what i do i look for the most condensed area with the most cover i like fishing 3 to 10 feet of water for flathead's i use whole live bluegill 40# stren magna flex and Cajun red 50# on Penn 309's and Penn 209's with 10 and 9 foot rods usually 10/0 kahle hooks and i bend the eye of the hook back with pliers half way in between straight up and straight back seems to help hook set and i also widen the offset a decent amount this helps hook set and i also use 1 to 2 foot leaders with 120# power swivels and Palomar knots and above the swivel usually a 3 to 5 oz no roll sinker depending on the current i like to use that set up when fishing shallow places where there is lots of cover the reason why such big stuff is because i hate re rigging i like to rip through snags and plus if you have a 30 or 40 pounder on sometimes it helps to pull them out of the cover i do use quite a few ambassadeurs 6500's and a couple 7000 c3's i usually use 30# on those when fishing places where theres not so many snags