mossydan wrote:

I had a chance to go wiper fishing in a spot where someone told me about, so I went. The white bass are feeding right now and heavy too and up too 16″ and caught plenty of those. Well I’m hooked on wipers now because they fight like heck and are one heck of a game fish.

Imagine a 3 lb. white <strong class=”ido-tag-strong”>bass which is a nice one then multiply that times 4 or 5. I’ll tell you what, they hit like they have no mercy and pull like you just hooked a semi going by.

Its amazing the power they have and the ones I have been catching make 3 or 4 serious runs in any current conditions and the ones I have been catching were considered small ones, the biggest being 5.5 lbs.

The neighbor said he caught one that went 15 lbs. and he was worried that his medium action Fenwick would break even though he had the drag set because they run so hard and fast with tons of power. Compared to a nice smallie of 4 pounds they fight and pull 2 or 3 times harder in the same weight. These fish will go out and lay in fast water until you get them turned and make runs like you wouldn’t believe.

8 lb Trilene, a 1/4 oz white jig and a 4″ twister tail is all you need, then hold on. If you ever get a chance to fish for them don’t pass it up and you more then likely be hooked too.

Anyone ever get a chance to fish them?

12 plus pounder. I have caught a few that were in the 8 # range. This one was like hooking a freight train.

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I too was like you and had no confidence in plastics years ago. Now I have went over to the dark dark side and fish them almost exclusively. You have to work plastics slow. The fish will tell you how they want the bait. I can tell you that I have caught bigger fish with plastic. I use a lot of hair grubs. Plastic with hair. Also flukes catch a lot of fish for me. I chase walleye on the river all the time. Plastics have caught most fish on the Mississippi. Be patient and it will happen.

We were up the last week of May. Pitching 1/8 oz jigs in 8ft of water to shore. Walleyes, smallies, and northern were on the chew. I suspect the shallow bite is still there for a while. Good luck.

Ty Kennedy wrote:

Hey all, I’m interested in setting up a rod strictly for vertical jigging and have basically only used a braid/fluoro combo on all of my setups. Anyone feel that mono outperforms it for vert jigging? Thanks.

I use both depending on the temperature. I think there is a distinct advantage for me personally with mono. There is a little stretch that gets me better and more hook sets. Once the temperatures get below 40 is when I do more vertical jigging. In the past I think I have lost fish do to pulling out the hook to fast with fire line. Six pound test with hi vis line seems to do just fine, and catches me more walleyes. Warmer temps has me back to fire line.