Pond Boss Forums INTRO Questions & Observations New Stubby Steves works!

Thanks for the "fridge tip" Scott!
You know we fish a lot - know what tho?
We keep our fly tackle "rigged and ready" with fly rods strung and sometimes Stubbys still on hook.
They still will catch fish after even a few days!
G/

George's Stubby Lighting Bug. That is a mouth-full !

Yeah right Eric. I just left George's and he wouldn't even let me touch it. I walked out with a box full of his hand tied flies, but a Lightning Bug somehow wasn't in there.

I've never seen a fly with a padlock on it before today.

George's LOCKED UP Stubby Lighting Bug --- --- --

ROFLOL !!

Ok I have a question for all you S and S experts out there. How should I fish these pellets? I bought 4 or 5 packets last year and I could not get a bite on them? Of course I don't have fly rods so I was bobber fishing with a small sinker about 3 inches up the hook. I had been feeding my fish AM600 all season. I thought maybe they just are not hungry at the time, but I put on a real worm and BANG fish on?

So is it something I am doing? I would really like to get them to work for me as it's not always easy to get worms.

Or are they made more just for fly fishermen? Maybe I didn't catch that when I bought them???

Not trying to be negative here at all just want to make sure I am fishing this product right before I give up on it. As I think it's awesome and would love to use them verses worms any day!! Maybe the stubby worm would work better for me?? Any help or advise would be great.

Thanks,
RC

RC. I cannot imagine why Stubby pellets will not work for you - even under a bobber?

Don't I recall you have CNBG and HSB - Mrs. G and I have caught so many on flies on fly tackle, I wouldn't even hazard a guess as to how many?

What size hook - how deep - have you tried to chum with AQMX 600 pellets prior to casting?

Betcha if you try a Stubby worm rigged "Texas style", you will catch a HSB.
Any feed trained LMB?

Maybe Scott or someone has an idea.
George

Hey George your right I have RES, CNBG, BG, LMB, HSB.

No I didn't chum first with AM600 prior to casting I could try that kind of get them in that area first. That's a good idea.

I think it was a #6 hook or 8 I can't remember for sure. It wasn't real big.

I don't have any feed trained bass but my HSB are feed trained.

I know the pellets look great! I only tried them twice each time for about 15 minutes or so. I am not giving up on them yet just wanted to make sure I wasn't doing something wrong. I figured if anything I would get some small ones pulling on it but not even that. I will try the chuming though that may work.

I know I really want to try the worms. I bet my HSB will love them and maybe my bass too.

Thanks George for the chuming idea. I will try both again this year and see what happens.

I am picking up a bag of AM400 and 600 Saturday and going to start feeding again. Time to get things rolling again!!

RC that is very strange. I can go right now and catch 25 big CNBG & RES off the dock with a cane pole and 1 SS pellet. Fished with a bobber or not. I have never seen it not work even when crickets and worms struck out. Never have chummed.

I've never used a fly rod with the pellets. My method is usually to chum a bit, then thread one on a #10 Owner Mosquito Hook (very light weight and sharp) with no bobber or weight. I'll use #2 or #4 test line. Using that hook, the pellet will float most of the time. If I need to get more casting distance, I'll thread 2 pellets on the hook. One I'll push up over the knot, the other one will stay on the hook, making sure that there is enough clearance for the fish to be easily hooked.

Maybe it is the difference in the smell/oil/taste that the fish are accustomed to. A wiggling worm or a bug is pretty natural, and bred into their genes.

Something that looks like a naturally occurring fly, bug, or worm would be of interest. But, if they haven't seen a pellet all winter, or if the Stuby Steve's pellet doesn't look/smell like what they have been trained to eat -- will they sample it?

I would question whether a truly wild fish, never having had pellets, nor having had pellets for quite some time, would be interested in something like a Stubby Steve's lure.

We need to remember that many years ago our good friend Cecil Baird introduced us to making "Cecil's Pantyhose Pellet Lures" to catch feed trained fish from our ponds.

Except maybe for a few perverted fish in the wild, none would attack a pantyhose bait. Yet, many of us have had great success catching our feed trained pond fish using this technique.

What I'm about to say may be illegal, but I can't find anything that says it is illegal.

Where Stacy and Stubby live (I'm just across the state border from them) we have a lot of public waters that are stocked with 11-14 inch rainbow trout during the cool months of the year, from about October to early May.

