fishinwrench

I thought that Judges became "Judges" by leaving the "assuming" to those with far less authority. Interesting lesson, Hoglaw. Thanks.

I live to feel the bites. Do y'all hold your rod when your towing crankbaits, or do you stick them in a rod holder, grab a beer and scratch your balls until one starts bobbing up and down?

The way I understand, and it corresponds with my experiences over the years, is that it takes a pretty substantial cold snap to initiate a genuine rollover. And that usually happens in late October right before the Chamber of Commerce annual derby. During that time the mid-lake fishing is pretty slow, but the upper-end bite can be awesome.

I'll give them ONE pass, then I'm going in BEHIND them. THAT'S as courteous and ethical as a caster needs to be to a troller AFAIC.

Typically the mid-lower lake area turns over right around Halloween.

Every single one of those needs googly eyes. Jus'sayin.

Where's the squirrely one?

Great stuff, RM! I know a striper/hybrid fella (or three) that fish gurglers on a sink tip. I haven't played with that yet myself but but just last week I discovered what a crease fly can do on a 5.6ips sink-tip.....so I think I 'get it' now.

There's no question that giggers PREFER a sucker fry. But once the shindig has been planned, the cooking oil and cornmeal bought and all the gear loaded there IS gonna be a fish fry regardless of whether the suckers cooperate or not. If the suckers happen to be scarce that night they aren't just gonna eat jerky and frito's and call it a nite.

Well IMO it would take a heck of a lot less effort to bust a outlaw gigging party than it would be to infiltrate a small town drug cartel. Sad fact is that the payoff isn't as good.

I have never put a torque wrench on a spark plug...and I have installed thousands of'em. You can feel when the sealing ring seats firmly, and that's all you need to worry about on your 2-stroke Yammie.

I'd like to give a big HELL YEAH! to that.....But I have to reserve it since it is pretty obvious that the world doesn't "work" the way I think it should/or could. And I have my doubts that anyone else I'll ever fish with has a clue either. Everytime I try to deep-think the problems in society I always come to the conclusion that there is just too many disposable people in the world. I say "disposable" to mean that they aren't valued, just maintained and herded like cattle and hogs. So I just take comfort in the assumption that I am just ignorant and that things aren't truly as they seem to ME.

My g/f permanently altered the color of a plastic comb from bright pink to a nice woodland gray with some brown hair dye. Just a thought.

Most of the stuff you'll read or hear about whites/hybrids will attempt to convince you that they "follow schools of baitfish around almost constantly", and while that might be true in bodys of water where baitfish are scarce in comparison to the size of the body of water I don't believe that is true at all in lakes that are thick with shad. On LO and Truman, for example, shad are EVERYWHERE and I think the whites (at least some of them) operate more like ambush predators and tend to "home range". They seem to hang out in certain areas and launch attacks on schools of shad as the shad move through their "zone". And those are the ones you can kinda pattern. Find a large mud flat where the water is off colored, then look for spots on that flat where there is rocks or hard bottom structure. At some point during the Fall there WILL be a group of whites patrolling that area. Evenings seem to be the best time to catch them being careless about what they put in their mouths. The schools of whites/hybrids that roam around mid-lake randomly are impossible to pattern so I don't even acknowledged their existance unless they do something to call attention to themselves like start boiling the water within reach of me, or stack up on a windy shoreline....which again is one of those things I "hear about" way more often than I have ever actually been a part of. Running around fishing windy banks and points is nothing but casting practice AFAIC, the odds of stumbling onto a group of mainlake whites is about the same as cashing in on the Powerball unless you know of a certain bank/point/ledge where that sort of thing routinely happens....but then again we are back to dealing with "home range" patternable whites that never required high-tech sonar to locate in the first place.

