1. When respooling an open face spinning reel, place the spool flat on the floor. Reel the line through your fingers to create the tension on the line. After you reel on about 10 yards, open the bail and let the line go slack. If the line twists, turn the spool over on its other face on the floor and continue to fill spool on the reel.

2. When fishing with an open face reel, once you complete the cast, manually flip the bail. This will prevent line twist. Reeling and letting the bail flip itself over creates line twist.

3. When respooling any reel, frequently spray reel cleaner onto the line. This helps prevent line twist and yields longer casts.

4. When fishing for stripers, carry a pair of scissors in your boat. Cut the fish between the gills and let the fish bleed out in one of your live wells. Once the fish is bled, place in your fish box. Then, when you fillet the fish, there will hardly be any red meat to remove.

5. When fishing either the Sassy Shad or the Coho, try MANY different retrieves. Let the bait fall to the bottom. Reel in slowly then disengage the reel and let the lure fall back to the bottom again. Don't always reel the lure in with a steady retrieve - slow or fast! Vary the retrieve until you find out what the fish want that day!

6. About a week before you go fishing, place your Sassy Shad/Cocahoe/Bass Assassins in a zip lock bag. Generously spray the bodies with a fish attractant....zip up the bag. Letting them sit for the week will allow the soft plastic to absorb the scent and be more effective. Leaving the soft bodies in too long can discolor the lures and/or make them hard. Experiment with your favorites!

7. When trolling, you can catch more fish if you use planer boards. This gets your lures out away from the boat. The fish don't like to be run over by boats. :) Running two planer boards out each side of the boat is standard. Give it a try. Vary the distance the lures run behind each of the planer boards. Once you find the length most effective, set all lures to run the same distance behind the boards.

8. Carry several different weights of lures. You should carry Sassy Shad and Coho Heads in various weights of 0.50, 0.75, 1.0 and 1.5 ounces as a minimum. You never know until you locate the fish what depths they will be at. You will lose A LOT of lures if you try to fish a 1.5 ounce lure in 2 feet of water. By the same token, if you try to fish a 0.5 ounce lure in 45 feet of water, it'll take so long after the cast for the lure to sink that you'll go to sleep waiting for it to sink. :)

9. Take the time to 'super glue' your plastics to the heads before you go out. This way they won't slip off and tear. Let the fish tear the tails up.... :)

DAILY THOUGHT: All of our days are numbered. Use each one as if it is the last. Treat people as you want to be treated. Love folks like you want to be loved. Be generous with your worldly goods because God only loaned them to you. Tell the people in your life how much you appreciate them....and tell them often.