Test Drive: Jackall Lures Iobee Frog

Please dont mistake this for a full blown review of the Jackall Iobee frog (all full reviews will be posted on the Frog Pond),  I have been asked about it a few times recently so these are just some initial comments I have after giving the Iobee a test drive last night.

I had some time to kill after work and thought I would head over to a local froggin' hot spot to break in my Iobee frog. I have been very excited to get it a test drive since buying it in the off season, and so far I have to say it has lived up to expectations. Here is a little pro/con list after 2 hours of throwing it exclusively.

Conditions: Thick slop and sparse pads

Fishing Time: 2hrs 05mins

Blow-Ups: 6

Fish Hooked: 3

Fish Landed: 2

Hook-up Ratio: 33%

Pros: 

Man, I will start of by saying, this frogs moves better then any frog I have used to date, it walks extremely well, and can almost be given a seizure if twitched fast. It moves well in super thick slop and can be pulled or dragged of pads with ease. Although I did not get a chance to use it much in open water, when I did I was impressed by the fluid movement and the erratic action.

It casts well, and seems to land belly down religiously and the odd time that it did land hooks down, I was able to roll it back over fairly quickly. I really like the way the Iobee sits when paused, and feel it was designed well for all aspects of frog fishing

Cons:

there were a couple things that at this time I will say are "minor annoyances". I will start off with the legs, the rubber strands are very thin, and continuously get bunched up around the hooks. Often they looked like a birds-nest at the back of the frog which in turn means they were not doing their job in the water. I had to fix them after every couple casts

the barb on the hooks is also fairly large, and will not fit in the hook keeper on my Dobyns rod. I dont know if this will be an issue with many other rods as it will depend on how they design their hook keeper. If you are a Dobyns user, beware that this is a pain

the Breakdown

I had a blast throwing the Iobee frog and I cant wait to give it some further testing this coming weekend. After just a couple hours on the water I was very impressed with the action of the frog and it seemed to have the fishes attention as well.  Above I listed the blow-ups as 6, these are direct hits and do not include the 4 blow ups that happened 2ft or more in front or behind the frog. 

As you can see above, my initial hook-up ratio was not great, but Im going to chalk that up to the angler and lay the blame on the frog itself. I will mention that that I did have a couple fish come off, one fish I lost as I was pulling him out the slop and one fish that I landed came unstuck as soon as I had him on shore. Again I will continue to monitor this, but as of right now Im not confident in stating that the frog has a "hook" issue.

Equipment:

Rod: Dobyns 736c

Reel: Daiwa Advantage

Line: SunLine FX2 Frog Line

Fear & Loathing on the BBTS: Weslemkoon 2012

(Vince Yonemitsu)

Well, I will be honest here, this post has taken me a couple more days to write then it probably should have. I can blame it on a number of things, but what it really comes down to is that Dustin and I took a shit kicking on the Koon this past weekend.. On a lake we consider our "home lake" in the BBTS series, we placed 19th the worst ranking in our short tournament careers. 

Like most anglers we like to figure out what went wrong, and although I would love to sit here and tell you that it was a change in the weather, or the high pressure the lake saw on Saturday (Bass Season Opener), I cant, simply put the other anglers taking part in the event just out-fished us, there is nothing more I can say.. all that means is that on July 15th, we need to bring our "A" game, we are behind the gun now and have some serious ground to make up if we want to contend for the team of the year

Now that Im done my mini rant, lets get on to some guys that actually caught some fish, and collected paychecks.

The winning team brought in a healthy 16.26lbs bag of fish, and easily took home 1st place beating the next closest team by just under 2lbs... congrats guys

(Brad Badeau & Gord Tucker)

2011 Team of the year winners Randy and Jason Fransky also had a good day on the water bringing in a bag just over 12lbs, good for 6th place. They were the team with the target on their back all day as last year they weighed in an new series record of 24lbs (approx) on Weslemkoon

(Team Fransky)

If you want to look for a team that made a huge leap in the standings look no further then Derick Tompkins and Shane Crumb, their 14.3lb bag was good enough for 4th place and was a drastic improvement over the 4lbs they weighed in last year on Weslemkoon.

