Fun family fishing 4/27

Yesterday, if you didn't know it, was "Take your kid to work day." I didn't think Griffin would much care for it, so I took Aubree. She experienced life as a NASA engineer: Coffee, Dog and Pony Show, meetings, meaningless trade studies, and CHICKEN WRAP THURSDAY! Of course, we couldn't help from checking out some heritage hardware!

Yep. That's a Real J-2!



Mom and dad had asked us to eat dinner with them, so, I couldn't resist wetting a line on the way over. Naturally my "Go to" spot was COVERED up. Aubree, Griffin, and I decided to try the other side of the lake. We braved the chest tall weeds. The kids were quite the troopers. The fish were biting pretty well, although I couldn't take much credit for caching them. The wind was in our face, so I couldn't feel the bites. I would take up slack and they would be on there. I caught several decent little fish, but that wasn't the highlight....not nearly!

I was minding my own and a fish came FLYING at me. Apparently, Aubree has inherited Josh's hook set. She reeled down and jerked this poor dude clear out of the water. THEN, she popped the hook out and tossed him back! What a girl!

All new swimbaits!

Man, was I busy this weekend. Yep. Ball games on Friday and Saturday. Piano Recitals. Church. And yet, I still managed to make around 200 baits! And I am SO excited about the new swimbaits. Not only do I have new colors, I also have an all new 100% custom plastic formulation that combines the toughness of my old baits and the flexibility and softness you won't find anywhere else.

How did I do this? I combined the typical #502 plastic with a predetermined amount of #536. Then I added a specific amount of plastic softener. Man. Are these baits soft!

Sure, I made plenty of my usual colors (baby carp and silver minnow) but....I went above and beyond.


Here is my new Chartreuse bait

And...now I officially unveil the hottest bait I have made. I have been dreaming of making this bait for 6 months and could not figure out how to do it. And, no, the iPhone pictures do NOT do this bait justice. I do not know what to call this bait yet...so I think I will hold a contest!

New Batch of Swimbaits!

That's right! And...New and Improved!

As you may recall, I sold the last of my baits last week...only to have emails asking me to sell more. So, I put in an order for new plastic. However, I made a slight adjustment. Although my baits are very hearty...they also loose a good bit of flexibility. So, I now have a custom formulation plastic that will maximize bait longevity AND flexibility! I will be pouring the same colors, as usual.

If you are interested...please message me here, on facebook, or email zach.taylor@yahoo.com!

A quick afternoon family trip

As with most afternoons, our's was packed with lot's of things to do. In fact, although the afternoon was heavy on things to do...this weekend was even busier. So, I came home around 4 and went directly to cutting the grass. Did a little gardening. Then, picked the kids off and rushed Aubs to her piano practice (she has a recital this weekend. Got that done, then ran home to do a little hitting and fielding practice with Aubs. Ate a quick dinner, did some homework and soon we found ourselves with a beautiful afternoon free. So, packed up the kids and pregosaurus rex and headed...where else...but the Publix pond. Naturally, some one was on the spot I wanted to fish. But that's ok. It's a free lake. Now I just had to convince the 9 month preggo to walk half a mile. She did...even if she complained a lot! By the time we got to the spot, it had been vacated..some good fortune for us! Unfortunately, the fish weren't exactly tearing it up. But luckily, the local ducks provided some entertainment. See, they are used to having kids feed them. And, although my kids didn't have any food to give...they wouldn't take no for an answer! I had to teach Aubree to beat them with the fishing rod. Although we only fished for about an hour, I finally figured out what the fish wanted. They wanted me to let the boat soak. I was throwing the Spot Remover Pro series shaky head topped with a Yum trick worm:

I caught several small fish...but I couldn't find the sizeable ones. Not that I really expected to. I mean, that's a big lake to catch the handful of bigger bass that have been put in there by myself and who knows who else. Alyse was itching to go home and the kids were getting tired. So, I said..."Last cast" Well, you can imagine what happened. I drug the work over some chunk rock and let it soak...and a fish picked it up. I swing and missed. Reeled it in and recast. This time, it knocked slack in the line. I swung on it and it broke off. I inspected the line and it was frayed. Whatever fish were there were sitting on some old tornado junk. Probably pieces of Piggly Wiggly. I retied. "One more cast!" I tossed it out...let it sit. Nothing. Shook it. Let it sit. And something picked it up and dropped it. Then picked it up again. I let it have it. It pulled back. I knew it was one of the "big" fish.