The local trout hatcheries and farms mainly use Melick's Aquafeed for raising trout. At public waters, during this time of year, I "chum" with a few handfuls of Melick's pellets. Then I throw in a hook, whether a spincast line with a hook under a bobber, or from a fly rod.. In any case, they are baited with one of the original Stubby Steve's pellets.

I did it last Friday evening at a local state-maintained lake, with snow all around on the mountain tops to the shoreline. I was the only one at the 80-acre mountain lake. It had been stocked about a week-and-a-half earlier (out of a two week stocking cycle).

Within about 15 minutes after chumming, I caught two nice fat 12 inch rainbows on Stubby Steve's pellets. That was all I needed for an Easter dinner appetizer.

The trout got smoked and turned into more than a pound of spread/dip that disappeared in seconds after it is put on the kitchen island with some crackers and chips.

.... yep, that's a keeper name

Can I put in an order for one?!?
Mr. Glazener has BIG plans for that bugger! We can't wait to hear about it....

I'm SO glad you gentlemen fish so much that you can answer these tough questions for us! We are constantly learning from you. Thank you.

Steve is home making his first prototype of a Fish Food Crawfish lure.... The Stubby Mud Bug, or Bruneaux Bug (I'll explain the "Bruneaux" thing a little later when I'm allowed to)... we're thinking the bass will go nuts over them! Hopefully I'll be able to take a photo tomorrow when I see it!

I’m not to sure about all this genetic “imprinting” for LMB – maybe other species but LMB are funny critters. Avid bass fishermen use scented plastics for years with garlic, anise etc. and even heard of WD-40.

I recall as if yesterday, the first bass I caught some 80 years ago – about 8 years old at the time – fishing worms on a cane pole.
Ran out of worms on a nice spring day and picked a berry blossom and put it on my hook and caught a fat little bass!
George

Stacy and Steve have asked me to test their new Stubby worms on Largemouth Bass, so I came up with a plan:

http://forums.pondboss.com/ubbthreads.php?ubb=showflat&Number=328603&#Post328603

Thanks for the confidence guys – we will give it our best shot.
“Team Glazener”


PS: I have some "doozy" bass bug fly ideas for these Stubbys!

Hey Eric,

Yeah I know most of you guys can catch fish right away? Which is why I questioned maybe I was doing something wrong. I don't know? I am not going to give up just yet. I will keep trying to see if things improve this year. I will be at my land this Saturday setting up my feeder and all so maybe I will try them again for a while.

I have as you suggested a mix of AM400 and AM600 that I will be using.I will keep everyone posted on my progress with the Stubby Steves as I use them and we'll see what happens??? I just don't want anyone to think I am bashing their product I fee it's more user error on my part. It's easy to see a LOT of folks are having great luck with it. I hope I can join in at some point!!! Then again like CAT said maybe my fish just don't like them????

thanks

Should be throwing some Stubby Steves next weekend Stacy. You've definitely been talking to the right guy up here.

Hey, Josh! I can't wait to hear how it goes! Remember to take photos!

You're right, we've got the right guy on it!

Hello, gentlemen! I hope all is well. This note is from Steve:

