When I went with Lowe175 last Saturday he recommended that I get some PowerBait or something similar to fish with until I got better at detecting a light strike. I went by the Guntersville Walmart and picked up a pack of 2" Power minnows. I got to slip off a little early this afternoon and I tried out the slippery little minnows. I caught a fish on my first and third casts. Both were Bluegill but they hammered it. I got bite after bite and I fished up that pack of minnows in about 15 minutes. I got what I think were a couple of crappie bites but didn't connect.

Those 2" Power Minnows are so small that they are very hard to put on a jig head with #4 hook. They are also so tender that I had to replace the minnow every time I caught a fish and several of them after a strike but no hook set. I'd have to buy 20 packs of them to fish for a half a day. I'm not doing that. They're also too small. I tried some regular soft bait with some crappie attractant "juice" poured on it but it didn't get the same attention the powerbait did.

Do any of you have a flavored "go to" bait? Any advice? I may try a 3" or 4" version of what I fished today but I doubt it's any tougher. At least the jig wouldn't tear it up as badly.

Oh, and Glenn, I got my 4# Berkely XT Solar in this afternoon and spooled up with it before going. So far I really like it and it is definitely more sensitive than the 6# broom straw Mr Crappie junk. I was surprised that the XT was as limp as it was. I've used a bunch of it on baitcasters but always have used XL on spinning tackle. Thanks for the heads up about the XT Solar.