Old buggers

These are pictures taken before I got my first digital camera. Kind of a blast from the past that my wife found when going through some old pictures. Paper on back said October 16,1998 so almost 20 years ago. I liked the big eyes I made with the vinyl paint, don't use it anymore. Took pictures of the pictures with my digital camera to post these on here. View attachment 1

You had skills.... even before JigCraft! Who knew? haha Those look like great proportions. Fun to see where we were and how are styles change. Some of my old ties looked like a mess on a hook. I used to tie a bunch of dark colored jigs with a similar pattern to those and tore up the smallmouth in my local river.

Back then I didn't pour so bought unpainted heads from local bait shop. These were either 1/32 or 1/16. The hackle looks pretty thick so didn't buy the good stuff then.Still some good memories.

What the heck, they probably caught fish! Waaayyyy better looking than my first ones or even some of the ones I tie now.

Have your improved tying skills resulted in better catches ?

I think I'm catching more so the answer is definitely. Whether it's the ties or just being more confident or both who knows. Saw some big redear swimming a couple days ago but couldn't get them to bite on 1" tube jigs. Went back yesterday afternoon and fished in a light rain with some 1/80 chub jigs  I tied in the morning and had my best big redear day ever. Two over 12" and several more in the 10-11" range on the tiny grizzly brown marabou jig that's 3/4" long. Even some 14-15 inch bass as well. This is at a city park 1.1 miles from home. Had the whole lake to myself. View attachment 4

Some pics.  View attachment 5View attachment 6View attachment 7View attachment 8

Nice fish!

Sweet jig and a great fish. Good job!

extra nice

My first ties weren't pretty but they caught fish

Nice job JJ

Still fishing this little lake and the little chub is still getting them, even caught a nice crappie yesterday on it. Trying some bigger baits like 1/32nd and nothing. Bad part is some chiggers found me yesterday as well. Think I'll take a day or two off. Had one Redear hit the 13 " mark on the rod so my new PB Missouri mark. State record for Redear here in Missouri is 2-07 so lake could have the potential to break that some day. Lot's of snails and small crayfish for them to eat and coon tail moss makes it hard to fish later.

I'll take a day fishing like that anytime. NICE!!

I found out the state record for alternative methods like trotline, throw line, etc. is 1-05 here so was thinking about trying to break the record with a hand line. Caught some bigger than 1-05 with rod and reel this year so they wouldn't qualify. Fished today and coontail is everywhere now so window has closed it seems for now. Maybe late fall before trying for them. Let them grow some more too.