What's baits on my line?

Don

Don

Well-known member
Talking to another fisherman, he mentioned that he always had 8-12 rods laid out when he fished semi-pro. I can't prove that he ever fished semi-pro and what Is semi-pro after all? He went on to say that when fishing artificial lures with bait casters, I should consider what I want to use and make a rod permanent to each item and keep that item on that combo sort of permanently. Then it is ready to go and you won't have to re-adjust the brakes and tension.
Am I on the right track with Baitcasting. So one rig would have a spinnerbait, another a topwater lure, and the last has either a football jig on it or a Senko?
How do you fish on your boats?
 
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troutspinner

troutspinner

Nuts & Bolts Guy
Semi-pro always means semi-paid…..RIP Toby Keith

Now that I have that out of my system…..

Your line of thinking is spot on. Pros do like to have 10-20 rods on their deck, all dedicated to a certain method, some rigs are the same method, just different colors. They are on a clock though so being efficient is important vs us who are just going “fishing”.

I do use method specific rods, even different weight rods for the same method. I do not choose rods/methods until the night before I am heading out so I am usually able to narrow it down to 3-4 rods a trip now.
 
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pabassman

pabassman

Well-known member
Don said:
Talking to another fisherman, he mentioned that he always had 8-12 rods laid out when he fished semi-pro. I can't prove that he ever fished semi-pro and what Is semi-pro after all? He went on to say that when fishing artificial lures with bait casters, I should consider what I want to use and make a rod permanent to each item and keep that item on that combo sort of permanently. Then it is ready to go and you won't have to re-adjust the brakes and tension.
Am I on the right track with Baitcasting. So one rig would have a shave pinnerbait, another a topwater lure, and the last has either a football jig on it or a Senko?
How do you fish on your boats?
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I have lots of room and storage. I know I've had 15 rods in the locker one time and had room for more. I dont often carry much more than 6. I rarely just head out looking to catch whatever I can find. I'm in bass mode now, night bass. I carry three set ups that are the same rod, reel,line. They are my workhorse rigs. Spinnerbait, chatterbait and the third is basically a spare for either. This way I have the same feel when I change what I'm throwing. Those baits are 90% of my casts on any night. I have a jig rod, crankbait rod, buzzbait rod and a spook/whopper plopper rod. Different actions, lines for these baits. I empty/refill my boat four times a year. Early spring I do panfish, then walleye/stripers, Bass, then back to panfish late fall. Panfishing I'll have three rods with pretty much the same lure. If I break off or bait gets torn up I just grab another and cast. When youre on a school you need to keep at them so I dont want to waste time rigging when theyre hot
 
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truecrimson

truecrimson

Well-known member
Tried that years ago in the yak and it was just too much. Lots of guys do pack 8 to 10 rods in a kayak. Found 3 to 4 is my limit. Easier and faster to change the bait than to spend the time and energy to manage a forest of rods sticking up behind you waiting to get pulled out by branches or tangled in your next cast. I like to take 2 spinning and 2 bait casting setups.
 
Don

Don

Well-known member
TC with Mono I tend to agree, its quicker to change out. But with braid to floro its a little more better, I think, to tie up before setting out onto the lake. IDK. We'll see.
 
Don

Don

Well-known member
What I still don't get is that in my short five years of fishing here are styles and types of fishing whereby success has completely hidden from me. I like and succeed to a good degree with plastic minnows on jigheads, spinnerbaits. I do okay with spinners. I've yet to catch anything on any type of crawler, not anything not even a bump on a football jig, any type of Ned and nothing but one fish on spoons. During these year I've only caught 5 or six fish on any type of Senkos, plastic worms and wacky style worms. Less than one fish per year with dozens and dozens of hrs spent. Happily I do well on live bait and spinnerbaits (kieteck minnows).
I'm not giving up either. I look for the day when my skills and understanding allow me to leave the house, confident in catching fish, without using Kieteck minnows, and without using live bait. Its coming....
 
