JJ’s Magic

For those of you, like me, who believe that scent plays a large role in bass fishing, I would like to share one of the best kept secrets in the industry.  JJ’s Magic is rapidly becoming a staple in the boat for not only weekend anglers but many professionals as well.  I have been using “the magic” for a couple of seasons now and I certainly feel that it gives me a competitive edge on tournament day.

 

                I had been using another dipping dye for years and while I always kept some in the boat, often times I wouldn’t reach for it unless conditions got tough.  I didn’t use it so much for the scent because that didn’t seem to last more than a few minutes.  It was always more of a color thing with me.  Once I was introduced to James and Carl at the BassMaster’s Classic Expo in Birmingham that changed.

 

                JJ’s uses a chemical formula that allows the scent to actually permeate the bait which results in a permanent scent as well as color on your baits.  Just dip the plastic into one of the 5 different colors that are available and you are all set.  I have even taken a treated plastic and left it in a bowl of water to see how long it would hold the scent.  It took several days for the scent to fade and it never went entirely away.  Now, if you can fish with the same piece of plastic for several days, I need your phone number and some pointers.

 

                Magic is available in clear, merthiolate, blue, chartreuse and the newest color, red.  You can use several different colors on one bait to get a look that fish have never seen, go with the old standby method of dipping the tip of your bait into the chartreuse dye or just stick with the clear when no additional color is needed.  There are several videos on YouTube demonstrating how to dress up a bait using Magic and the possibilities are truly endless.

 

                While many anglers may have a color preference, what is not arguable is results.  While out in the boat with a good friend of mine, Chris Cook, we were on a good plastic bite and decided to see just what kind of effect JJ’s Magic had on the bite.  Both of us were using the same color and exact same rig.  Both of us were catching fish at about the same pace until I stopped using Magic and Chris continued to use his treated bait.  Within a few minutes he had caught 4 or 5 fish and I had not put anything in the boat and our experiment was over with a quickness.  I dipped my bait and almost immediately hooked up.

 

                Over the past couple of years I have introduced several anglers to JJ’s Magic and every one of them has continued to use the products after seeing what it could do for them.  If you haven’t tried it yet, visit http://www.jjsmagic.com/ and order yours today.  As JJ and Carl like to say. “If you aren’t using it, you are being beat by it.”

Greg’s Custom Rods

It started with a chance meeting at Bass Pro Shops in Leeds, AL about three years ago. I was in the store to pick up a few items and I saw a display of custom rods built by a local Birmingham man. Like most of us, I couldn’t resist stopping to play with them for a few minutes and I ended up having about a 30 minute conversation with Greg Hughes, the maker of Greg’s Custom Rods. I had several opportunities to bump into Greg in the couple of years that followed that initial meeting and every time it ended with me reminding myself to try a few of these rods out. In December of last year, I pulled the trigger and ordered my first two rods from Greg. After countless hours of fishing with these sticks and catching more fish than I care to count on them, I have three more in the process of being built and hope to have every rod in my boat replaced with these custom sticks over the next couple of years. I would like to share with the reader some of what I have discovered over the past year and invite you to visit with Greg, let him put a rod in your hands and decide for yourself.

The first thing that comes to mind when some of you think of a custom rod is appearance. While my field testing has not concentrated on the appearance of the rods, I have to say that they are absolutely gorgeous. Of course, what one person likes may not suit another’s taste but there is no doubt that Greg can put something together that you will be proud of and enjoy looking at almost as much as you enjoy fishing with it. He offers marbled or thread wrapped rods, aluminum inserts, snakeskin, even a grip with baseball threads on it. Every rod is truly a work of art and can be as fancy or as plain as you want it to be.

More important than appearance, at least to me, is performance. When you fish as many tournaments as I fish each year, something being pretty doesn’t put fish in the livewell or a check in the bank so let’s get down to business. The sensitivity of these sticks is on par with much more expensive rods and Greg credits that to not only precision workmanship but also high quality components and the fact that almost every rod that goes out his door is constructed with spiral wrapped micro-guides. “The spiral wrap method turns a casting rod into a spinning rod in the aspect that the line lays on the guides instead of the blank. This results in much better sensitivity”, says Greg. These rods have an almost overwhelming number of guides and the first three or four actually offset the line to the underside of the rod. I have fished with much more expensive rods and while some of them have been very impressive, Greg has managed to produce a product that is of at least the same quality (I personally think they are better than most) at a much lower price point. Each rod is spined to find the straightest point on the blank and the eyes are then attached at the point where they fit that particular rod. There is no handbook that tells him where the eyes go and each rod has its’ own personality.

