Lake Houston

With Friday just a few days away I'm getting ready for my next outing on the water.  This trip will be with my best friend Tom to Lake Houston and we will again be looking to get some Bass to bite.  Tom is more of a saltwater fishing guy and Lake Houston is not noted for bass fishing so this will be a good test on both the Santone Lures Jigs, XZone Lures Slammers and also Throw-n-Thunder Spinnerbaits if they arrive on time.

I've only fished Lake Houston a couple of times and will say it can be tough on fishermen.  It is a 11,854 acre reservoir on the west fork of the San Jacinto River with a maximum depth of about 45 feet that was impounded in 1954.  It is located about 15 miles northeast of downtown Houston and is the secondary municipal water supply for the city of Houston.  Because Lake Houston is not a major fishing lake it has been pretty much ignored by the Texas Parks and Wildlife Department stocking program.  It did receive some Florida Black bass in 1990 and again in 2013 but the numbers stocked are very low for this size of this impoundment.

Can you catch bass on Lake Houston?  Yes there are bass to be caught, both Florida Blacks and Native Texas Largemouth bass roam the lake and for someone that does some research bass fishing can be rewarding.   Don't expect to catch a wall hanger but the lake record is currently 10.47lbs and it is noted for giving up 5-6 pound bass on a regular basis to those fishermen in the know.  As I stated I've only fished the lake a couple of times, but both of which we caught fish.  When I say caught fish I mean we caught great numbers, but nothing more than a pound or so in size.  Here is a video I shot fishing Lake Houston on my birthday last year.

If you watched the video you can is it took me some time to figure out what they wanted.  It was a drop-shot with a Zoom Trick worm and once I started fishing that rig I caught a bunch of schoolie bass.  So with that in mind I believe on Friday the XZone Slammers on a Shaky-drop rig will likely be the ticket to get Tom some bass on his hook.  Stay tuned in for the fishing report and maybe a video of your trip.

Until next time, Tight Lines and Take a Kid Fishing!!!

Slammer Review

At first I wasn't going to write a review yet on the XZone Lures Slammers.  Why you might ask, well it is because we fished them on Lake Fayette and everyone that goes to Fayette catches bass.  So I wanted to give them a try on a tougher fishing lake before writing a review.  Then after hearing all the reports of folks getting skunked or only catching a couple on Saturday at Fayette I reconsidered.  If you watched the video you can see that my son and I didn't have any problems catching bass using the Slammers Saturday morning.   We would have likely caught more at some point in the day had we not had to over work the trolling motor battery fighting the wind.

I'll score the XZone Lures Slammers on a scale of 1-10.

Bait Action -  9.9
The Slammers really resembles a bait fish as it is worked through the water and if put in front of a bass' face I don't thank they can resist not eating them.  The only reason they don't get a 10 is there isn't an artificial bait that is perfect and imitating a bait fish.  Even so these are some of the best Finesse baits I've fished and should be perfect for anyone that loves to fish a Shaky Head, Drop-shot or my favorite the Shaky-drop.

Durability - 9.5
The Slammers are made of some tough quality plastics that should last many fish.  However I did lose a couple of them early.  Even though I believe the hook I was using at first was the main cause of this I'll have to fish them a little more to see how they last.

Colors - 10
The Slammers come in some awesome colors and they are all bright and realistic, enough said!!

Availability - 5.0
Currently there aren't any stores in Texas that are carrying XZone Lures' products.  This is not XZones fault and I hope to spread the word and get some of the shops in the Houston area to think about carrying at least the Slammers.

Tackle Box Stable - 10
I can say this for a fact; I'll have Slammers in my tackle box even if I have to drive to Canada to get them myself!!!

Other Uses - 10
Living in the Galveston bay area I also do a lot of saltwater fishing and I can see these getting a lot of use.  Flounder are going to love the Slammers and I'll also bet that a lot of Speckled Trout and Redfish can also be taken on them.

Overall -  9.1
9.1 out of 10 is a great score in anyone's book, but "Availability" was the factor that dropped the score.  As I stated above that is not XZone's or the Slammer's issue.  You can order them on-line from the Tackle Warehouse and I'm sure in the near future other stores and outlets will also jump on the bandwagon.  So lets just throw out that Availability score and give the Slammers what they deserve on their own merits - 9.9!!!

Here is a link to the Tackle Warehouse where you can order Slammers and other XZone Lure products.  I'll be testing more of their products in the near future!!!

http://www.tacklewarehouse.com/searchresults.html?search=products&searchtext=XZone&x=0&y=0

Until Next Time - Tight Lines and Take A Kid Fishing!!!

