Stitching In The 21St Century?

[Thad]

I recently finished reading Bill's book. I decided to finally get it because my fishing mentality has somewhat changed recently. I love fishing tournaments but I like the idea of catching bigger fish than running and gunning for a limit. Swimbait fishing is one method I really love but I also hope to start stitching as well.

Bill's book was published almost 20 years ago and I was wondering what changes, if any, would be made to the equipment. I know this is not a popular method with most fisherman but if any of you use it I would like to know what equipment you use.

Bill used his long fiberglass rod, what spinning rod would you guys suggest?

What line do you use? I'm guessing most would use flouro but I would think braid with a flouro leader would have its benefits. One of the main ideas of stitching is to feel the bottom structure and I would think braid would afford you the best opportunity for this.

What baits are you using? I know Bill liked to use bulky straight tail worms of various sizes and that he preferred stiffer worms. It seams to me that a senko type worm would fit this bill pretty well.

I want to change my focus towards trophy bass and I understand the benefits of this method. I also understand Bill was not simply conveying a fishing technique in his book. The real importance was placed on where to fish. He understood how big fish related to structure.

[deep]

Stitching I like to believe is a concept, and doesn't refer solely to the way he puts line back on his reel while retrieving. The concept being to present the bait as naturally and convincingly as possible. Why do you think they say "when you think you're reeling slow enough, reel even slower" about swimbait retrieves? Same concept. The great benefit with a worm is that it's looks totally inoffensive and natural to a bass.

Did you read how he camped out at a spot and wait for the fish to start feeding? That totally blew my mind when I first read it. I've tried to emulate him, without much success; which comes down to my lack of patience.

[stratosjoe]

[i tried it a couple times on a lake not too far from my home in Illnois the spot has a ledge of about 8' water with stumps right on the edge of the drop then a straight fall to about 12' then a smooth drop into 30'. I shut of the big motor and ran the tm on low crisscrossed the stumps and ledge 3 different angles then sit up with anchors like he suggests. fished this spot hard for 3 hrs with total concentration used spitshot rig also a do nothin (charlie Brewer stye head with 4" worm) Nothing,,, even though I saw fish on all three passes. I decided to stop fishing eat a sandwich and have a cup of coffee . This little break was about 20-25 minutes. Started up again and for approximatly 20 minutes I could do no wrong. I caught 2 LM over 5 one I weighed, 2nd one was bigger so estimated it plus numerous 2-2 1/2. In hindsite I should have put them in the livewell and turned loose later. The second time I tried this was close to the same thing only the wait was about 1 hour. The thing about fishing like this is I enjoy just working that bait slowly visualizing what its doing but most guys I fish with are bank pounders and fish fast. I really enjoy this and it proved to work just need the patience of the Pope. I always wonder how many times this place gets hit in the course of a day but guys just zooming by not taking the time cause they are tournament fishing and cannot spend that much time in one spot. Long post but hope someone else will try this.

[Thad]

I never really thought the name stitching came from the way he respooled the line. I imagined the name came from the way the lure was slowly crawled along the bottom.

The camping out part was amazing. He felt more in tune with the lake by doing so. Now that's a purist.

The patience required for this technique is incredible. Most people don't naturally have this kind of patience and that's why this method of fishing is overlooked. To me it adds to the sport. It's an internal challenge that must be constantly fought while hundreds of things go through your mind that try to make you second guess yourself.

But back to my original question.

What equipment are you using?

[deep]

I never really thought the name stitching came from the way he respooled the line. I imagined the name came from the way the lure was slowly crawled along the bottom.

lol, you're probably right. But I've read that book so many times that whenever I hear the word *stitching*, even in a different context, I imagine a guy, sitting in a boat, oblivious to everything else other than his worm and the lake bottom, taking up line with his hand, waiting forever until the big female decides to feed. My favorite day-dream too. Picking up line by hand is a very effective way to "reel" slowly enough though

Instead of camping out on a good-looking spot, I like to do something that Bill Siemantel calls a milk run. Hit several good spots with several lures several times in a day, hoping that sometime somewhere I'll connect with an actively feeding fish. Each cast and retrieve though is a stitching technique. As slow and as natural as possible; the whole retrieve usually takes a couple to three minutes. But I make a maximum of 5 casts at a spot, from different angles. If a fish is there, and doesn't hit the lure on the first cast, another retrieve along the same path will only tick it off, or scare it away. That's what I believe anyway. So you see, I've stitched hudds, I've stitched jigs, I've stitched big floating swimbaits; stitching meaning I've retrieved as slowly as I could stand it, and mixed in deadsticking. The only bigbait I never stitched is a Punker. No wonder I've only ever caught one fish on it.