The Spoonpluggers Forum

Spoonpluggers,

Here are the two videos of fishing the weeds with John Bales at the Muskegon Outing.

Part I: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eCZE5jnulVE

Part II: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u1LoekM22mg

Jim

Excellent! These two videos are not the usual "we're having fun fishing" videos. It's more instructional. Jim asks, and John answers, germane What, When, Why, Where, and How questions. There is also comic relief at several places in the videos. Notice the weather conditions, even though John talks about them; especially how the weather changes in the second video.

Overall thoroughly enjoyable as well as instructional videos. Don't miss them!

Thanks Jim and John.

John and Jim,

Another excellent video and one that needs to be studied for all of the good information contained.

Several years ago the hot item in fishing was trees, trees, trees and a few stickup thrown in for good measure. All the TV guys, the tournament heroes, and the outdoor writers, gave untold coverage on trees. Things changes, nowadays, the hot item is grass, grass, grass and weeds. Same folks extolling the virtues on the latest great discovery.

Through all of this, the only voice explaining the fishing situation was, of course, Buck Perry. Mr. Perry said that it was not just the weeds, grass, or trees; it was the features on the bottom of the lake on which the weeds, grass or trees were situated. Also, all these features had to be adjacent to the deepest water in the area. Only Spoonpluggers heard this message ! ( Mr. Perry's video on "Weeds" is an education unto itself)

The videos are a classic lesson on the right way to fish grass, weeds or trees, whatever one finds on his fishing waters. Also, the video is one of the best at showing the correct way to present lures under classic cold front conditions. (Beautiful weather; tough fishing)

Good job. Thanks for all the time and effort.

TN Dave

I agree, a great teaching video. Thanks, John and JIm. Bill.

Mr. Duplex did the hard part. All I did was do the fishing. Jim is a great guy to spend time with. Easy going and funny as hell. I hope to get the chance to fish with him again and share our time with you with another video. Jigs should be a part of your tools and having spoonplugging experience will tell you when and where to use those tools. John

Great videos guys...I have a question on the fish behavior. What puts those fish inside the weeds after a cold front instead of the deepest water in the area? Is the deepest water in the area not deep enough to so they move inside the weedline where conditions are more stable?

Mr. Perry taught us to think about the deepest water or the deepest water in the area being fished as where the fish spend most of their time and during movements, they may move towards the shallows on well defined routes. What this does is keep us out of trouble. What I mean by this is it is good to think outside the box but if you get too far outside the box, it normally spells trouble for the fisherman. However, there are bodies of water where the largemouth will be found in and around the weeds for most of the time. In waters with a large population of fish with teeth like the musky or northern, It may force the largemouth to use different areas of a structure or spend a lot of time in and around the weeds. Look at the spoonpluggers catches when you hear of how many northerns they are catching just outside of the weeds or on the first breakline outside of the weedline. How many largemouth are they catching? So where are they?
During the summer and on a clear lake, you can put the odds in your favor by fishing at night. But............. it is the same as it is in the daytime. You need to be there when the fish become active or you still won't make a catch. Maybe we will catch enough fish to post a report. Our plans are to keep everything within a legal limit. Michigan raised their out of state licence a lot this year so instead of throwing back what we catch, we are helping to pay for our licence fees. John