(Shane Crumb & Derick Tompkins)

Tournament organizer Braind Stubbings and his partner Tom Allen also had a nice day finishing up with 11.74lbs.

Big fish of the day went to the Hockey connection, Chicago Blackhawk Brian Bickell and his partner (former Peterborough Pete) Justin Caruana brought in a sweet 5.54lb largemouth. 

(Brian Bickell & Justin Caruana)

You may remember this face from last year, and if you dont, let me refresh your memory, Terry Lucas landed a 6.85lbs large mouth during the Jacks lake event. Here he is again showing off a nice Weslemkoon smallmouth, (as you can see it was a bit wet out there)

(Terry Lucas)

Alright thats it for the fish pics, but keep scrolling for more scenery and behind the scenes look at the first event of the BBTS season...

Next Up: Jacks Lake July 15th

If you want to follow the progress on the BBTS site, it can be found here. There are still some team openings for some of the events, so be sure to check it out

Quinte Bass Champs - Results & Pics

I will start this off by saying it was an honor and privilege to take part in the first in what I can only hope becomes an annual event for Ontarios bass Anglers. The Quinte Bass champs series broke ground or should I say "water" this past weekend and from what I can tell It was a huge success.The event saw close to 140 boats and nearly 300 anglers take part in a "big fish battle" on one of Ontario;s premiere fishing resources.. the Bay of Quite.

Hourly weighs in gave anglers the chance to take home $1000, $500, and $250 paychecks simply by weighing in one of the 3 largest fish each hour.. Im proud to say I could have weighed in a 3lb or larger fish each hour, yet opted for strategy and only weighed in 4 times, just missing a paycheck by 0.10lbs in hour 4.

Before I get into the results, I think it only prudent to give a shout out to the event organizers, this was a first class event from start to finish, ,every little detail was planned for, and carried out with a smile on their faces.

The blast off went as smooth as any 140 boat blast off could go, and each hour as you approach the weight in station there was a staff member on hand with in weigh in bag in hand, and ready to help with you boat. The Weigh in station itself could get hectic but the team there kept things moving and it was great to see some young kids on hand helping out and ensuring the future of this event.

Ok, Ok, here are the winners.. congrats to all those who weighed in fish, and even more so to those who took home pay checks.

(Photo courtesy of Quinte Bass Champs)

7-8 AM

1st 5.11 lbs team 103 Rick Weagant, Gene Hills $1000, Murray Henderson Print 
2nd 4.76 lbs team 18 Dave Young, Dan Mathieu $500
3rd 4.15 lbs team 6 Neil Farlow, Tom Streek $250

8-9 AM

1st 4.97 lbs team 47 Garnet Armitage, Wayne Misselbrook $1000, Murray Henderson Print
2nd 4.61 lbs team 100 Tom Davies, Dusty Craven $500
3rd 4.35 lbs team 52 Darrell MacLean, Adam Karlewicz $250, Shimano $150 certificate at ProAdvantage Sports & Hobbies, GLoomis Jacket

9-10 AM

1st 3.86 lbs team 77 Cam Brownson, Lee Branscombe $1000, Murray Henderson Print
2nd 3.85 lbs team 89 Bill Landman, Ross McIntosh $500
3rd 3.77 lbs team 80 Lorenzo D’Altorio, Hans Vaillancourt $250, Shimano $150 certificate at ProAdvantage Sports & Hobbies

10-11 AM

1st 5.54 lbs team 50 Gary Marks, Trevor Davies $2000 Bay Marine Big Fish of the Day, Murray Henderson Print
2nd 4.55 lbs team 105 Barry Pringle, Court Rose $500
3rd 3.75 lbs team 105 Barry Pringle, Court Rose $250

11-12 PM

1st 4.55 lbs team 16 Rich Letourneau, Kevin Weir $1000, Murray Henderson Print
2nd 4.25 team 30 James Walker, Steve Knapp $500
3rd 3.99 team 86 Eric Hill, Gord Burrowes $250