The casting distance on these rods also far surpasses many of the more expensive rods that I have fished with over the years and while a lot of that can be attributed to the blank itself, much of it is caused by the simple physics of the spiral wrapped micro-guides as well. My first impression was that with so many guides (commonly 16-17 per rod) there were more friction points and this might inhibit the casting distance. Not the case! A little research answered my questions and I discovered that the coefficient of friction was almost non-existent with the lines and guides on the market today. What actually increases the casting distance is the substantially less dampening effect from line vibration going through the guides. With a larger guide, the line actually may come into and lose contact with the guides repeatedly on each cast and this causes a dampener effect that produces much more negative impact on distance than the nearly constant contact with the micro-guides.

Walter Britt, a long time customer of Greg’s Custom Rods shared a story with me recently. He said that his first experience with Greg was when he went over with a friend of his to have some repair work done. He told his buddy on the ride over that he was not going to buy a rod but was interested in seeing some custom work. “30 minutes with Greg changed all that”, says Britt who has now been a customer for 6 years and with the exception of getting a good deal on a used rod here and there has not bought an off-the-shelf rod since. “Greg took out a rod, tied it off to a trailer hitch and dared me to break it within 5 minutes.” Walter says. He was so impressed with the spiral wrap process that he ordered his first rod that day and hasn’t looked back since.

That being said, I did recently manage to break my jig rod. It could be from thousands of miles riding in a rod locker and developing stress fractures from being bounced around, swinging countless fish in the boat or any other factor that goes into a broken stick. I know that it is something most of us have experienced but this was the first time that I actually mourned over the loss of a rod. I had to resort to using one of my old off-the-shelf rods for a few weeks while Greg was building me a replacement and the old saying “You don’t know what you got until it’s gone.” Comes to mind. I realized that my hookset has changed, my casting physics were different and my fishing suffered for those few weeks. I mentioned this to Walter and he replied that he had also experienced a learning curve when he bought his first rod. “I broke off the first several fish that I set on.” says Britt. “You learn pretty quickly that with the spiral wrap, the pressure of the line is exerted onto the eyes instead of the blank and you get so much more torque on the hookset that you have to tone it down a little.” Britt says he also had to change his cast. “I noticed that the bait was hitting to the right of the target but soon realized that it was because it was getting there quicker and made the adjustment.”

Walter, like myself, had nothing but positive feedback on these rods and agreed with my statement that they will change the way you fish. As with most products, technology is changing by the day and Greg stays on top of the newest materials and procedures. He has worked with Fuji to develop an eye and continues to work with blank manufacturers to test products and give his feedback. Greg Hughes has made a name for himself through his products and is continuing to build that name in a positive manner. You would never know it to talk to Greg. He is one of the most humble human beings that I have been around and while his passion for what he does is evident, he takes pride in his work and is dedicated to building the rod that you want.

For more information on Greg’s Custom Rods, you can contact Greg Hughes directly at 205-608-FISH or through the Greg’s Custom Rods Facebook profile. I will also be more than happy to show you some of his work, take you over and introduce you or answer any questions that you might have.

Gulf Coast Recovery In Full Swing

This week I had the opportunity to experience some of the fastest paced fishing I could possibly imagine.  My good buddy Bryan Brasher and I headed down to Biloxi, MS to see for ourselves the impact the recent oil spill has had on what has always been a great fishery and one of the largest sectors of the economy in that area.  Admittedly, I had no idea what to expect going in. 

We met with our charter Captain at 7am on Wednesday morning and headed out in windy conditions with a heavy chop that I was afraid might hinder our trip but Captain Robert Brodie from Team Brodie Charters had other plans.  We didn’t have to go far before he had us on the fastest action I have ever experienced with a rod and reel.  Within just a few minutes of the launch and with the Biloxi coastline casinos in the background Captain Brodie idled over a shell bed where he told us he had been catching some pretty good numbers of white trout and after studying his electronics for a minute or two he dropped anchor and we decided to give it a shot.  Over the next couple of hours we boated 109 trout as fast as we could reel them in.  The action finally slowed just a little and Captain Brodie wasted no time in getting us set up to catch another species in a nearby location.  Within minutes we were sitting on another of his hotspots where we reeled in 14 keeper black drum over the next hour or so.  We had123 fish in the cooler and our arms were aching from literally getting bit on every cast when a quick glance at my watch showed that it was not even noon yet.  Captain Brodie decided to make a little longer run to go try a few flounder but we waved the white flag and decided a half day trip was enough for us.  In just a few hours we caught numerous species of fish including white trout, sand trout and black drum as well as gafttopsail catfish and croakers that immediately became cut bait.  We had over 200 fish total in about 5 hours of fishing.