Lake Fayette Video

They say a picture is worth a thousand words, then I guess a video is worth a million.  So I won't say a lot here and let the video do the talking.

Hope you enjoyed the video.  Until next time, Tight Lines and Take a Kid Fishing!!

Great Morning at Fayette

My son and I had a great morning at Lake Fayette!!!  If the whole day would have been like the first hour we wouldn't be able to hold our arms up from catching so many fish.  The fish were on the point I thought they would and we started catching them almost immediately.  My son was throwing the Santon Texas Finesse jig with the XZone Slammer trailer and I was using the Shaky-Drop with two Slammers.  The video is currently uploading to YouTube so I'll post it once it is ready.  Since I have video of this trip I'm not going to post any more details here now.

After the first hour the wind kicked up so bad that it was almost impossible to fish.  We tried for a few more hours in a few different spots but no more fish.  We gave up when the trolling motor battery started to die.  It had gotten a work out like never before trying to hold the boat in the wind today.  We even gave up once and put an anchor but it also had a hard time holding the boat due to the strong winds.

So keep any eye out for when I post the video and until next time Tight Lines and Take a Kid Fishing!!

Lake Fayette - The Return

Yes we are making a return trip to Lake Fayette.  The rain we have been getting in the Houston area has kept the water in the bayous very off color.  With the bayous pretty much unfishable we are forced to take Texas Bayou Bassin' on a road trip again this week.  My son should be here in an hour to start this trip as the drive to the lake is about 2 hours.

We are looking forward to fishing today not only because of the chance of catching a Texas Big Girl, but we will also be testing out the Slammers from XZone Lures.  These finesse baits have been just killing the smallmouth bass up north so it is time for their invasion of the South and Texas is the right place.

We plan on fishing these using two different methods starting out this morning.  The first is as a trailer for a Santone Lures Texas Finesse jig.  I caught a few good fish using this jig on my last trip to Fayette but with a Slammer as the trailer it brings this baits game up a notch or two I believe.

The other method will be a combination rig.  I pair up a Shaky Head with a Drop-shot into something called a Shaky-Drop.  Those of you that fish Shaky Heads and/or Drop-shots know they are fished very similar from a technique standpoint.  It only makes since that if you combine these two proven fishing catching methods it becomes a super fish catching presentation the bass can't resist!!  The other advantage to this rig is the chance to fish two colors at the same time in two different zones.  If one color is catching all the fish then you can put it on both the Shaky Head and Drop-shot. 

My Shaky Head of choice these days is the Santone Lures Piglets.  They are very well constructed and made right here in the good ole Lone Star State.   Today I'll be using the Football style Piglet as I feel they with provide the best results for the type of structure found on Lake Fayette.  Also due to the structure I'll be using a VMC weedless Drop-shot hook and not my normal VMC Spin-Shot.

Now later in the day when the sun gets up in the sky we will be moving to the standing timber in deep water.  We will give these baits a try but will likely switch to the Big Girl Candy from our last trip.  That was a 3/8 oz Santone Lures Rattlin' Jig matched up with a Fish Magnet Baits trailer.  Though a couple different color combinations caught fish; the color of choice was the Pumpkin Seed/Chartreuse.  The Big Girls just couldn't say no when this piece of candy came swimming by them.

Here are links to where you can get more information about these baits.

XZone Lures - http://www.xzonelures.com/
Santone Lures - http://www.santonelures.com/
Fish Magnet Baits - https://www.facebook.com/fishmagnetbaits

Check back later this evening as I should have the fishing report and day's events posted.
Until next time Tight Lines and Take a Kid Fishing!!

Slammers In Da House

Yes the XZone Lures slammers are here and will get a good testing on Lake Fayette this weekend.

Once removing them from their packaging I find they are made of a tough plastic that should be able to catch many bass before you have to change to a new one under normal circumstances.  I also found that the colors are even brighter out of the package and these should really attract some strikes at Lake Fayette.

The plan is to fish these in a Shaky-Drop configuration using a Santone Lures Piglet football shaky head at the bottom and a weedless VMC drop-shot hook about 6 inches above the Piglet.

There is a pocket at the base of a point with a grass flat in 2.5-3 foot of water that drops pretty quickly into about 8 foot of water.  It is on the east side of the lake and protected from the morning sun for a few hours and the bass like to stack there and ambush prey coming out of the grass.  So that is the reason for the weedless hook.  I plan to cast this into the grass and work it out until it drops and hold on for the hit.  

My son will be fishing a slightly different rig with one of the Slammers.  The Slammer will be used as the trailer for a Santone Lures Texas Finesse jig.  The bass are going to jump on one or both of these rigs and we had better be holding on to our rods as the baits come out of the grass.