The same kind of thing happens when fishing rigged soft plastics either Texas or Carolina rigged. The fish sucks it in while moving towards you, balling the whole thing up in its mouth. If he mashes down on it with the hook pointed AWAY from you and that sharp hook point stabs a little, then you haul off and cross his eyes you are snapping that line at a 90° (or more) angle to the point of the hook. Sluggo/fluke hookups are NOTORIOUS for this. Just start looking for tears inside the mouths of fish you land on "tex-posed" flukes and you'll see what I mean. Geeze, this is impossible to explain without pictures

Fishing wide open flats from a boat, for striped fish. I'm usually stripping line like I am trying to start a chainsaw with bad gas and the hits are usually pretty violent. Like I tried to explain earlier in this thread (but it's hard to describe in words) I believe it happens when they engulf the fly at breakneck speed and the hook point hangs up at a severe angle to the direction of line pull as the hook is going INTO the fishes mouth.... then they either turn and blaze off....or I set the hook, and....Snap! In this situation it is trying to "roll the hook out, but they are so sharp that the point sticks putting some pretty severe sudden tension on the hook bend. I know this happens alot with whites and hybrids because It is not rare at all to land a fish on a 34007 that is stuck somewhere in the lower jaw and also notice a nasty fresh tear in the roof of its mouth. Or land one stuck in the upper part of his mouth with a torn up bleeding tongue. The 34007 is strong enough to resist flexing due to the wire diameter, and isn't so heavily tempered that it becomes brittle.....like some ultra-tempered fine wire hooks are. I have also broken several B10S when lightly hung up on a piece of wet wood and I throw a brisk roll cast over the stick to free the fly (ya know, that little trick that we all try a couple of times before we go fetch it manually). Just the sudden jerk of a loop of 7-9wt. Line will snap a #4 B10S. I can break one without ever pulling hard on the snagged fly, just by doing a fast tight looped roll cast if the point is stabbed into soggy wood, so that is what convinced me that it was a "line pull angle vs. brittle tempered steel" thing. Does any of that BS make any sense? LOL

Awesome! Yessir it does look like the bite is finally picking up on this pond. I do wish they'd stop with the drawdown though.

This is interesting. How do you arrest someone who can't be identified? A person is standing on the riverbank close to a stringer of fish but he will not speak or respond to questioning.... How long can he be held in custody for that?

Well if you thought it was a rattler you were being rather careless with that right foot. Is it just me, or does something about that snake look very relaxed (dead)? I guess it's possible that you were that close and he didn't know it, but...

You can't protect them if you can't admit to ever BEING THERE. LOL

Ya know, if this is someone that you see fairly regularly you can approach them minus the holier than thou attitude. Chat it up, share a beer. You might find them interesting and halfway decent people. Be friendly and then it's highly likely that your views will rub off on them. I'm proud to say that I have "converted" a few Hoosiers in my day Not many people will turn down the chance to upgrade the quality and integrity of their associates. Just something to consider.

Oh make no mistake, I am in your corner. If they'd grant some of us some immunity I'd be glad to spend some cold dark nights on the river. I know exactly where to bust some of them too, but it's on private property so I'll need immunity from trespass and temporary authority to hold them at bay until a badge shows up. Not sure how I'd call a badge though because cell service in that holler is non-existent. The reality is that it'll never happen. The owner of the place is reasonably connected and in effect he pretty much owns the river. Truth be known... My interest is slowly fading away from issues on bigger rivers that the law only patrols when it benefits them exclusively. My concern has shifted more towards aquiring legal access to many of the smaller rivers and streams. Because I honestly don't give 1/2 a $#!t about Smallmouth that live in places where I have to risk getting hassled or arrested for fishing them. More and more anglers are fishing....and more and more water is being placed Off Limits. To me THAT has become the greater fight to win. Easier too, since nobody has to loose sleep or miss their favorite TV show. The stroke of a pen can fix it.

So what y'all are saying is that a person can just stand there and pretend to not understand a word the lawman is saying.....and the lawman will just walk away? I'd have to see that to believe it. What keeps the lawman from placing them under arrest?

Sounds like a posse is assembling. I'll cover the otters !

With the Whites, if they suck in a clouser and stick the hook point straight in, at a 90°angle from my rod tip, and then I either do one of my instinctual hook sets, or the fish turns and does a powerful 180° away from me that hook bend has alot of pressure on it. Once it starts flexing it's gonna keep flexing/bending until the angle of pull between the point and eye is more favorable. I think the bending/breaking happens when a fish hooks itself and THEN (with the hook point at 90° To the direction of line pull) you "set the hook".