Thread: Winter Tips

Hello again fellas, I’m back with my report. Ordered the Okuma Celilo from Amazon, unfortunately it arrived with a broken tip which was a real bummer. For some reason they put the rod in awkward 5x2 box with no packing paper. Didn’t want to miss out on crappie fishing this weekend, so I took a drive over to Bass Pro and ended up picking up their 7’6 UL Micro Lite series graphite rod. Paired it with my Stradic and 6lb hi-vis braid. Great rod, but I didn’t realize until I was on the water that it didn’t have a hook keeper. Hit the places where I was seeing shad activity, but I had minimal luck. Found exactly three crappie all day with all being in 8-10 feet of water. The majority were caught while I was trolling in between spots (only set the hook on one fish). I was using Bobby garland soft plastics (shad, chartreuse), with 1/32 jig head with spinner, a marabou jig, and crappie nibbles here and there. Largest fish I caught on the new set up was a 2lb striper which was fun. Bent my rod like a limp noodle. After about five or so hours of fishing I decided to call it a day on the crappie as the wind was starting to pick up. Spoke to another fisherman that was using a bobber and minnows and he said he’d caught a few nice ones, but that the bite was real slow. Fished for bass the rest of the day. Gonna keep studying and try for some again this coming weekend, maybe lake Tarpon. Got a feeling I was too impatient and could have caught more fish if I really slowed down. Thanks for all the input/help.