12-1PM

1st 4.93 lbs team 7 Gerry Ebel, Mike Brayford $1000, Murray Henderson Print
2nd 4.74 lbs team 42 Karl Neumayer, Pete Tucker $500
3rd 4.53 lbs team 61 Marc Schofield, Marty Gutzman $250, Shimano $150 certificate at ProAdvantage Sports & Hobbies

1-2PM
 
1st 4.10 lbs team 135 Gary Kapps, Randy Bergstrand $1000, Murray Henderson Print, Shimano $150 certificate at ProAdvantage Sports & Hobbies 
2nd 4.09 lbs team 10 John Clayton, Barry Batson $500, GLoomis Jacket 
3rd 3.87 lbs team 29 Murray Henderson, Murray Henderson Sr $250
 
2-3PM
 
1st 4.64 lbs team 112 Derek Thibault, Kevin Truelove $1000, Murray Henderson Print
2nd 4.42 lbs team 62 Jay Martin, Brad Arnott $500
3rd 4.07 lbs team 104 Curtis Richardson, Rob Webster $250 

Now for some of my pics, Ill be honest, the action was so fast for the morning portion of the day, there was little time to take pics, but here are some shots of the behind the scenes of this great event

The Day started out a little scary, the clouds rolled in as blast off approached, with thunder and lightning crashing in the background. We all prepared to get a little wet

When the sun forced it's way through it was a beautiful day, and although it was not the last we would see of the rain clouds, it sure made for a great backdrop for blast off

As 6:45am approached, my tournament partner took the wheel, and got us in position for blast off, with 140 boats in the fold it was a huge advantage to be team 19 and get to blast off as part of the first 40.

As mentioned above, this whole event was well run, here is a great pic of the blast off team getting ready to get things started.. a bull horn and a Canadian flag says "wake up" to me

Part of our initial strategy was to weigh in any fish above 3lbs in the first hour.. well that only took 5 minutes as Dustin hooked into this nice little guy in his first or second cast. Coming in at the 3.5lb mark, it put us in second place for a few minutes anyways. 

The storm really got the fish riled up, and the bite was hot for the first couple hours, we landed fish after fish, all of them over 2lbs and most over 3lbs. My thumb was worse for ware, but hey, it comes with the territory.

In hour 3, I landed my biggest fish of the day, a nice largemouth just over 3.6lbs, this time we opted for a bit more of a strategic play and sat outside the commitment markers with out minutes left in the hour. I knew we would not take top spot, but this fish had a great chance for second or third place money. with 1 minute left in the hour we crossed the markers and committed to weighing the fish. My excitement at my third place result was short lived as one more boat crossed the finish line with  just seconds to spare and he knocked us out of third by 0.10lbs.

In our second spot of the day, we had an unexpected guest that seemed to really like the new Lice Target mouse, this Gar pike would not let go, but thankfully the mouse lived to fish the day

Just a nice scenery shot from under the bridge, we fished a thicker mat section looking for a frog bite, again we found fish, just not a $1000 one.

The weigh in station was just off the George street launch and the team was second to none, always ready with a helping hand and kept things moving smoothly. 

All top weights were recorded on a white board as well as posted to twitter, so we were always on top of the current leading weights. 

This is one of my favorite shots, of all the boats headed in for the final hours weight in. This is where things could have gotten hectic, but again they ran smooth, this was an easy off and on.

So again, congrats to all those who took home paychecks, but a bigger congrats to the team and sponsors that ran the event, This was a great experience, and if I was asked to sign up today for next years event I would not hesitate. I recommend you keep your eye on this one, as I think it would  grow and I would be surprised if there are not more then 150 boats fishing it next season.

