'COOL' not enough for me

Sometimes bullet-proof ain’t enough. And come to think of it, style isn’t everything either. So, when it comes to optics for anglers, I can’t tell you how disappointed I was after hanging around the show for the WileyX press conference this past Thursday.

Yeah, they’ve got our Skeet Reese; they’ve got the other Mark Davis; but as an optics manufacturer, they’ve also got short-sightedness (pun intended.) (more…)

Hey, I don’t have a boat these days, so I wouldn’t have given this matter much of a thought. However, with ICAST, the national fishing trade show coming up, I have been getting a stream of product pre-announcements on what I should be looking for when I get to Las Vegas.

So here’s one.

Having stood on the sidelines for an awful lot of tournaments over the years– sometimes guys break down and the organization has to go out and find them. (more…)

Do you know the best single tail grub ever made? That’s an easy question. The best grub is the one they’re biting. Here in California, a couple have had their starring moments including the Yamamoto (especially the 5-inch salt and pepper), but also the Kalin 5-inch.

Since the earlier era, however, a couple things have occurred. One, Yamamoto changed its molds on the bait we used to split-shot and Carolina rig, and Kalin, of course, was sold to Uncle Josh in Wisconsin, and kind of slipped out of the spotlight. (more…)

Back in the day, all the rods were made of fiberglass, reels had 3:1 gear ratios and sonars were portable. There was no tungsten, no stainless steel and certainly no fluorocarbon.

But bass anglers are never satisfied. New methods create new necessities and new technology allows for the creation of new products. And while there was a time I never thought I’d need a faster reel, a lighter rod, or more transparent fishing line, the fact is I use them all now.

So how about this deal? I sure didn’t see them coming (and maybe that’s the point), but I just discovered you can actually get transparent “hardware.” (more…)

You don’t have to tell me. I know you’ve been hoarding Megabait spoons since the company went out of business and your collection of custom-painted ice jigs is the coolest in three states.

But not every day is the same out on the water. With an extra layer of clothes and a lot of adrenalin going, we don’t always sense the changes in conditions. But down there, those marks on the color graph–those are living creatures that are facing another winter day of survival.

True, some days they are hot to go, rising up in the water column to catch your bait as it falls. Other days they like that slide-and-glide look from Norway. And then there are a lot of other days, when bellied down in the mud or silt, they need a real good reason to get up and move even a foot or two. (more…)

UPDATED: Okay, it may be an issue of bass fishing eras, but I’ve been sitting on this lure for awhile–just because I knew the water would start to cool down, and around here, there are still places with shallow cover.

Yes, all singles and tandems work fine in the brush. But I’ve been around long enough to know that the first dual-bladed spinnerbaits were actually twin-spins. A lure that has a blade on either of two spreader arms, allowing for a slow fall–like a parachutist, (more…)