CKoch

I like the hi in a lot of situations. I don't think Mike even scratched the surface of the hi. If you don't like yours I'd gladly pick them up for a deal. Haha I typically like the hi like it is in the video when the shad are boiling. Otherwise I like to put weights on different places and I can make the bait look like a dying fish to a knocking suspended bait fairly easily.

I agree. Don't listen to most of the people watching YouTube. Most of those guys are just pushing baits for money. It tends to trickle down from there. I was always told that big baits don't do well in the northeast. All that tells me is the I will be fishing something that most will not. I've caught fish on some of the largest baits in the middle of the day on a really hot day. Figure out your lake or river. If you want to try out a bait tie it up and used it over and over till you perfect it. If it's fun and how you like to fish then don't worry what everyone else says.

I'm in the northeast and the bite has all changed in the last few years. There seems to be a few things I can contribute to the few lakes I fish. The last few winters were very warm around here. The lake didn't ice over like it usually does to kill off some of the bait fish. On some days you can see huge schools of bait fish all over the surface. It looks like a science fiction movie with the whole surface moving. Then in the summers there has been abnormal amounts of rain. The rain tends to flip the lake almost every time. With COVID I know in my state fishing licences saw a huge increase in numbers. With that I've seen an increasing amount of people that don't have the same respect most of us have for the fish and habitat. I've seen people filling buckets full of fish. Anything they caught would be going home. You would see them there multiple times a week from spring to fall. I know this has been having an impact on the panfish population in about every lake. Let alone I've seen people taking out big bass to eat. The last one I've seen is the pollution problem. One lake by me has a new golf course by it. I've seen the creek running into the lake being a blueish green color. That was reported and the golf course was tagged but still happened. The other lake there was an issue from one of the farms with their new weed killers. Near that part of the lake there isn't any plants in the water. I'm still optimistic that these things are just a fluke and will smooth themselves out. Looking at what everyone else wrote I'm seeing the same other places.