Opening Day - Bass Season 2012

(2011 Season Opener Photo)

well it is finally here, Bass Season 2012 (in Ontario anyways). I will be starting this season off right, fishing in back to back tournaments, (starting today), I will be fishing in the 140 boat Quinte Bass Champs event hoping to take home at least one of the $1000 hourly prizes.. following that up with a trip to Weslemkoon on sunday to kick off the BBTS series. Hoping to improve on last years results

In between the two events  I may even spend a quiet evening casting with friends at a Lake X in search of some peaceful top water action.. this weekend will be fish filled to say the least

I will be posting pics and info to my twitter feed all day long both days, so be sure to check it out if you want to see some of the craziness surrounding the Quinte Bass Champs event.Like you I have been patiently awaiting this day since the season closed late last fall. So Im going to stop typing and get my ass out on the water to take advantage of every minute the 2012 season has to offer

Hope to see ya on the water

BassJunky

Sneak Peek: El Grande Lures 5" Gila Monster

I got word a few weeks back that El Grande lures were about to  launch a new smaller (5 inch) Gila Monster, being a huge fan of the original, I could not pass up the opportunity to get some in my hands asap.. I dont think these bad boys are listed on their website as of yet, but here is a sneak peek for those as impatient as I am.

If you that have fished with the original Gila Monster you will quickly noticed that this new size is dramatically smaller, El Grande not only chopped almost 4" inches off the length, but they also reduced the the baits overall girth.. the new Gila monster seems to have spent the off season at Jenny Craig...

Not that this is a bad thing, as the reduction in size has done nothing to effect the action of the bait and may even improve it for some applications. Like in the Original Gila this little guy is salt free and the tail will float when paused in the water. It also seems to have a bit more whip then it's predecessor and the slender body profile will more easily slide through thick cover and dense slop.

The 5" Gila Monster is the perfect sized bait for Texas rigging, flipping & pitching as well as shaky head fishing. I may even give it a run on my drop shot rod, as I really love the movement of the longer slender body and tail.  Owner's Jig Rig hook and weight combo is also new to the market, and I feel they would pair up well with the smaller Gila

The larger Gila will still be a staple in my arsenal and will be used mainly to drag like a tube or Carolina rig. When flipping the larger profile is great in sparser cover, and I will use the 5" version when I really need to slide it through a small hole (which requires less body drag).

Less face it, although a great bait the original Gila is a beast, and many anglers will stay away from baits at the 8" or longer mark. Many Northern bodies of water do not hold the same brutes that can be found down south, and thus the average angler avoids monster baits.. Although I dont agree with this tactic, I do see where they are coming from. The new 5" Gila should reach a larger audience as it falls nicely into a more user friendly size.

Not one to rest on their laurels, El Grande not only changes the bait size during this revamp but they have also come to the table with a whole new selection of colors. The new Gila will be introduced in 5 new colors, including an awesome green pumpkin with purple flake that has quickly become my favorite of the 5. See the full color selection below (listed from left to right)

Watermelon (w/red flake)

Black (w/Blue flake)

Green Pumpkin

Junebug

Green Pumpkin (w/purple flake)

If you are a fan of the original El Grande Gila Monster, do yourself a favor and check out the new 5" version, these baits are extremely versatile and will be a great addition to your arsenal. These babies are not yet available on-line, but keep an eye out on the El Grande Facebook page and Website as more info will be available soon

Pond Hopping - Sun Dolphin Pro120

The size of the lake, does not always dictate the size of the fish, but often it can dictate the size of the boat!  Yes, those high powered bass boats may be key pieces of equipment when you need to run up and down lakes bigger then some small towns, but what about some lakes, or ponds. These small bodies of water hold some pretty serious lunkers, and it you want to get to them, your going to need to leave the bass boat at home.

I dont have anything against Kayaks or Canoe's but not everyone is a canoe or Kayak person. I own a canoe (Radisson/SportsPal) that I have enjoyed fishing out of for years, but a time came when I wanted the same perks that a large boat has to offer, only in a compact size.. I wanted the ability to fish standing up, the ability to fish the same way I would fish from a bass boat.. canoes dont generally offer this option, so in turn I started looking for a "pond hopper" a small boat that I can easily get into small lakes.

