I like to rig it with 8- or 10-lb Sufix 832 Advanced Superline and a 5-6′ leader of 8- or 10-lb Sufix Advance Fluorocarbon. Smooth + strong combo and can still feel ’em “donk” the bait on the drop. Heavier leader when snapping out of thick weeds, and drop down to 8-lb for the sparser stuff.
I immediately hit Spot-Lock and fired another cast up top. Ended up catching 3 walleyes in 4 casts [!] snap-jigging my bait so hard that every stroke looked like a hookset…and sometimes was.
Noticed on the 3rd cast (the one where I didn’t catch a walleye) I had a piece of “eelgrass” hanging from my bait. The next few casts after that flurry of fish helped me put together the pieces of that puzzle. Ended up catching a couple of largemouth bass, brought in a little more eelgrass, and snagged 2 small-ish perch in the belly. So now I knew what they were feeding on and where.
That “eelgrass” typically grows in 10′ or less…sometimes out to 15′. Likes growing on a semi-hard bottom…like sand covered with a thin layer of muck. It can get thick, but these fish were relating to thinner patches of the stuff. Only thing I can think of is it was enough cover to hold bait (perch) but thin enough that those fish could easily feed in and around it. Especially since the cabbage/coontail mix I normally get ’em out of was soooo thick and overgrown = a nightmare to snap jig through.
The “X” marks the spot(s) where I found ’em relating to that shallow eelgrass, and I highlighted in yellow where I normally catch ’em midsummer on this point:
