SHINERS OR PLASTIC

[Grumpy11]

I Live in Vero Beach Florida. 25 minutes from Headwaters Lake. I don't have a boat right now. I occasionally hire a guide. They usually want me to buy and fish shiners for a chance at big bass. That's true enough but I'm 75 years old and have been fishing all my life. I've owned some nice boats to include big Grady-Whites and Pathfinders and Mavericks, and will be buying a Scout bay boat again but right now I'm hiring guides. My personal best was 9 lb on a Senko on the big O.

I prefer the challenge of using artificial baits. I guess next trip I'll start out with a few shiners, then finish the day with artificials. Which do you find more satisfying at the end of the day?

[basshammerwannabe]

I Live in Vero Beach Florida. 25 minutes from Headwaters Lake. I don't have a boat right now. I occasionally hire a guide. They usually want me to buy and fish shiners for a chance at big bass. That's true enough but I'm 75 years old and have been fishing all my life. I've owned some nice boats to include big Grady-Whites and Pathfinders and Mavericks, and will be buying a Scout bay boat again but right now I'm hiring guides. My personal best was 9 lb on a Senko on the big O.

I prefer the challenge of using artificial baits. I guess next trip I'll start out with a few shiners, then finish the day with artificials. Which do you find more satisfying at the end of the day?

both? float some shiners while throwing artificial?

[LateralLine]

Always tell the guide ahead of time, when booking what you want to do and how you want to fish. I don't like live bait and tell them, also always tell them no spider rigging, but not as popular anymore for sure.

[billnorman1]

Get 'em Bill!!!
Wishing you success whatever you use.
George

[marshman]

The guides go with the guarantee…..

around here with the inshore/saltwater crowd, you can’t find a 1 that leaves the dock without a livewell full of live shrimp….

[21XDC]

I don’t find much fun fishing any live bait

[cg2fish]

Shiners is for people that don’t know how to fish. Obviously you do so go with artificial.

[basshammerwannabe]

Shiners is for people that don’t know how to fish. Obviously you do so go with artificial.

lol thats so funny. We give the boys s*** down at the coast that use live Shrimp for speckled trout. Some of the old time speck boys get heated over that conversation.

[250bassFL]

I personally would rather fish artificial baits myself. But I hope you do great on whichever you use.

[LateralLine]

The guides go with the guarantee…..

around here with the inshore/saltwater crowd, you can’t find a 1 that leaves the dock without a livewell full of live shrimp….

We told our last bay guide nope to live bait but he did get a few anyway. We never even looked at them. At the end of our trip he said looks like I'm having shrimp for dinner.

[Grumpy11]

Hey George. How's fishing up there. I'm sidelined for a little while cause I broke my hip like a dummy. I'll be back at it in a while. Hope you are doing well. I'm enjoying life down here. I do still own a house on the Coptank
up there but haven't been up for a year.

[Grumpy11]

Artificials more of a challenge freshwater here but I mostly use shrimp etc. in the salt.

[billnorman1]

Fishing good. We need an Ark today. Caught a bunch Monday on a different river. Almost all the fish were 2&1/2 to 3 even after the tide shifted.

[Lou]

I prefer fishing artificial baits and at the end of the day I feel like I tested my skills as a fisherman when I use artificial baits.

You will generally catch higher numbers and some larger fish on Headwaters using shiners. All of the guides have holes they have found that have fish stacked up like cordwood, and those fish are conditioned to being fed shiners. The guides can put you on fish if you want to fish artificial baits - you just might not see the same number of fish in the boat as you are having to work instead of spoon feeding conditioned fish, lol.

As a disclaimer, my old fishing partner/mentor is a guide there and we talk on a regular basis and fish together when I can get down there.

[red tzx 190]

I don’t find much fun fishing any live bait

Got you beat Mike.. Wife and I would fish with live bait all the time and one of the reasons we stopped was we would fall asleep in the boat ?

[adchunts]

Did a guided trip at Okeechobee some years ago. We punched mats with artificials for half a day and fished shiners the other half. It was a once in a lifetime trip and I wanted the full experience.

[ProVle]

I have seen artificial for numbers and live bait for Trophy/Largest while fishing for several species, Bass,Walleye, Stripers etc.

[pabasshawk]

I can enjoy eather. Sometimes it is enjoyable to sit back relax and enjoy the sights and sounds while watching your balloon get nervous then disappear.

[BrianKF]

I can't even remember the last time I've tried live bait for bass. I don't think I'd even no how to begin. I do use live bait for salt water a lot.

[mean_dean]

I fished the phosphorus pits around Tampa with a guide once, we had shiners out the back of the boat and were casting worms to the front.