Well! Made it to 10,000 Hits!

That's awesome! I just wish everyone was actually reading it....HAHA!

If you were the 10,000 hit...PLEASE LET ME KNOW. I know who was 10,002. You have 24 hours to get with me before we go to the 10,001 hit, and so on. If you were close to this number (but after 10K) go ahead and email/message me. I want to give these away.

The good news is, I made the order for a big order of plastics. I will be telling you all about it...but trust me, you all will love it!

Turkey Hunt/Fishing This Weekend

Lately, my dad has really gotten into turkey hunting. I can see the appeal, for sure. I just haven't been able to make the time to do it. But, with the "turkey bomb" that our family land in Tennessee has seen, it has gotten to where it would be silly NOT to go up there.

So, I went to Wal-Mart to pick up some camo, since I have no warm weather camo. Turns out, Wal-Mart (as usual) is THE place for cheap stuff. While the selection was terrible, I was able to score a pair of camo jeans and shirt for 6 dollars! Their Ammo was HALF PRICE from Dick's.

So, we got up to Humphrey lake and started doing some fishing. I was determined to catch my first frog fish for the year. I wanted to try out my new BPS Extreme 7:1 reel

I was throwing my Spro Dean Rojas frog.

They were deff hitting it, but I could not get a hook up! I mean, 20 or so hits in the first 30 minutes. Almost EVERY cast! So, I stuck to my game plan and started throwing the old shakey head. As you may recall, I am throwing the Spot Remover Pro series hooks with a zoom trick work,

That paid off in spades and I quickly (first 2 casts) caught two fish. we fished a little more and something became very evident: The size of the fish have dropped again. I probably caught 20 or so fish that afternoon and none of them were over 12 inches. The lake has had a leak for some time, but you would think that would have more of an affect on the spawn. So, if you manage a lake/pond, I would love some help. I have a suspicion that all the sizeable fish are being kept/killed.

So, dad and I went to Papa Boudreaux's for dinner. Folks, I am sure you are all aware that some of the best food comes from holes in the wall. This place is the definition. It's a 30x10 concrete block building. It has the finest cajun food. you can go read about them on their site:

http://www.papaboudreaux.com/menu.html


Incredible food. I had a bowl of gumbo, the seafood etoufee with the redfish, and rounded it out with a bread pudding. Dad had their new special, fried green tomatoes with etoufee. I think he got the better end. It was crazy good!

So, fast forward to the turkey hunt! Dad and I got up before daylight, headed to one of our cousin's land and set up our blind. Dad had hunted it enough to know that they roost very close to a set of hay bails on top of the hill. almost immediately we started hearing them cluck and carry on from the trees. Dad started calling to them and we heard them fly out of the trees. Let me tell you, there is not debating what they are doing...if a butterfly can start a monsoon another continent away, I'd hate to know what a flock of turkeys can do! The turkey hens walked out in front of us, followed by 5 jakes. We had already decided that I would not be picky and take the first male I could. However, another group of turkeys started calling and the newly landed group started walking away from us!

Luckily, dad started calling to them and the jakes, despite being over 75 yards away, started back! He knew that they liked to walk along the edge of the knoll, so they would drop out of site and likely reappear right in front of us. True to his word, the 5 jakes popped up less than 15 yards from us. But, I was facing the wrong way! I ducked down and turned to face them. I targeted the rear bird, as he was much closer. As I stuck the shotgun out the window, you could see him take notice. His neck stretched to maximum length about the time that I fired! Man, those 3 inch shells have a punch and I didn't even see the bird go down since I was knocked on my butt! But dad did. He laughed like a little boy...knocking the blind over! Sure enough, the bird was bagged. Not big...but he would be good eating!

What a great trip!

To round the weekend out, Josh and I fished the Publix pond yesterday, despite the 20mpg sustained winds. Didn't catch anything big, but we did catch some. Ole shakey head did it again for me while Josh caught them on a T-rigged brush hog. We also fished the back pond and found some real interesting under water structure that seems to hold lots of fish.

All in all, great weekend...thanks to good ole Dad!

Equipment Review for Bass Pro Extreme Series Spinning reel

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As many of my readers will know, I have made an honest effort at getting back to the basics of bass fishing. When the water is tough and the fish won't bite the power baits, you got to be able to throw the shakey head. Considering that I didn't own a spinning reel any more, that might be a problem.

