Fishing season is finished ... or is it?

EXTRA! EXTRA! FISHING SEASON HAS BEEN CALLED ON ACCOUNT OF ICE!!

Well as the first line says my fishing for this year is most likely finished. I live in northern Illinois and most of my ponds have a nice thin sheet of ice on them. Unless we get some strange warm front that gets rid of the ice and makes it comfortable for me to be out fishing I will not be making any more trips out this year. I am not one of those guys that likes to freeze sitting on ice trying to catch fish so my winters are spent staying warm and doing other things. So how does this fisherman pass the time? I do all my tackle maintenance, research, playing mad scientist, play video games, and snowboard. For those following along, I am sure video games and snowboarding are not what you are here to hear me talk about. So lets get into the fishing stuff I do over the cold months...

Tackle maintenance

I begin every season, maintaining my rods and reels. I wash up the rods and make sure there is no problems with the eyes or blank. I clean the reels and oil them up as needed. The third step is, to strip the old line off my reels and I may keep 1-2 rods just in case the rivers ice out. Then I leave them that way until spring, and every spring I buy new line to spool them all back up. One trick to help save money during this process is to use reel backing. There are a few options you can do for this one. 1) leave some of the old line on there. 2) put some mono or braid as the backing line. 3) good old fashioned electrical tape works too. By using backing, that will fill the spool part way so that you won't have to fill each spool with as much line. One 200 yd spool of line would get me a reel and a small amount left over, not enough to fill a second reel. Now, I put about 100 yds on one reel and 100 yds on another so I get 2 reel fills off one spool. Less money spent to do this hobby that costs so much at times. Any left over half spools, can be used later in the season if 1 of your reels starts getting low on line. To join the new line to one of the line backing options, I use a uni to uni knot.

Next step is to go through my boxes of baits and check every hard bait. How are the hooks, split rings, paint, spinnerbait wires and blades, crankbait and jerkbait bills. If the hooks or split rings are rusty they automatically get swapped out. The LAST thing I want is a rusty bait ruining a box of lures or a rusty hook loosing that fish I need for a tournament. If the hooks are dull I may just use a hook file or swap them out.
Evaluate the paint jobs on you lures, if I have a crankbait or jerkbait that is missing a little paint, I may or may not choose to retire it. Crankbait and jerkbait bills can get a light filing to remove any minor blemishes but make sure you file the bill evenly. **NOTE: If you file the bill, make sure you test the bait because it may not run true.** Spinnerbaits and Jigs can be repainted with a fresh coat of powder paint to make them look like new.

The last step I do in this process is to take inventory. What baits/colors do I need more of? What hooks, weights, and other terminal tackle am I low on? This helps me make a minimal shopping list and gives me direction when I head to the store of 'what I need' vs. 'what I want' so I don't overspend. As said before, I love trying new baits, to compare them to my go to baits but I make sure to limit my spending and choices on those baits.

Research

An underrated and underused, but highly effective and efficient part of fishing. Having the internet readily available at our fingertips, information is easier and faster to find. The internet can provide informative blogs (like this one), articles, forums, and videos to help you learn new techniques and cut the learning curve down dramatically. I use the internet, fishing magazines, and TV shows to learn techniques. I also use this time to research tournament results from lakes in the area. Understanding the date, location, structure/presentation, and lure selection -- helps me to figure out seasonal patterns and begin to formulate my own plans of attack. I am then able to make a lake box for tournament given the seasonal pattern information. Sure my boater may choose to fish a pattern that I don't have in my lake box at the given time, but it happens occasionally and my goal is to make the best of what I have with me (I always have my 'Panic Box' right?). Hopefully, if your boater did their research, your pattern and lure selection should be similar to his/hers. I study maps and look for areas that fit the seasonal patterns just to have as a reference. As a non-boater, the maps are not as critical for me as if I were a boater.

Mad scientist work

I also use this time to try new ways of customizing baits or making new baits. Customizing jig skirts, adding colors to lures, modifying soft plastics, or working on figuring out new rigging techniques. I would rather tear up a few soft plastics now to tear up a lot more later when bass are destroying them from a new rig that I figured out.