When I started doing some research and I came across the Sun Dolphin Pro 120. it seemed like the perfect combination of size and functionality. Coming in at just under 12ft in length this little baby has plenty of fishing room.  With front and rear casting decks. Two pedestal seats (removable), and sunken middle section perfect for the kids or your dog. Personally when fishing alone I like to keep the rear seat in, and pull the front seat. This allows me to fish freely from the front of the boat, but also  to sit while making longer trips on the trolling motor.

When fishing with a buddy (or the wife) I can give them the option of seat in or seat out. As you can see above one of my co-anglers getting lazy with the chair in 

(Sun Dolphin with my Minn Kota Traxxis)

When it comes to power choices for  a Sun Dolphin, you really have a couple options. First off you can look at smaller sized gas engines, anywhere from 6 to 9 horse power. But I did not want the added weight or the need to fill-up and winterize at the end of the season. So I opted to power it by trolling motor alone, with a MinnKota Traxxis 80lb thrust hand tiller. This little motor pushes or pulls the Sun Dolphin  at a decent clip and makes it easy to cover water on small lakes and ponds alike. Because trolling motors are fully adjustable you can also get this boat in to some pretty skinny water, as well as some serious thick weeds with no issues (I carry a push pole just in case)

I would avoid going any lower then 80lbs thrust when using a trolling motor as your main power source. The only downfall to this method is the dual battery required to run the motor. The Battery compartment does have room for two, but it is a tight fit and adds weight to the back corner of the boat. 

If you opt to go with a gas motor, the Sun Dolphin is rated for up to 9 horse, but I feel that would be way more then what is required to operate it, and you could easily get way with a 6hp. 

Paring up your gas motor with a bow mounted trolling motor is a must, if you want to use the built in wiring you will need to look at 12v motors, this usually means staying at 50lbs thrust and under. Once you make your choice the motor easily clips into the front of the boat and can be run off the internal wiring and your single battery. This one two punch is great if you fish medium to larger bodies of water with this small boat and will be traveling larger distances between spots

(Top View of Storage compartments)

For a small boat there really is an abundance of storage. The Sun Dolphin Pro 120 is equipped with 5 compartments, 3 of which have specific uses, but can also be used for traditional storage space if required.  The rear storage consists of a live-well , with pump, as well as a battery compartment. The battery area is wired internally to run the live well, the light system as well as a trolling motor (plugged into the front of the boat)

At the Front there are 3 more compartments. Two are general storage areas, and I use them to store extra tackle, maps, and misc equipement. The third is designed to be a cooler, and has a drain plug that allows water and melted ice to be easily removed after a long hot day on the water.

When it comes to transporting the Sun Dolphin, it's light weight makes it easy trailer on some cars as well as most SUV's. If you have a full size pick-up I have also seen one slide into the truck bed. It weighs just over 200lbs and can be lifted, shifted and moved easily with 2-3 people. I opted for a trailer as I drive a small SUV, this sitll allows me to get this boat into many back lakes and areas in which larger boats and vehicles have a harder time getting into.

I love fishing on empty or secluded lakes, LAKE X as they are famously known. In these lakes the fish are less pressured and the peace and quiet is second to none. Having the option to pull out the small boat and have a quiet day on the water, catching big fish.. it doesn't get any better then that.

Off to NIX 2012: Toronto Tattoo Convnention

NIX 2012: June 15th - 17th

Well, it's that time of year again.. convention season, and probably not the kind of conventions you are expecting. I will be taking the next few days off the water and heading in to the big city.. Toronto... for some work and some play, as I will be working the Eikon Tattoo Supply booth at the 14th Annual NIX tattoo convention. This will be my 3rd trip to NIX and my second time working the show.

So it will be a bit quiet around here starting on Thursday (today) but should be back to normal come some time on Monday, .. well that honestly depends on how much "work" and how much "play" we actually do.

Anyways, if you have never had the opportunity to check out a Tattoo Convention up close and personal, now is your chance, the Toronto show is top notch with some amazing artists from all over the world (Including a few you may have seen on TV)

here is a link to the shows website, if your in the neighborhood come check it out

http://tattoos.com/nix/