This Xmas, I received a Bass Pro card from my loving father and I knew exactly what I wanted to do with it. However, I didn't have much money to spend and I had learned my lesson on buying cheap spinning reels. I had heard good things on the Extreme series reels and decided that I would give it a try. I purchased the EX20B. Even got it on sale for $49.99!


Here is the link to check it out!


When I received it, I was simply amazed at the smoothness. I spooled it with 8 pound Seguar red label. The first time I got to use it was at Logan-Martin. When the day got tough, I swapped from power fishing to the shakey head. It hasn't disappointed me since. It has handled some very nice fish since.

For the money, the BPS Extreme Reels cannot be beat. Period.

My only issues with the reel are:
The drag is touchy. It goes from very loose to very tight REAL quick.
The bail is setup in such a way the catches the line every few casts

Other than that...terrific piece of weaponry!

Equipment Review for Bass Pro Extreme Combo Caddy

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Read about all of my Fishing Adventures!

We were visiting Nashville this past weekend for the annual Lads to Leaders Convention (Church convention that features Bible based competitions). We have been coaching the senior puppet team for the last few years (we won 2nd this year!). Anyway, made a stop at Bass Pro and they had these dandies on sale:


Because I fish out of other people's boats frequently, I have a hard time transporting my tackle...specifically my rods. I usually take between 4-6 as a back boater...which I feel limits me. Even with this "small" amount, there are hooks everywhere. They get tangled up in each other and it is down right dangerous to the rods. I have broken many rods in transportation. Well, this thing looked like it would be awesome. It holds 8 combos. So, I bought it.
http://www.basspro.com/Bass-Pro-Shops-Extreme-Combo-Caddy-Rod-and-Reel-Carrier/product/15114/65040
My initial questions were:
can it REALLY fit 8 bait cast combos?
will it keep the hooks from going everywhere?
The answer is yes. It does a fantastic job of wrangling 8 bait cast combos.

My only complaint is that they say it will fit up to 7'2'' rods. it's more like 7'0''. And I have 2-3 rods that are 7'3''-7'6''. Why not make it a little larger to fit them all?

Anyway, solid piece of equipment. If you tote your rods around, this is a MUST HAVE!

Free Swimbait contest!

That's right folks! FREE FREE FREE!

All you have to do is send me a screen shot of being the 10,000 hit on my blog, I will ship you 5 FREE CUSTOM POURED SWIMBAITS!
The 15,000 hit will get 10!
The 20,000 hit will get 15!

All you have to do is pay shipping!

Custom Poured Swimbaits Update

I have some good news and some bad news....but the bad news is kinda good news.


Most of you have seen my swimbaits:
http://best5zach.blogspot.com/p/zachs-custom-swim-baits.html

I usually pour swimbaits 1-2 times a year. Once you get everything setup, it just makes life easier. Well, back in January, I poured over 300 swimbaits. I gave a few away. I used maybe 5 of them (they are hardy baits). The rest, I sold. I got an email yesterday from a gentlemen from Columbus GA asking about buying some swimbaits. Well, I knew I was low. In fact, I knew I was down to my own personal stash....usually those that weren't judged as "perfect". But, I told him I wold look. Turns out, I had less than 20! He was happy to buy what I had. Well, I just shipped off the LAST of my baits.....in April! What a terrific feeling! Guess I will be ordering more plastic today.

If you have a need for swimbaits, let me know! Email me at :
zach.taylor@yahoo.com

Fishing with the kids

When Publix built their store on the corner of Jeff and HW53, they setup a land trust complete with two fairy large ponds. I had heard they were stocked and upon inspection last year, saw that indeed there were small bass and other pan fish. Since bass only grow a pound a year, I didn't want to wait for 2-3 years to catch fish of decent size. So, I did what most fishermen do....I brought home some good fish from both Wheeler and Guntersville and stocked it myself. I didn't expect that to pay dividends....maybe even ever. At least not for me. But maybe the gene pool would get deeper. Maybe someone would catch the biggest bass of their life. After all, not every body has access to a boat or can afford to fish.

Well, I had been over there a few times. After all, it's only about 10 minutes from my house and about 2 minutes from my parents. First few times I went over there with the kids, no luck. Well, that kind of defeats the purpose, doesn't it. I am trying to get my kids some successful trips so they can learn. Other than a few good photos, the first trips were kinda boring.:

A few weeks back, my mom wanted to go fishing and she wanted us to come. So, we met her over there. I asked my friend TJ if he wanted to come, and he agreed. we showed up and went to it. But, no bites. I was throwing everything I had at them without luck.