Swim Jigs ... My first love story

Let’s talk about a lure that I have a special place for… Swim jigs. With the wide selection of swim jigs on the market how do you choose the one the best fits you without breaking the bank?? I got lucky in choosing the swim jigs I love because I only tried 3-4 kinds before settling on what I use. A lot of factors go into selecting a swim jig (or any lure for that matter). You have to look at the hardware: hook, head shape, line tie angle, weight material, weed guard, bait keeper. Then you have the pizzazz factors: the skirt material, skirt length, skirt colors, head paint color(s), head paint durability, rattles. All of those things need to be considered when selecting the proper swim jig for you and there will never be one swim jig that fits the bill for all of those criteria so you have to choose what factors are most important to you.

What makes a good swim jig to me?

When I approached the question of finding a swim jig, I began by doing my homework online and when I research something new, I jump into the deep end with both feet. I printed out article after article (my wife makes fun of me for killing forests with all my research and notes), watched videos, talked to tournament anglers at seminars, and took notes on everything. Then came the fun part, spending some money on jigs to test them all. The key was to not get caught up on buying every color and weight at the beginning. I chose white because it is more visible in a variety of water conditions and I selected a single weight to get all of the swim jigs in to limit variance because weight differences. During my trial phases, I tested, what I consider to be, the big 4: Terminator, Booyah, AT Tackle, and Strike King (and I still continue to test others a few at a time). I bought one of each jig and began my testing there.

Over the years, I have found a few lakes I consider to be my proving ground lakes. One lake is full of aggressive bass and I can go there with anything and as long as I present it correctly I can get bit proving that A) the lure works and B) my presentation technique works. Both factors in building that confidence needed to be successful. The second lake is a quarry lake where zebra mussels got introduced a few years back and cleared up the entire lake (AKA my phase 1 lure testing grounds). I can see lures 25 ft down perfectly clear allowing me to analyze the action, sink rate, lure color in water.

**SIDE NOTE: If you ever fish a lake with zebra mussels, make sure you dry out your baits before taking them to a new lake to prevent cross contamination**

With my baits and a hand full of different style trailers (trailer selection is vital to swim jigs!!) I headed down to the lake and began testing the baits. For testing purposes and ability to switch baits quickly, I tied on a snap swivel but normally I tie the line directly to the lure.

Phase 1 initial tests include basics of appearance in and out of the water. Then I made a short cast of the swim jig to see its action by itself. Then I added the gamut of trailers to it to see what each trailer does to its action. If it didn’t meet the criteria of the action I wanted, the lure was scrapped and did not make it to phase 2. I ended up with 2 baits making it to phase 2

At the beginning of the phase 2, I did more homework online looking at the available colors and weights of the lures and both offered good colors and weights. If I had more lures in my testing group that made it to this part the available weights and colors might weed some of those out. Phase 2 involved taking the 2 remaining lures out to a lake with numerous aggressive bass and testing the lure’s ability to work in the various conditions – weather, cover, various casts and retrieves. After testing both baits with a few different trailers, I was able to settle on 1 swim jig that worked well and caught fish at this lake. 

Then next step is to practice, practice, practice and experiment with that one lure to understand how to make all the trailer options work with that bait. I took my new project and fished it everywhere and anywhere. I picked up a few more colors and tested those out as well. Learn all you can about a bait and try to minimize your colors. I have 4 color swim jigs that I carry and I know that 1 of those 4 colors will get me bit anywhere I go. After finding those colors, I then branched out and bought the 3 various weights I prefer to use -- 1/4, 3/8, & 1/2. With those weights I can go any depth and be effective. General rule of thumb is lighter weights for shallow, heavier weights for deeper. I found that there are times where fish want something moving super fast in the shallows so I would use a 1/2 oz and burn it as fast as possible.

The overall consensus was that I didn’t like the features of some of the jigs from phase 1 and phase 2 weeded out the remaining jig that didn’t meet my demands. In the end, I found one lure that works for me and my box is loaded up with them, but that doesn’t mean I don’t still test others. My first choice is now the golden standard that all others must measure up to. This process can be used for other lures even soft plastics as well, I have used this same process for almost every lure I have in my tackle boxes.