 

I'll post a full report of the days fishing and hopefully this time the video camera will work correctly and I'll have some video of the XZone Slammer testing.

Until next time, Tight Lines and Take a Kid Fishing!!!

New Product Excitement

I'll be testing and reviewing some new products that have me EXCITED.  The first of these is the Slammer from XZone Lures.  These are a finesse worm that is really killing the smallmouths up north so it is time to test them out on tough Texas summer largemouths.

I really think that these slammers will take the Texas Bass by storm, but the proof is in the pudding so we will have to see what those bass think.  If you are interested in seeing more XZone Lures here is a link to their website.

http://www.xzonelures.com

Now lets talk about new Spinnerbaits.  There is a new company out there that is taking spinnerbaits to a whole new level!!!  Throw-N-Thunder has some very unique designs and to tell you the truth they have peaked my interest very much.  They have some 4-blade, that's right 4-blade spinnerbaits that will give the appearance of a school of bait fish and will likely trigger even a hardheaded Texas summer bass into striking.

 

TNT has a lot of proven bass catching colors and some newer colors that this ole Texas Boy is dieing to get on the water.  So once more the proof will be in the pudding when I get them to the water and see what the bass think about them.  However I'm pretty sure the bass are going to love them as much as I do.   To see more Throw-N-Thunder products check out their website.

http://www.thrownthunderlures.com/ 

Until next time Tight Lines, be safe and Take a Kid Fishing!!!

Lake Fayette Report

Folks I hate to say I told you so, but I did!!!  The combination of the Santone Lures Rattlin' Jigs and the Fish Magnet Baits trailers were really the ticket today on Lake Fayette.  We even pulled fish from spots that had been fished by sometime 3 and 4 boats and only saw them catch a few.  All toll I ended up with 10-12 solid bass and my son-in-law ended up with 9-10.   Here are a few pictures of the fish.

The bass were in the grass early and Brett (son-in-law) got an early jump on me using a Rattle Trap, but I did get a couple on a Santone Texas Finesse Jig tipped with a Zoom Trick worm.  Later we hit the standing timber and though Brett again drew first blood, the Santone Rattlin' Jig and Fish Magnet Baits trailer proved to be the bait the fish wanted.

The bass were actually suspended in the timber and they were hitting the jig as you worked up fast over a branch or as it fell over the branch.  It was an odd manner of working a jig that I actually found by accident, but hey it kept working.  I even had a 4lber follow one up and hammer it next to the boat at the end of a cast.

I caught solid fish on all three colors of the Santone jigs; Watermelon Red Flake/Chartreuse, Pumpkin Seed/Chartreuse and also June Bug/Chartreuse.  I used two different colors of the Fish Magnet Baits Trailers, Watermelon Red Flake with Chartreuse Craws and Pumpkin Seed with Chartreuse Craws.

The Santone Texas Finesse Jig was in Texas Crawl and the Zoom Trick worm was Watermelon Red Flake with a Chartreuse Tail.

The Ardent Football Jig/Worm rod is now my favorite rod.  I caught all but 2 of my bass on it and it out performed those high dollar Asian made rods HANDS DOWN!!!

The Vicious Fishing Pro Elite Fluorocarbon performed very well but I want to get a couple of trips in on it to see how it lasts before I make my final judgement.

Tight Lines everyone and Take a Kid Fishing!!!! 

Lake Fayette

We are off to Lake Fayette to see if we can get some big girls to bite and test out some new products.  The one that I'm most excited about is my Santone Lures Rattlin Jigs with Fish Magnet Baits trailers.

I really think this combination of jig and trail is going to be a big winner and catch some monsters.  Both of these baits are made right here in the USA by great Americans that we all should be supporting when we buy fishing tackle. If you are interested in getting some of these check out the link below.

http://www.santonelures.com/

https://www.facebook.com/fishmagnetbaits

I'll also be testing out a new made in the good ole USA rod from Ardent.  It is a Jig and Worm rod and it will see action with the combo above.  Not only does Ardent make rods they also have the only reels made in the USA and I will be testing one of those in the near future.
http://www.ardentreels.com/

Last but not least I'll be testing out some of Vicious Fishing's Pro Elite Fluorocarbon line which is also made in the USA.  

Pro Elite FluorocarbonP

Pro Elite Fluorocarbon

http://www.vicious-fishing.com/

As you can see I'm making a big turn to using as many Made in the USA products as possible in my fishing and Hunting.  I really would like to all of use supporting the companies right here in the USA. 
Good fishing and tight lines!!!!