G

Gremcat

Well-known member
I have enough time with 3-4 rods and prefer 2. I have a coworker that was full time BP tour for years and still is part time. He also has a $70k boat new every few years. Never desired to fish with him but he’s a great guy. I sort of recall a similar dialogue with him. I think it included the catalog of colors they run on lures to. IIRC he said he runs all the colors but was honest he only needed a handful of colors. I’m not surprised they run 20-30 rods or more. Switching between them fast instead of retying or changing tactics throughout the day. I envision it’s a number of casts and water covered game when you have all the other details comparable to others in the tournament.
 
G

Gremcat

Well-known member
Don said:
What I still don't get is that in my short five years of fishing here are styles and types of fishing whereby success has completely hidden from me. I like and succeed to a good degree with plastic minnows on jigheads, spinnerbaits. I do okay with spinners. I've yet to catch anything on any type of crawler, not anything not even a bump on a football jig, any type of Ned and nothing but one fish on spoons. During these year I've only caught 5 or six fish on any type of Senkos, plastic worms and wacky style worms. Less than one fish per year with dozens and dozens of hrs spent. Happily I do well on live bait and spinnerbaits (kieteck minnows).
I'm not giving up either. I look for the day when my skills and understanding allow me to leave the house, confident in catching fish, without using Kieteck minnows, and without using live bait. Its coming....
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You know my stance on all things artificial. If I can’t solicit a bite presenting bait a half dozen ways I wouldn’t do better artificial. If they’ll bite bait they will hit artificial. Only time I don’t mix baitfish or something in is in SR but even then I have single eggs and sacks.
 
G

Gremcat

Well-known member
I’ll through a butterworm on a trout magnet head and hit a half dozen jumbo trout even after running 20 things through prior.


I finally reordered the returned 6601. Have to wind on some line today and have 30 lbs braid or mono. I’m going to use mono I think even though I’m heading to LI to fish a few days next week. I’ll tote my shark/tarpon travel rod, the Daiwa euro model I imported as a lighter travel, the 8wt just in case, and I’ll probably respool my steelhead/salmon loner rod with the braid.

I’m going to see how I like BC setups before going further with them but it might push me to more artificials. I’m not sure how they’ll cast bait unless it’s extremely well hooked.
 
G

Gremcat

Well-known member
I also was very careful how I swapped handles on the new 6601. I like the fighting handle a lot better and this reel the threads were fine, no issues like the original I ordered. Even with thin ish hands they are kinda long and the regular BC handles felt really uncomfortable/cramped. I don’t know how I’d feel about 30 rods at one time. I sort of wear them in to me and I’d have to fish 24/7 to keep that many rods broke in how I’d like. I hated replacing my 5wt for the new cork feel alone. Old worn polished cork just feels better to my hands.

I’ll be like the older guy running old spincasters for everything just because he likes how they feel and has the muscle memory 😉

J/K, I spent more time with a SC than anything else over my lifetime. Those “Open Face” reels were viewed with disdain as black magic alchemy only really talented, borderline cult like fishermen tried to use. We were convinced even those types really couldn’t use them either.
 
Don

Don

Well-known member
Gremcat said:
I also was very careful how I swapped handles on the new 6601. I like the fighting handle a lot better and this reel the threads were fine, no issues like the original I ordered. Even with thin ish hands they are kinda long and the regular BC handles felt really uncomfortable/cramped. I don’t know how I’d feel about 30 rods at one time. I sort of wear them in to me and I’d have to fish 24/7 to keep that many rods broke in how I’d like. I hated replacing my 5wt for the new cork feel alone. Old worn polished cork just feels better to my hands.

I’ll be like the older guy running old spincasters for everything just because he likes how they feel and has the muscle memory 😉

J/K, I spent more time with a SC than anything else over my lifetime. Those “Open Face” reels were viewed with disdain as black magic alchemy only really talented, borderline cult like fishermen tried to use. We were convinced even those types really couldn’t use them either.
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No Muscle, Just memory and not much of that either.
 
MB3

MB3

Well-known member
I have 4 combos with me from ML to M or MH depending on what I'm doing that day and where. I'm far from pro, have no ambition to be or compete. I just like having my go to set ups handy so I can switch off as needed.
 
Don

Don

Well-known member
Spent big on 8 or 10 bags of senkos and maybe caught 2 -3 fish, I was doomed until I met spinnerbaits, Beetle Spins and Jigheads
 
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