Champ188

Thanks, guys. I am blessed beyond limits.

Wish you could have made it, Chris. Hopefully we can get together soon.

C4F, easy remedy for No. 2 ... no need to use fluorocarbon for spinnerbaits. I'd suggest 17-pound mono in the brand of your choosing. Looking forward to the tournament myself and celebrating with Donna our 22nd wedding anniversary. Should be a fun weekend.

Holy smokes that is FUNNY! Jerry holds the early clubhouse lead for YouTube gem of 2016!

Couldn't agree more on this reel. Donna and I have several and have had no problems with any of them. Lew's spinning reels have been another story. It'll be a long while before I buy another one, if ever. I have one less than a year old with the main drive gear ratcheting every time I try to play a fish.

I can't help it that the dang things started biting a spinnerbait. I may have gone into seine mode. Temporarily. Just sayin. But I ended up calling her up to the front deck with me, putting my own rod down and just running the trolling motor. She'll vouch for that.

I haven't fished the Old Glory but I've had pretty good results in stained water with the Ayu color. Remember, if you can't don't have at least 2 feet of visibility, you should probably be throwing something other than a jerk bait.

Don't pass up the blue bandit when picking colors.

Hop on Pop? Now there's a book title you couldn't have these days. Dr. Seuss woulda been labeled a pedophile and put on the sex offender registry.

Every word the truth.

Welcome, Andrew. Look forward to meeting you.

I use a fairly cheap Shimano Compre 6-8 medium power/fast action rod for my jerk baits. Sometimes you want hi-tech, sometimes you want lo-tech. With a jerk bait, you sure don't want to feel a fish breathe on your lure. Like a crank bait, you want him to have time to take the bait fully before your brain engages and you start pulling back. A fast action actually has a softer tip than extra fast, for those unfamiliar with the terminology. It also bends farther down into the rod, which is called a parabolic action. The end result is it "gives" more when you and the fish are pulling against each other, hopefully preventing you from losing the fish. But you still need to never "horse" a fish on a treble hook lure --- or any lure for that matter unless you just HAVE to get the fish out of heavy cover.

I bought a 7-2 MH Lew's Custom Speed Stick casting rod a few months back and have been totally impressed with it. It's the most sensitive $130 rod I've ever owned. Really great for FB jigs and wobble heads. And you can send in for a very nice free hoodie. As for spinning rods, I have a couple of the St. Croix Premier series (about the same price point as above) and am pretty fond of them.

Brett, they done CHEWED the paint right off of that stick bait. I've caught more than a few on that particular bait over the last few weeks.

LOL, yes that little Shineee Hineee jig was under a floater ... was trying to find a school of crappie on some of those big standing trees in Panther. No luck. But the conditions were certainly right. Mike, water temps ranged from 51 to 55 for me yesterday.

Bigmo, they seemed to bite pretty well all day for me. I wasted the first hour or so in some really stained water but after that, it was steady. Not fast and furious, but never a really dead period.

Couldn't agree more, Old Plug. I started using the 6-pound Excel mono on my spinning reels when one of the top tournament anglers ever in NW Arkansas personally recommended it. He's not sponsored by Bass Pro Shops ... in fact, the only sponsor he has at all is War Eagle ... so he wasn't pimping Excel line. Through the years, I can hardly recall any break-offs on it. And it's cheap enough that you can afford to change it often, as ANY spinning line is going to twist and wear over a fairly short period of time. I later decided to try the heavier Excel line (17 and 20 pound) for my spinner baits and topwaters. Can't tell that I've lost any performance from P-Line CXX and again, it's much cheaper and allows me to change more frequently. I'm not sure how many actual line factories are out there, but Plug is on the button about there only being a few and that a lot of different brand lines are made in the same facility. I use Cabela's store brand fluorocarbon and I can assure you that Cabela's does not have a line factory. Neither does BPS.

Best way to tell if it fits your needs is to buy a spool and see how it performs under your style of fishing. At the worst you're out $10 for a spool of mono or $20 for carbon.

Fished a pretty full day Thursday in the rain and later the wind, starting at Eagle Rock and fishing down to Rock Creek. Babler was on Taney playing with the slick fish, so had all day to pillage and plunder his stuff rather than find my own fish. It's just easier that way. Ended the day with 24 but only 5 keepers for about 12 pounds. Nothing over 3 pounds. Threw a jerk bait, crank bait, spinner bait, shaky head, crappie jig and a lure that shall remain unnamed because of upcoming derbies (not the OA gathering Saturday).

Good job. Fish are on the move.

That just sucks, man. Was looking forward to visiting. We'll have other chances later this spring/summer. I won't even make any Ford jokes right now.

We are all limited by budgets of varying degrees, but this ^^^ is so true ... spend all you can afford and you won't be sorry. The performance gap is pretty wide between cheap, better and best when it comes to reels.

Great experience for all of you and thank you so much for releasing the big un.

Great stuff there. The kids will remember that day forever.

I was in the newspaper business for 35 years and that's one heckuva good shot, Gabe. Captures all the emotion, etc.