abkeenan

Great info Bo. I am ALWAYS open to learning or critic. Especially when that comes from someone like yourself that has more minutes logged on TR waters than I've been alive. Thanks much and I will store this info in my bass bank in the brain. Thanks again for your input.

Report from my Saturday and 1/2 Sunday trip: not much to report. Not that any trip to TR is terrible but the fishing was TERRIBLE. Fished all day Saturday for 3 fish and half Sunday where we had one big 14+" crappie and 0 bass. Tried a bunch of baits, bunch of locations from the dam to just past the MO/AR border in Long Creek. Tried different depths. Tried main lake stuff, bluff walls, secondary points, back of creeks, flats, 45 degree banks, gravel runouts......I exhausted what knowledge I had about fishing The Rock, which continues to prove to be limited. Tried a buzzbait, plopper, spook, jig, 10" worm, spoon, swim jig, rock crawler, wiggle wart, mag wart, spinnerbait and jerkbait. Didn't matter. The jerkbait caught all the fish other than one which came on the mag wart. Had a 2 short strikes on the spinnerbait and that sums up the trip. I really tried to force the shallow bite figuring I'd at least run into a few......NOPE. Probably should have stayed out deeper and given the spoon more or a chance but like I mentioned I was hellbent on beating the water to a froth in the 1-15 FOW range. Even fish I did mark on the graph out deeper and would drop a spoon on them wanted no part of it. Most action I got from that was a slight tug for an instant and came up with a scale on one of the trebles. Could have gone to the Ned but really didn't want to do that and the wind was howler at most times on Saturday and pretty much all day Sunday. Would have been impossible to keep the little guy down. Even fished Saturday night from 8-11pm and had all of ZERO bites on the jig, big worm and single blade Colorado spinnerbait. Hopefully someone had some better luck than we did. Water temps ranged from 64-67 on main lake to 69 in some of the creeks. Visibility around the dam I'd estimate are around 10 feet. Was more color in Long Creek where I would say visibility is around 3 feet. Only 2 other rigs, besides myself, at the 86 ramp on Saturday morning when launching and 0 when pulling out on Sunday around 2pm.. Not many guys out fishing around the dam. Long creek they were pretty stacked up in Brushy and most guys were out in around 30 feet drop shotting or spooning. Had the lake to myself on Saturday night as I did not see a single boat in the dam area. Good luck out there, hopefully this weather cools and gets these fish on their regularly scheduled program. Almost 70 degree water temps in November?? Pffffft. I did catch one smallie that Champ "Jimmy Houston'd" earlier this year, apparently. When you only catch 3 bass and a crappie in about 1,000 casts......you're dadgum right I am showing them off!

Interesting. Thanks for sharing.

Don't ask. It wasn't pretty.

Pradco questioning Champ "Mr. War Eagle Spinnerbait" on his thoughts about the buy out......

Welp. So much for that. Pradco....where good baits go to die. I guess you can call them the Fishing "Black" Hole.

Guess people really wanted that Lew's rod. All 200 are already gone. Wowsers.

Yep. Just signed up. Look forward to it every year. The one and only tournament I ever fish. Fun format, every chump like me has a chance to win a boat and/or cash and the Big Bass Staff put on a great event.

Good deal. Will be headed down Friday evening. Probably won't be able to get on the water til Saturday morning . If you're around the the green roof'd 2 slip dock in the first cove along the east side of The Cove That We Shall Not Speak of give me a shout out.

Wow, Bo. That is a HECK OF A SACK. Congrats! What part of the lake if you don't mind me asking.

Must have gotten the chicken nugget by-product discharge and not the 98% fat free grilled white meat strips.

This thread has gone North of the Wall....

Quill and Royal Blue both chimed in on the only 3 baits I would add in keeping it simple. Ned, Topwater, Finesse Jig, Crank and Spinnerbait. Those 5 baits should put some in the boat for you.