TJ, however, finally found some fish on the deep section of the lake on a lizard. Nothing big, but at least we had something to show the kids.

A little aside here, but this year, as you either know from reading, or can witness by the LACK of posts so far this year, has been tough. It could be bad luck, could be that I don't pick the good days, but PERSONALLY, I think it's because I am geting to confident (head strong) in my methods....namely, power fishing. Until a month ago, I didn't even have a spinning rod. I never throw plastics. So, starting at the Logan-Martin tourny last month, I decided that I would make a serious effort this year to re-learn finesse fishing...which is what I grew up doing.

So, on Saturday, I had some spare time in the afternoon. I picked up my spinning reel, a packet of Yum Dingers and a packet of Spot Remover Pro shakey heads, and took Griffin up to Publix. My current finesse combo is a Bass Pro Extreme Series Spinning reel and a Gander Mtn. Spinning Rod strung with Seguar Red Label in 8 pound.

Just so you can see what I am using..haha!

Well, call me superstitious...call me whatever...but when I take the kids, I literally pray that I can catch something for the kids. After all, you need success to get them hooked! As we pulled up, the parking lot was full. After all, it was a beautiful day. Luckily, every one was fishing right next to the parking lot, so I put him on my shoulders and started walking.

With big bushed lining the banks, you have to find openings...which are far and few in between. But, at the first corner of the square lake, I started casting. After a few minutes, I was lifting the tip and heartedly shaking...and the line got heavy. Then it started moving..RIGHT AT ME! I tok up slack as fast as I could, but I couldn't keep up. The fish jumped right in front of us and threw the hook! It was a little bank runner, but no matter. I had one bite and I missed him! According the the luck I have had this year, that would probably be the only bite I got all day! But, I kept at it. A few casts later, felt one nibble on it. So, I swung on hi, and hooked up. After a few jumps, I could tell I had him hooked good, so I handed it over to Griffin and let him reel it in!

He was a lot more excited than he looks in this picture. I promise! we had one of those afternoons....one that I hadn't had in a long time. The kind where you actually caught a lot of fish! Now, none of them were very big, but he didn't care....so neither did I!

A funny thing did happen, though. I busted a sandle as far from the car as you can get and had to call my dad to bring me some shoes! Also, on the way out, we passed several people fishing. We exchanged pleasantries, but I found out through conversation that NONE of them knew there were bass in the pond! Hmm.....guess I shouldn't be writing any of this, huh?

Fast Forward to yesterday. I worked all afternoon as hard and fast as I could go. About 4:30, I decided to take Aubree with me. If I had the luck I had the day before, maybe Aubree could finally catch a fish all on her own. First thing I noticed was the amount of people fishing. Sure, it was probably the same as yesterday, but they were all spread out now! So, we decided to walk around to the far side of the lake....quite the haul! So, picked up the shakey head rod and her pink reel on a full size rod and went at it. Didn't take long to find that they were biting just as good, if not better, than the day before. I had to keep on Aubree to keep casting...and slowing down...but, she would listen and she was rewarded!

Caught it on a Yum lizard. I was catching more and more dinks, but I didn't mind. Better than catching nothing. One one particular cast, I felt one pick it up, so I slammed it. now, because I had been accustomed to the dink...and I was trying to re-learn setting the hook, I had been letting the fish have it. Most of the time, jerking them clear out of the water. But this guy just sat on it. Then he surged. And it stripped line. I pulled back, and he pulled harder. I thought it was a cat fish. Had to be. Cause, if it wasn't...it was a 5 pounder. And there was no way that I had stumbled upon one of those that I had put in here. Then it tail walked...and every head on that end of the lake turned towards us. The secret was out and in grand fashion. I worked him and he worked me. After several minutes, I lipped him. *DISCLAIMER* I don't normally embelish on fish...but there pictures don't do it justice. Don't know if it's because Aubree took them or what...but this fish was every bit of 4.5.

By the time I retied my shakey head, every bass fisher on the two ponds was within 20 yards of me...HAHA!

Thinking it was 1 in a million, I was ABOUT to call it a day...but the sun was still high. I made another cast and ANOTHER one inhaled it. Another few minutes later and I had another 3+ fish on the bank! UNBELIEVABLE! Few minutes later, I had another hook set and broke it off. It was another big fish, for sure. Aubree caught another few fish and we called it a day. That is as perfect as it gets! Best part is, we didn't pay $4 a gallon for gas!