run off from the record rains we had May-July, and heavy algae blooms once the water was warm. No sun light = no weeds. Silver's watershed is in the middle of dairy farm land. We got about 25" of rain over a 7 week period from late May into early July. Right after all the surrounding land was planted and fertilized. This rain carried with it a tremendous amount of nutrients into the lake. All was good....................until the water reached it's peak temps in August. We had an algae bloom for the ages here that thrived on this runoff. It lasted until October, and basically choked the grass out by robbing it of sunlight. The dying weeds just added more fuel to the fire, and kept the bloom going for weeks, if not months longer than most blooms we get. By the time the bloom faded...........there wasn't much standing healthy grass left. BUT............I have seen this cycle before. The grass will be fine this year, just as long as we don't get all that rain in the late spring/early summer again. Clear water = good weeds all year, with carry over into the winter. The best time for it to rain here to keep the water clear is in April-May BEFORE the farmers start planting.........OR from mid July on...........after the crops have started taking up the fertilizer, and the ground is dry with the ability to soak up the rain, instead of it being saturated and ending up in the lake.

I liked them better than the Xrap, but I like the SK KVD jerkbaits, and the Storm Twitch Sticks better. The Clunn bait's were too unpredictable out of the box. One would suspend, one would sink, one would float.............etc. Not to mention the hardware on them sucks..............bad. For $2 more the KVD have suspended PERFECT out of the box on dozens of baits, even after a hook change to my preferred hook.

Put the boat in around 10am this morning, caught 2 smallmouth before noon, 2 pike from noon-2 while looking for largemouth, and 6 smallmouth after I decided to give up on largemouth for the day. The best five were a 5-1, 4-9,4-5,4-3, and 3-13.................. The water is wet, the fishing has started...............I now keep my mouth shut about what I am doing. Pics of the better fish...

I use both. A little bit of Star-tron every time I put gas in the boat, and Seafoam once a month, OR if I have been out in a lot of wet/damp weather. In the fall when the nights are cool/cold and the days are warm I put Seafoam in a little more often. I make sure before tha boat is put up for the winter, the gas has been treated with both AND is the one time all year long I go out of my way to use ethanol free gas. I have not had any issues since switching to this method over Sta-bil.

Silver is ice free................end to end, side to side. Maybe I'll be out there tomorrow.

It's always amused me that people whine about the clock change in spring.............on the other hand, I hate the one in the fall. I would rather have more daylight at the end of the day than in the morning. I say after we set them ahead this time we leave them alone...............forever.

The rod your looking for sounds a lot like the St Croix Legend Tournament Bass 7'6" MH power, moderate fast action. Don't let the "MH" power rating fool you, St Croix's often fish a power heavier than their listed ratings. In other words...............a MH St Croix = H power Loomis, Kistler, Fenwick, etc... I had this rod for a couple years, and it was a fine flipping stick, and before I went with custom built rods.........I have often though about going back to this stick as a "do-all" rod for casting heavish baits (like big cranks/a-rigs) and flipping.

I like the Berkley Havoc Bottom Hopper, and the Yum Sharpshooter.

I keep track in my head,for that day............two days later I have already forgotten, unless it was "one of those days" that come around a couple times of year.

I am neither for, nor opposed to bed fishing. I will bed fish intentionally for smallmouth for a few days, then it gets boring because it's stupid easy at times. As for largemouth...........I rarely intentionally bed fish for them, but I have no doubt that I catch a lot off beds. Why don't I bed fish for largemouth on purpose? Because they are jerks...................you can practically park the boat on top of a smallmouth and catch them on a bare hook, come back in three hours and catch them again..............with largemouth you have to paint your face camo, sneak up on them, mark the bed with a stick, comeback in two hours, get the male agitated, say three Hail Mary's, have your hat tilted to a 45 degree angle to the axis of the sun, and try 653 different baits before one even looks at it.................I ain't got time for that.

I have caught plenty of smallmouth, and perch right after ice out...........largemouth are hit or miss. If you time it right, you can be on them, but the windows are small and tight this early. Out of an 8-10 hour day, they seem to bite in one or two little flurries all day. Pike can be caught regularly.............but they are off limits targeting them intentionally until season opens for them (as well as walleye) on the 1st Sat. of May. I catch more than I care for on accident while targeting bass. I am not a fan of fishing in water temps in the 30's...........it's slow, but it beats not going. Once the water temps hit the low 40's............which can be just a day or two.............or as long as a couple of weeks after the ice is gone, the fishing is much better. .