Blaming a company for making a product that the consumer wants and turning a profit? So you are not in favor of the American Dream or capitalism? Seems reasonable. If people didn't buy it, the companies wouldn't make it. So who exactly is to blame? The chicken or the egg?

Great report. Thanks for the in depth detail. Hopefully I am able to get down there in 2 weeks and the bite continues to improve.

I'll agree that some of the fishing industry has gotten a little out of hand in "bass bling". But you can't blame the company's for producing because there is clearly a demand for it. Where I will disagree with you is the cost of some items such as rods and reels. Go get one of your old round reels and put that against a modern low profile mid-to-high end reel and see which one casts further with half the effort. See which one is easier to skip docks. See which one doesn't backlash thrown into the wind. If you have physical ailments due to the weight issues of your tackle, why would you not spend a little more money on equipment that weights around 10-13 ounces in a rod and reel combo? That combo would allow you to not only fish more often but also more comfortably without pain or fatigue. Seems like, if I were in your position and discomfort was keeping me from doing something, I would pay whatever the cost that I could afford to turn back the clock a little on my aging body parts. In the end it's each individuals decision on what they want to spend there money on. None of my business.

I have no doubt that those would work. But like Royal Blue said...if it isn't the elaztech it's just not the same. Won't float the same way, won't get "spongy" the same way and won't last anywhere near as many fish.

Well, when the best of the best in the world of BASS fishing change....hopefully that is the idea....that as I mentioned before a trickle down effect will occur and will become the norm for the rest of us small-timers.

B.A.S.S. is now requiring mandatory NON-PUNCTURING culling clips on the Elite Circuit starting in 2018. This is GREAT to see as we had a little bit of a discussion about this a few months back when some of these more "fish friendly" culling tags were seen at this summers I-Cast show. Good to see that BASS is encouraging better treatment of their fish and hopefully that will trickle down to the regional and local level tournaments/clubs. Now if they would just go to the MLF style of weigh and release that would be awesome. I actually think the best idea of a happy medium was they did at Sam Rayburn this past 2017 season. They only brought their biggest fish of the day to the stage . With so many tournaments and so much fishing pressure that some of these lakes get, such as Table Rock, protecting our resource is the name of the game. Tip of the cap to B.A.S.S. for making advances in the preservation of the fish and our beloved sport.

Don't get too down on yourself if you aren't catching right now. This is pretty typical for The Rock this time of year. Fish should push up shallow chasing bait into the back of creeks and whatnot fairly soon. The tournament weights the last 2 weeks or so is all you need to see to tell ya it's TUFFFFFF out there right now.

Not that I've ever had to pick out a professional overrun......but just for the rest of you..... I always used to pick it out with my fingers and as you all well know sometimes that can take 5-10-15-30 minutes or just cutting it out. I watched this video probably about 5 years ago and it has helped me immensely. Every now and then you come along something that seriously improves you way of doing things on the water.....this video was one of them for me. Works great, less "kinking" which ultimately leads to weak spots in the line and have yet to do a full "abort mission" and cut out the line and respool.

Good info there. Thanks for sharing.

I have a bunch of different rod brands in the $100-150 price range and the Hammer is the most comfortable and well made of them all. The BuCoo's aren't too far behind and I actually love fishing with my Duckett Ghost. The quality/finish on the rods are clearly different and I am only speaking in terms of "fishability". If the Hammer is a 10 on quality, BuCoo an 8 and the Ghost is about a 5. I have some $100 range Shimano rods and I like them but they are all pretty heavy and don't fish like the 3 I mentioned above. I have an couple year old green Compre Jig n Worm model which doesn't balance well and fatigues the wrist in about 30 min whereas with the Hammer I never get that ALL DAY fishing the same jigs.

I have the 7'3H Hammer rod and it's a great rod. It's more of a MH than a H and is perfect for so many applications for Table Rock type baits. Wobble heads, t-rigs, jigs and so much more. Very versatile rod and if you are in the market for a rod in the $175ish price range I'd give it a look. Love mine.