still looking for someone to fish with...

[Mac3]

Thanks Bender, good seeing you again.

Went out the other evening and caught 4. Our reservoir is hard to fish, but 4 seemed like a grand evening for me. I fished a skirted grub with a bullet weight on one rod, a lightly weighted tube on the second rod and a zoom speedworm body weightless on the third. I used all 3 lures in an alternate fashion for about equal time on the water, and caught all 4 on the slow falling and deadsticking watermelon/red zoom speedworm. I've given this bait a shorter name
by calling it "Zoomie". I fished most of the time in 4 to 6 feet of water near brush, laydowns and rip rap....the water temperature being 74, little wind if any and overcast conditions. Hope to do better next time out.

[crankybait]

right... well now it is also pretty hard to go fishing, with my mom and dad both having jobs now. ive been trying to see if anyone else at school fishes.

[Bender]

Is there a local tackle store that you can stop in and hang around a little without bothering anybody? If so you can talk to the people there about what is working and also maybe meet a fishing partner.

[crankybait]

ive tried to find a tackle shop, but there are none near me.there is one near the highschool im going to next year, in walking distance. but for now, there are none

[Fish On]

Come to NY for 2 days and I will help you.

[crankybait]

i would, but i dont think my parents would take me there to fish. if i ever do go to new york, itll be for something busy... probably wont have fishing time.

[Zach_BassFisherman]

it seems as if maybe your techniques arent right, when your using different plastics and lures try different retrieves, sooner or later youll come up with something that works, also the bass maybe be hitting slower, so try dead rigging something, perferably a tiki stick, and keep it towards the surface, and let it sink for about a few seconds and u should come up with something

[Fish On]

Well it would only take me a few minutes to see what is wrong with your technique. It must be really weird so it will be easy to spot.
Fell free to give me a call tonight or whenever.

[crankybait]

right ill see when i can get a call in. Zach- would a yum dinger be fine? ive only got one tiki stick, and its pretty torn up.

[JB]

cranky, ya need about a million bags of plastics if you're going to hang with us, hit daddy-O up fer a loan

[Rebbasser]

Cranky, a Yum Dinger will work fine. I threw a baby bass/pearl laminate Dinger today and caught several.

[crankybait]

ooh goody... bass pearl laminate yum dingers are exactly what i have! JB, i dont see why id need so many plastics except for if i catch fish. other than that i dont think ill get snagged that many times. so even if i catch one fish, i dont care, ill be happier than ever

ok, i think im going fishing today. here, i drew up a plan that im going to use.


the O's are where i get hung up the most. almost every time i reel in there is a thick goopy stuff... would bass be there? also ive reeled in small tree branches before, so ill kep casting to there. the arrows with the lines coming out are where im going to fish, and where ill cast. ill cast in each direction 5 times. then the X's are trees, and the shading is the shade. any other ideas? of and at the top theres a fenced area, the rectangle at the bottom is the dock.

[flbassman]

Looks good cranky. Try some parallel casts to those trees. Cast up on the edges some. Good luck. Is there any way you could get a video of you fishing from cast to end? We could analyze it for you.

[crankybait]

um i can probably make a video but i wouldnt know how to get it onto the computer.

[flbassman]

One of your friendsmight know how, or, you could mail a hard copy to someone on here that is good with computers (JB comes to mind, but he is also good with photoshop, so you may be wearing a dress in the video)

[crankybait]

yeah thats what ill probably do. JB are you willing to do that?

[Rebbasser]

Cranky-try walking the bank throwing parallel to it-maybe 4-5 feet off the bank and bringing it back close to the bank. That pond is figure-8 shaped, so where it narrows-the points-try standing down the bank within casting distance and fan casting across the points. Then go the same distance on the other side of the point and fan cast the same way. You are getting hung up on something off those 2 points that will hold fish. If you are using a Yum dinger, don't wacky rig it-rig it weedless so it won't get hung up as easily and work it through the cover. This time of year I wouldn't throw anything in a pond that isn't weedless or at least semi-weedless like a spinnerbait, but I think your best bet woud be that Yum Dinger.

Here is what I mean: The red circles indicate where to stand and the lines indicate where to cast. You can work both directions and see which works best:



You are on the right track-just alter your presentation a little. One word of warning: If you do get hung up and get the bait loose, check your line-if it feels rough, cut your bait off and retie. The frayed line is a lot weaker that undamaged line. Last Tuesday I got hung, got the bait back and checked the line. It was real rough-scraped over a flooded tree. I retied and next cast got a 4-7 largemouth. I would not have caught him if I hadn't retied. The line would have snapped taking my lure and a nice fish with it.

[crankybait]

alright sounds cool. although i dont know if i can get to that point along the treeline, its all thron and poison ivy except the one empty spot, theres a path there. and does this mean i shouldnt fish from the dock?

[Rebbasser]

Not at all, but try standing off and casting to and around the dock before going out on it and work the edges-the bank, the corners of the dock-up under the dock if possible-etc. The dock can itself hold fish. Just remember bass are not an open water fish-they like to be in and around cover, and sometimes the bank is the cover they use. For example, yesterday Flyrod and I were fishing a lake that doesn't have a whole lot of cover-it is an old lake with no vegetation, so the fish use rock and whatever wood remains as cover. Flyrod was catching them on a topwater maybe 6 inches from the bank, so I started throwing a Tiny Torpedo and didn't get any hits unless it was right next to the bank. Fishing a steep rock bank we were throwing soft plastics, and if we didn't get a hit right next to the bank on the initial fall we reeled in and cast again because they weren't in open water but right next to the bank.

Years ago I was fishing a big pond in a state park. Rather than throwing straight out I threw about a 45 degree angle from where I was standing with a modified Beetle Spin-had a curl tail grub instead of a split tail grub on the jighead. I'd catch a fish, move about 6 feet up the bank, cast again, and catch another. I must have caught 30 doing that-they were all small, but I was catching them. My point is that if you work the banks and the edges rather than just casting out into open water you will have more success.

Also, it looks like your pond gets a lot of fishing pressure, so try smaller lures-Beetle Spin type lures, Strike King Bitsy Pond Minnows, etc-the small baits. That ought to increase your success as well.

[crankybait]

no idea what beetle spins or bitsy minnows are, but ill search em up. thanks. and there cant be fish on the dock, its not over any water. all thats under the dock is sticks muck and washed up dead fish. ... but that gives me an idea. there are so many sticks around that dock. tons of branches that people have reeled in and just dropped in front of the dock. maybe i shoulod try there, even though is like only 2 or 3 feet

[pig n jig]

Doc, It might pay to read up on ponds. Find an article Doug Hannon did on pond fishing. Actually he did a show several years ago,where he demonstrated catching fish by monitoring the oxygen level of the pond and fishing the depth where there was a good oxygen supply.Down size lures and make your presentations more subtle, fish weightless worms and french fry baits slow.You should also see bass as you walk around the pond. P N J

[crankybait]

dont see any bass. but im going today. ill make sure to take a ridicoulously high ammount of detailed pics of the pond, when theyre developed ill scan them