I thought I would weigh in on the thread pertaining to Stubby Steve’s and its acceptability to non-pellet trained fish; in particular the very valid questions raised by Catmandoo as to the relevance and efficacy of our lure with wild fish. As the inventor I had the identical questions. This lure was invented because, correctly or not, I was convinced that my Aquamax fattened trophy fish became more difficult to catch with traditional tackle and techniques. We produced this lure exclusively for personal use. However, in our initial tests, its efficacy far exceeded our expectations. Unbelievably, the first fish I ever caught in our 2nd test pond was a non-pellet trained LMB. We knew there would be a small market directed towards pond owners who also wanted to catch their pellet accustomed fish. However, we wanted to know more. We wanted to know the answer to the very question Catmandoo raised- does it work with wild fish? In the past five years we have sent out approximately 50,000 sample packs to every fishing venue we could acquire, including 5.000 packs to NAFC and FishHound field testers. It is important to preface the following by declaring what I am about to say is based on hundreds if not thousands of calls and emails over the past 5 years, plus the results of the NAFC and FH which they were required to forward to us. Bottom line – the vast majority of fish caught with SS have never seen, tasted or smelled a fish food pellet. Many of their results are posted on our website. There wasn’t a species of fresh water fish that wasn’t equally represented in their catch results, including LMB. There is however, I feel, a very scientific reason for this. I wish I could share this with the PB community but I would be relinquishing very important proprietary information. Jardan inc. (Pure Fishing/Berkley, et. al.) is already breathing down our neck, so best I shut up. Since the shape of the brown pellet is very unfamiliar to wild fish the attraction has to be the smell. To help validate this I can relay a recent incident. We are now involved in the crappie tournament trail. In our first four tournaments in which some of the anglers used our product we procured 4 first places, 4 second places, 1 third 3rd, and 3 biggest fish (professional and amateur divisions). As most of you know, avid crappie anglers usually tip their jig with an odor attractant. They will tell you their success rate is much lower with the jig alone. In one tournament Jo Carter, who has been fishing the tournament trail for 20 years, and has always used minnows, was having terrible success. Half way through the one day event he had caught no fish. In desperation, he switched to the SS he had received as a sample pack. He very rapidly caught his 7 fish limit and won 2nd place. The following week, he won first place by such a large margin (3.2lb) that the rumbles of “what in the world did he do?” started. He declared at the awards ceremony he will never use minnows again (“coincidentally”, Berkley/Pure Fishing ordered a bunch of our lures the following week). Correct me if I am wrong, but my understanding is that crappie don’t take to fish food pellets well. I do think that with the invention of our lures and the likes of Gulp products we are in the very beginning of realizing how important the correct odor is in the day to day affairs of most fish most of the time; in particular as it pertains to catching fish. Thanks again to the Pond Boss community for their support; you gave us our start. Also, I recently recruited Eric West as an expert to draft an “affidavit of effectiveness” for my patent attorney and the patent inspector. In an unassuming way, Eric displayed his tremendous ability as a writer, an attorney, and his extreme knowledge as a scientific sportsman. Of course, he would not consider financial compensation for all of his hard work. I hope the PB community realizes how fortunate they are to have the “likes” of Eric West. One day I’m going to sit down with all of the scientific thinkers like Catmandoo and explain how this silly little product is made. Then you’re going to say, “that explains it!”. I promise you there is more to it than meets the eye. I feel this brown pellet and the favorable results with wild fish shows that a lot of the time if it smells right it doesn’t matter what it looks like. With the introduction of our worms and soon to be available crawfish and shrimp we will have the combination of familiar appearance and odor. We will be sending them to some of the PB folks for testing, if they will. Our worms are already in the very capable hands of George and associates. Thank you for your time and support,
Steve
aka Stubby Steve

-- --


Steve I believe in helping good people succeed and I believe in the product based on my own results. Plus I think a lot of Stacy and her efforts

Eric has some fun work ahead! Kinda like me playing with Roller Coasters, except I get paid for part of it

Esshup, you selling SS stuff?

My brothers birthday is coming up in short order, and I need to get him something unique! PM me and we'll get this ball rolling.

Oh,....Mr. West, that is really kind of you! It means a great deal to me. -- -- I love what we are doing and am so proud to be a part of it from the very begining. The website is my pride and joy. I can't imagine how dull my life would be if I didn't have all the challenges that goes along with this huge project. Steve is a good man and is such a hard working perfectionist. He always does the right thing and never "cuts corners" or half-way does anything. I procrastinate and am scatter-brained but we some how make it work! We do strive to do everything we say we will. He believes customer service is as important as making an awesome product. We'll be forever grateful for many people we've met here on the forum. People who go out of their way to help us just because they belive in us or what we're doing... people whom we consider friends. You made my day,
Stacy

JKB, Yep. I just haven't added it to the website yet. Send me a PM. We're in the clear because we're a paid advertiser. We're listed in the electronic Resource Guide, and will be in the next printed guide too.

The pellets flat out work. They stay on the hook for a long time too. This batch was caught with 3 or 4 pellets; I used a #10 hook and 4# test line.

Scott, can you share your website?

Sure! There's still about 50 items to add to the store, and not all the pages are done yet. There's days when I feel like my eyeballs are bleeding!!

http://www.hoosierpondpros.com/

Scott, website's looking great! Web work can infact make your eyes bleed.

Let us know when you're done, I can't wait to start shopping.

Looking good! Very happy for you. You have a new follower on Twitter.