I got the 2 inch baby razor tail mold in and shot some for you guys to give you a comparison. Sure is a lot of fun making baits. Can't wait to get them in the water.
Attachment 225850Attachment 225851
Printable View
I got the 2 inch baby razor tail mold in and shot some for you guys to give you a comparison. Sure is a lot of fun making baits. Can't wait to get them in the water.
Attachment 225850Attachment 225851
You do nice work ABH!
love it
now that you have the three-inch in the 2 inch and how about baby 1 inch this way you'll have the whole family:biggrin
The 2" looks like a nice bait size for this region.
Something that really is interesting to me is how different geographic regions of our country can have the same species of fish, I'll use black and white crappies as examples, that seem so different. The southern white crappies I see pictures of have mouth parts that rival those of a bass. Up here our white crappies have mouths slightly larger than the black crappies but still considerably smaller than mouths of the southern cousins. I think the size of the shad forage in southern climates has allowed the mouths of the crappies to evolve into huge gaping pits capable of chomping a shad and not losing it to a small mouth. Here I see white crappies on many of the waters I fish that may get to be 15", maybe 16", but are still potato chip thin. Some of those southern fish look thick like our black crappies.
Where I see white crappie populations in this region, the waters they are found in have a healthy forage base of soft rayed minnows. Black crappies in this region are often chock full of small perch and even sunfish fry to 2". I've found both black and white crappie fry in the stomachs of large black crappies during the winter months. These observations sort of support the idea that those shad, being soft rayed, help grow those mega whites down south. I am in awe every time I see one in a picture with its mouth gaping, looking like a humpbacked whale sucking krill. This is also why I think your larger baits are productive. In this region and 2" or 2 1/2" plastic can easily be at the top end of effective size even for white crappies which have a larger mouth than the same sized black crappie. Its amazing how many crappies get caught here on baits in the 1 1/2" range and by up-sizing to 2" or 2 1/2" a person is taking himself right out of a great bite at times. There are times when I see big plastics being shown as crappie baits but then I remember where they are being used. It still is mind boggling just how different the same fish can be separated only by a couple hundred miles.
Bob's comment on having all three sizes of the new bait will make a family. A southern clan perhaps but that daddy sized bait is more in tune to the walleyes up here. Fun thread to follow.
Lol I thought about it bob but really only want to have stuff that I would use personally. I really don't have any need for that 1 inch. If I do I just buy some from you he he he . Thanks you fellas I am humble in what I have learned and able to produce.
Ctom I can only attest to down this way our fish like big baits. At times though I found they snub there nose to them and hence why I will carry the smaller 2 inch bait. I have fished same colored jigs but in different size and at times they consistently take the big one and at times take the smaller one.
I see a lot of the ice fisherman use smaller baits and often wonder why. Wonder if they have tried bigger baits and just been more successful with the smaller stuff. Enjoy everyone's comments thanks and have a great day.
aren't you glad that I had the Arkansas downsized a 2 inch. I believe that an ice fishing the fish are slower to strike because of the water temperature so your smaller baits would be a little bit better because they could inhale him without any problem a good question you ask about why the ice fishermen have not tried the bigger sizes I really don't know because I never went ice fishing it is not the top of my list to do I'm one of those guys that like nice warm weather in all in the 65 to 75° range.Quote:
Originally Posted by arkansasbowhunter
Lol me too unless the fish are biting. I would like to ice fish as its on my bucket list.
In part ABH I think that people use such small baits under the ice is that the fishes' metabolism has greatly slowed down and they are not as prone to chasing larger baits. Still, if I am on the ice targeting crappies I fish much larger baits than the usual ice angler. I target actively feeding fish in altogether different locations in the water column and use regular 1/32 heads I use in open water and hang plastics of 1.5" to 1.75" on the jigs and do real well on larger fish. Too many people look at the electronics focused on the bottom and miss the fish moving thru above or simply dismiss those higher fish as rough fish. I wont mess with fish on the bottom as those are the ones with tight chops. The fish 12 feet higher up are on the prowl and will readily nail a larger bait and these fish are the ones a guy can brag about. Those down deep tend to be dinks.
Sunfish are a whole different school though. There a guy wants very tiny offerings with very thin, active tails/tentacles.
Fun to talk about fishing without everyone getting in a tizzy lol. What I would be interested in is seeing th contents of the ice fish stomach. I know here when I clean fish they are packed a lot of times with big shad 3-4 inches. Gonna put the ice fishing on my bucket list. Would love to give it a whirl. We don't get any ice to fish here in Arkansas lol.
a lot of times I will look into the stomach of crappie out West where I come from on the snake River it is a wide variety of stuff that you will fine in their stomach mostly freshwater shrimp in the course of a few insects in a lot of small fish not big like 2 to 3 inch most of the crappie on the smaller size from 9 to 10 inches because of the cycles. but I have never looked into the fish here in Texas and I'm sure that it would be a wide variety in Toledo band as a explosion of all kinds of small fish for them to feed on of course when you were catching 17 inch crappie they are more apt to feed on larger prey but along with the big boys we catch quite a few smaller ones which we find smaller fish in their stomachs for the most part I think the crappie feed on smaller prey I'm sure that this is going to lead into a big discussion between quite a few of us guys on this good subject.Quote:
Originally Posted by arkansasbowhunter
On our local lake its nothing unusual to have crappies in a bucket full of water to keep the fresh while on the ice and have them puke out 1 to 2 inch sunfish fry. Lots at a time too.
Very nice
Nice baits
Ctom that's pretty neat to see that. We don't have many sunfish here
Attachment 225907Attachment 225908
Here is a pict of the remnants of a fish dr. Nip caught while visiting me here in Arkansas this past fall. You can see that is a 2.5 inch carrot out southern fish do like big baits
This is the picture that got me thinking about the differences between southern and northern fish of the same species. Our white crappies have smaller mouth parts for an equal sized fish. Those whites look like a humpbacked whale ready to screen its dinner.
Really that's crazy, show us some pic. I have only fished here in Arkansas, Mississippi, Kansas and Louisiana for crappies. Dr. Nip is from Oklahoma and he too uses big baits. Granted these states don't get the ice you do though.
I have cleaned a lot of 10" crappie here in Mo. with a belly full of 4-5" shad. Our average size bait is 3" in length and I have gone up to 4" baits when targeting a big bite. Early spring and late fall there are no small shad for the crappie to feed on.
Attachment 225990
this fish has a 4" chunk of plastic in it's mouth
Attachment 225991
this 1/4oz tied buck tail was almost 4" in length
the way we(I) fish, bigger is better
it is amazing to read that the mouth on crappie are smaller the further north a person fishes. I guess I need to haul a boat northward and check that out for myself.
great bait comparison BTW
we have caught big crappie on dd22's bass fishing.
We have had occasional crappie catches WAY up here in Canada on Bass spinnerbaits and 5-7" bass worms including chunky senkos. These will generally be the largest size class of fish, but in most cases isn't that what you want?
Looking good bro!