The key is to find what works best for you and your style of fishing and to then stick with that bait. Don't feel bad about continuing to test other lures against your first choice. You never know when that one lure would beat out your first choice.

Jack of all trades, Master of _________

Jack of all trades, Master of none. I am sure we have all heard this phrase at some point or another, but what does it mean for fishing? Well, it doesn’t directly apply to fishing unless you are KVD and are a master of all. Talking with Mark Zona at the 2013 Schaumburg Fishing Expo, he told me that to be successful fishing at any competitive level you have to be good at almost everything but have one or two go to techniques that you mastered in your bag of tricks. Use that logic to look at any pro on the tournament circuits, 99% of them have one or two trademark technique that they are known for being a master of. So from that logic, it should be changed to “Jack of all trades, Master of One” for fishing purposes.

Any given tournament, you could be fishing any one of the many techniques that are out there. Your boater will have a pre-set technique/pattern for the tournament and if what they are throwing is all that is working  … you better already be good at it or be super quick to learn it to be successful. Over the years, I have learned from reading magazines, articles, YouTube videos, seminars, and talking with other fishermen about the wide variety of techniques and tricks I need to be successful. From that information, I have gained confidence in many lures however I have two lures that will ALWAYS have a spot in my box.

As said in the last post about having a proving ground. Find that place you can go practice and learn those new techniques there. Why? As you are learning a new technique, you probably aren’t going to get it correct right away. Learning at a productive spot will tell you quickly what you are doing correct or wrong because you will either be catching or not catching fish. It is instant feedback on correct presentation and helps to build confidence in the technique, which is tip number two.

Building confidence in a technique can be a double edged sword. You want to be confident in what you are using. For example, if you are in a situation where you need to throw a spinnerbait and all you have to rely on is what you have read and you think to yourself “I have never caught anything on a spinnerbait”, your confidence is already shaken and you won’t be in a mindset to be successful. If you had taken the information and applied it on that small pond to catch a few fish, it would show you that it works and your confidence in picking up that bait will be much higher when you need it.

DON’T LET YOUR CONFIDENCE BLIND YOU when learning new lures and techniques. In my early stages of learning techniques, I found myself wanting to learn a new technique but using another that I already had confidence in as a crutch. I would bring the confidence lure along “just in case they weren’t biting” and found myself using that bait more than the one I wanted to learn because I didn't have to prove that caught fish. So when learning a new technique, as Zona told me... commit to learning it and don’t bring a crutch; learn how to make that one lure do a variety of things to fit the given conditions.

That point of making a lure work in a variety of conditions will help you more than you can imagine. It will also give you opportunities to do something different than your boater which may pay off for you. An example would be the Jack Links Major League Fishing, when all the pros were flippin/pitching jigs around docks but Ike was flippin/pitching a chatterbait, and the extra action on the lift and fall paid off for him.

Hopefully that helps you prepare for tournament fishing, and figure out how to make those final preparations before you jump in. Build your confidence and learn how to make all your lures work smarter for you.

Interrogating your boater for information

Let me preface this by saying that you are in no way shape or form tying up your boater and torturing them for information. Now with that said, let's move on.

So you meet your boater and try asking him what seem to be some basic questions to solidify the details about the day and to help you plan out what you need to bring, but he avoids answering your question by providing vague answers. This doesn’t tell you anything about what you are going to need and the only tools you have to go by is your internet research of winning weights, patterns, and possibly lures used. Then again, your boater might not fish that last tournament’s winning pattern due to seasonal differences, weather patterns, or their own fishing strengths. This happens all too often at the local club level where boaters and non-boaters compete against one another. So you need a way to convince him to provide you with some information so that you are able to plan a successful attack from the back of the boat.

What do you ask then??

As stated above, asking your boater, “What should I bring?” or “What am I going to need?” is probably are not going to get you much information for you to pack lightly and still be successful. You will probably get a response like “Well, bring whatever you think you are going to need,” or “Pack what you have confidence in.” He wants to win the tournament just as much as you do, so he’s not going to pass out his secret lures and colors. It all comes down to how you phrase your questioning to maximize the information that he gives so you can select your tackle and pack to be successful.

