>Look, Being proactive and supporting our DFG must happen.
>If we do not pay attention as a collective group to things
>that happen in courtrooms, we will pay the price with the
>continued infringment upon our sport. That's all. Your
>points are well taken. My counterpoints are this: Small
>ponds with 10 pounders? Ok, put a bass in a tank and feed it
>daily with some other source of food where it has to expend no
>energy, and yes it will get big. How big? really big. Look
>at castaic lagoon, tons of trout, small and confined area, and
>short fat bombs living there. Casitas used to got double
>trout plants, for a while there we started to see the return
>of the bomb. A lot of fish in the 14 pound range. Trout
>plants stop, and now we get the same length fish, but skinny
>as hell. You feel sorry for the fish. There is a ton of 8-10
>pound fish there, but the big ones just can't compete with the
>athletic fish. Can a fish get to be in the 18-20 pound range
>by eating crawdads? maybe. But the better bet is feed it a
>ton of protein rich BIG farm fish that swim nice and slow and
>have no fins. Look at castaic, once know as the lake that
>would produce the next record. Then the introduction of the
>stripers, and now good luck. Striper fishing is awesome
>though. When the trout plants start coming and those big fish
>key in on them, fun times! Clear lake is stuffed with a ton
>of other food sources that allow the bass to get big. The
>lakes that recieve trout plants? They will suffer. What else
>is there? Your points about mike long and mike gash. Good
>for them, I respect what they have done. They are innovators
>and deserve the credit. You use a 12inch swimbait? that's a
>bomb! how heavy is that thing? Is it hard to cast? I think
>that would be awesome to use something that big. Seems like
>it would scare the fish. That's it. Good luck there in Japan
>and good job spreading the word.
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Just so I am not misunderstood, and getting back to the original point, "Swimbait fishing is NOT over" if trout plants stop.
I was trying to put up some positive comments and possibly help some to at least think outside the box, that may benefit their swimbait experience.
There are so many patterns that do not have much or anything to do with trout plants. The Slammer night pattern; cast it out and reel back slowly, and wait for the noise (strike). That works great, even at places where there is not a trout to be found.

For the old school guys, 12 inches is not considered "huge"; I fish mostly 10, 12, and 15 inch baits in Cali, with my go-to bait a 12 inch, or "Medium" size. I fish with guys that fish much larger baits than me, and am often teased for using "girl" size lures.

The lure stuck in the fish's mouth in the pic is a 12 inch Rago GenTrout, in Midnight Shad (all black, w/red eye) color. Lure weight? I drilled holes and put two tungsten weights in the head, to get it to sink fast, so I was probably at about 9 oz., fairly easy to cast on one of my swimbait rods (8 1/2 feet, 7XH). I make two swimbait rods heaver than that one, a 10 XH, and a Unrated Heavy, which can handle swimbaits up to one kilo (2.20lbs). I have sold these rods in Japan for the past eight years; recently in the USA there has been several small companies that make rods to throw similar size lures.

About the attached photo: This photo was taken during a photo shoot for a national Japanese fishing magazine (notice the water caught falling from my hands and the fish) using camera equipment not familiar to me. The fish looks a lot bigger than it is, but is still one of my fav photos taken during my 8 years of working with the magazines. The certified weight of the fish was 12.70 lbs.

As Forest Gump would say "And that is all I got to say about that"
Good fishing to you all.







http://www.calfishing.com/dc/user_files/7062-Dsc04314.jpg

"Known as the person who introduced swimbait fishing to Japan"

Attachment #1, (.jpg file)