The focus of the trip was to see what impact the recent oil spill has had on the fishery going in but there were no thoughts of oil after that first cast.  It soon became obvious to me that the spill has had a much larger impact on public perception that the fishing and that is was more of an economic disaster than an ecological one in that area of the Gulf.  Many of the charter captains that have made a living providing customers with hours of enjoyment are now suffering more from a lack of clientelle than a lack of fish.  The only evidence of the oil spill that we witnessed was a crew of workers removing the man made barriers around some of the marsh grass near the dock and some empty parking spaces at the boat launch.  I would highly encourage anyone to take advantage of some of the best fishing I have ever experienced while at the same time supporting a sector of the economy that has suffered Hurricane Katrina, the worst recession in recent history and finally the oil disaster in the Gulf.  Many of the charter captains have thrown in the towel after this combination punch but there are some really good guys down there doing what they love and providing a service to those of us who want to experience it for ourselves who have refused to quit and are determined to fight the odds and contiue making their living by fishing.

Captain Brodie is one of these determined guides.  He works as hard as any guide I have ever fished with to make sure that you feel at home and catch a ton of fish.  Within minutes of boarding his boat I felt like I was fishing with an old friend and he treated us like he had known us his entire life.  He kept us on fish during the entire trip and this was the first guided trip I have ever taken where we decided we had had enough before the captain did.  Our catch was cleaned and packaged with great care and pride and we left worn out and happy to shower and change, have a few drinks and hit the bed early while Captain Brodie still had several hours of work to take care of preparing for his next day on the water.  He told us that a large percentage of his clientelle are repeat customers and after fishing with him I can see why.  

I am already planning my next trip with Team Brodie Charters and if you would like to do the same you can contact Captain Brodie by calling (228) 697-7707 or via email at captainbrodie@teambrodiecharters.com.  You can also visit his website at http://teambrodiecharters.com/.  He updates the site daily and I was surprised to see my ugly mug on there within hours of coming of the water.  One of the more unique options that Captain Brodie offers is a combination duck hunting/fishing trip that he calls “Blast and Cast”.  You get to experience a morning of duck hunting followed up with an afternoon fishing trip.  For you duck hunters out there, I can’t imagine a better trip or a better guy to take it with.  Thanks again to Captain Brodie and my good friend Bryan Brasher fora trip that I will never forget and enough fish in the freezer to hold me over for a while.  I’ll be back soon so keep doing what you are doing Captain Brodie.

Getting smoked in the grass!

The topwater bite has slowed down but the movement in the grass won’t allow me to leave for deeper water.  I know they are still there but cast after cast goes unanswered with buzzbaits, hollow frogs, horny toads and everything else I have slung at them.  I can’t decide which is worse, the heat of the sun beating down on me or the lockjaw that seems to have overtaken my prey.

I take a short break and dig through my tackle trying to see if something jumps out at me and I’m not disappointed.  There it is as plain as the nose in front of my face, a white swim jig with a little touch of blue just for good measure.  I add a white Zoom swimming chunk and make a test cast.  All I can think about is how sick this looks in the water.  About three casts later a small bass lets me know that he likes it too.  The heat is forgotten and I am back in business.

I have always enjoyed fishing grass beds in the early morning.  There is nothing more exciting than a blow up on whatever topwater offering you sling back in the slop but it never fails that the action dies down when the sun gets over the tree line and it is time to go do something else.  Swimming a jig might be the way to extend that grass bite for a while, or in this case all day.  The technique is really simple.  I cast to the back of the grass and then work the jig through with a steady retrieve.  The bite can come back in the thick stuff but they will usually bust it just as it hits the weedline and makes a break for open water.  Try to parallel the grassline and work it in pockets back in the thick stuff as well as fan casting it in some of the more sparse grass.  Give it a little action with a few twitches and jerks while maintaining a constant speed with your reel.  Drag it through the grass and kill it right when it hits the edge…There is no wrong way and if you will experiment, the fish will tell you what they want.

I use 17# fluorocarbon for most of my grass fishing but braided line might be in order for some of the thicker stuff.  A good stiff rod is also a must to get that pig out in a hurry when it kills your jig.  I like a 7′ medium heavy action rod with a fast or extra fast tip and good quality baitcaster with a 6.3:1 gear ratio.  Most people automatically think “white” when they think about a swim jig and I believe lighter colors imitate shad better than darker colors but there is a full spectrum of colors available and paired with the right trailer you should be able to find the effect you are looking for.

Next time you find yourself in a grassy area give some thought to swimming a jig through it.  I believe you will be pleasantly surprised with the results and it will soon become a regular part of your arsenal.

For more information check out www.alabamafishingbuddy.com.