“How long of a run do we have?”

This may not seem like a valuable question, however, it will help you to decide quantity of items to bring. If it is a longer run, the minimalist approach is best. Also, with longer runs, the boater may be more open to share a little bit of information so that you don’t over pack weighing down the boat for the long run.

“What is the primary forage species?”

A small question you should be able to find in your online research but this will help to hone in your color selection as well as rule out some options of lure selection. For example, if the primary forage species of the lake is Threadfin and Gizzard Shad, your color palette is much different than if the primary forage is crayfish. Most times, your lures and techniques change as well.

“What types of structure/cover are we going to be fishing?”

Knowing you are targeting points opposed to fishing grass mats or deep trees is key in your selection of lures. It provides insight into some lure and techniques you are going to be fishing. It allows you to start honing in what your confidence lures for those situations should be.

             

“What depth ranges are we going to target?”

             

Final question to hone in your lure and techniques is to know the depth. Shallow cranks are not going to be the best idea to fish shell beds in 25’ of water, and deep diving cranks and 1 oz spinnerbaits are not going to be best suited for fishing that 0-5’ depth range. Granted, it might be able to be done but its not going be the best idea. 

You want to give yourself the most information possible without asking what to specifically bring. Also, this lets you pick stuff that fishes to your strengths. Where your boater may pick up a spinnerbait, you may pick up a crankbait. Both do similar jobs but your confidence in what you are using is going to be key to your success.

Co-Angler Tournament bag

Just starting to get into tournaments? Me too!! I have wanted to fish tournaments for years but I knew that: a) my original gear was not good enough and I had to upgrade most of it before trying to fish tournaments and b) I just didn’t have the knowledge and experience yet. Now that I have made it to that point, I feel like I am ready to jump in and have done some homework about being a “good co-angler” and have put together this list of tips I found to help me prepare for my first one.

Pack Light but Remember the Essentials – Most boaters do not want to see you carrying 10 rods and wheeling a shopping cart down to the ramp with your gear. As many others have posted around the web, the boater already has the equivalent of a small tackle store under their front deck and hopefully if he is on a pattern where you don’t have that specific lure, he might lend you one to help you out. Otherwise, try to fish to you strengths!! Also, don’t carry every rod you own on the boat for the tournament either. Most online sources suggest 4 being the best and 6 rods at most. You want to have a back up in-case your rod goes down but not too many that you can't get to what you need to easily. Remember, you are not going to have the luxury of a large front casting deck, rod lockers, and under deck storage for all of your lures, so the less clutter you have in the back the easier it is going to be for you to manage, move around, and do what you need to do. 

For a tournament, I would bring a large assortment of lures and rods with me, but those will not all make the final cut of what gets carried down to the boat with me. I have 2 boxes that stay in my tackle bag at all times, my terminal tackle (hooks, weights, etc.), and my confidence/panic box. My bag has room for two other 4700 boxes which is where I would put in whatever technique we are going to be fishing. After talking to the boater and my own off-the-water research, I would plan out and cut down my selection of what should go in the 2 open 4700 slots. From there, I would select the appropriate rods from my assortment of rods to fit the lures already chosen. By choosing rods second, it makes sure you are not packing a rod that is not necessary or loading up baits that won’t work – just because you had to have that one rod with you. When I am ready to board the boat I will be down to 2 backpacks and 3-6 or less rods.

The first backpack will have:

- Two 3700 boxes of lures for the boaters pattern

- One 3600 box of terminal tackle

- One 3705 box of confidence lures -- wouldn't you like to know what's in it ;)

- All tools necessary - including scale, measuring board, cull beam, & cull system

- Couple bags of plastics in the water bottle pouch. 

Second backpack:

- Raingear

- Snacks

- Water

- T. Paper

- Ziplocs

- Life Vest

- Sunblock

- Sunglasses

Other Essentials:

- FISHING LICENSE(S) -- if you are on a body of water that covers multiple states, get a license for all states to be safe. last thing you want is to not be able to fish because the boater chose a spot on the side you didn't have your license for.

- camera

- extra clothes in the car

- money for the boater -- its their boat & trailer and they foot all the gas and maintenance so the least you can do is help out with some cash.

My list of items may vary to what you feel you need to be confident but this is what I feel will streamline my tackle organization and will give me the best chances from the back deck as I enter the tournament world. Until next time, best of luck on the water!! 

Organization for it all

For a first posting, this is a fairly large topic to tackle so here it goes ...

One thing every fisherman can relate to is having too much tackle (even though we feel like its never enough). The key to it all is proper management and organization making it is easy to find what you need/want for your next trip and even more importantly when you are already out on the water. Not having a house yet, I can't easily set up a pegboard in the basement or garage for all my spare lures and bags of plastics, so I have to rely on my 3 tackle boxes and other storage methods to hold everything, for now. I have 3 tackle boxes, 2 that are full of lures and 1 with 2 full boxes and a little bit of open real estate for 2 3700 boxes i can swap in and out (more on that in the next posting); plus my wife's 2 tackle bags but that's another topic entirely. My first box is a big tackle bag holding 8 standard 3700 boxes, some smaller boxes, plus room for other stuff in the side pouches. Second box is my pond box which is like a mini version of the first one but only has 3 small boxes plus room for hooks weights & some plastics and to make it all fit I cut out things that are not feasible to fish from shore. Third box is set up with a 3620 box holding all my terminal tackle and a 3700 confidence box of baits to fish year round in IL. The rest of my extra lures and plastics had to find a way to be stored in as small of a space as possible while still being quickly accessible. But not everything fits into those three boxes, so where does the rest of it go?

**TIP #1 Invest in additional storage **

For me, investing in a few extra 3700 plano boxes to hold additional copies of lures to replenish my stock in my tackle bags was perfect. Then to store those neatly, I found a couple basic plastic crates from either target or walmart for about $5. Next organization was for all my bags of plastics. I broke them down into styles and put them into gallon ziplocs labeled via sharpie and all of those rest inside a Plano 7080 storage box.

** TIP #2 Label makers are your best friend! **

All of my plano boxes in my tackle bags and in the storage crates have labels with their contents on whatever side will be visible. Inside my crankbait box, I also use the labeler to mark how deep each crank runs. In my Jig box, it tells me how heavy each jig is. Speeding up the process of selection and allowing me to get fishing faster. The extra 4700 boxes of lures also have their own labels telling me exactly what is in each one.

** TIP #3 Make a spreadsheet of your rods **

It may not seem like a great organization strategy but knowing the rod information of what each rod has on it for line and your intended techniques for that rod will help you to quickly pick out what rods to bring for a trip or which ones need maintenance.

My spreadsheet includes Rod name / Length & Action / Type / Reel name / Gear Ratio / Line type / Line name / Line Poundage / Rod Technique

** TIP #4 Do your off the water homework!! **

This step will help you in so many ways. Do your background reading about a particular body of water. Look at articles about productive lures, look at old tournament reports, check DNR stocking reports, and obviously lake maps (multiple if you can find them). These will tell you what might be the dominant technique or at least a staple technique that you bring with you for a given season. If you are a tournament fisherman, it will tell you the required weights to win on that body of water, were they targeting largemouths, smallmouths, or spots? Looking for multiple lake maps may offer different information for the body of water. One map might not show that tiny stump field in the middle of the big flat while another one does. Make a folder for your information from each lake and start a log of your trips there. Easiest way to log your trips, I found, is to print out the weather report for your area, and use the backside of that page to make your lake notes. Then you have the air temp, humidity, barometric pressures, cloudiness and all your notes of what you tried and what worked or didn’t. If you are not on a boat to that has electronics that measure surface temp, I use a simple IR temperature gauge to take a reading of the surface temps. This will allow you to see what lures/presentations worked on any given day for the conditions (water, air, etc.) and better decide what lures to bring with you to the lake or river to be successful. All details that will help you to streamline your fishing tackle and choose better locations on the water.

Well, I hope those are a good jumping off point to get you started with organizing your tackle. Not everything I do is going to work for every angler, and I'm sure there are other tips and tricks that others use. I will get into more about my gear, setups, tackle, and other tips in the future postings. Until next time, best of luck on the water!!