Shakey Head

Spinner Baits

Cranks of various colors (shallow and deep divers)

Plastics, Plastics, Plastics (Worms, Craws, Senko type, creatures, etc..)

Tops (Buzz bait, Pop-R type hard baits and frogs)

Rattle Traps

Jigs -

Vary your colors from light to dark (Shad, Perch, Baby Bass, green based (Watermelons / pumpkin, etc.)

Just get a good base of lures and add to your stash, based on what you have success / confidence with.

Not an expert on rods / reels. I don't have a single rod or reel that costs more than $100. You can always upgrade later if you are gonna put a lot of time on the water. I have H20 reels and quantam accurist reels that I got all on Academy sales for @ $30 each. I have some lightning rods, H20 and some Academy Tournament Choice Premeir rods ( a few years back) and I think the H20 was the most expensive at $60. Haven't broken one yet and they are light / comfortable enough for me to throw all day.

I'd vary my rods to accomodate the cranks, worms, C-Rigs set-ups, et al. M, MH, H, based on what you like to fish the most.

I may get beat from the back of the boat but it's not because of inferior equipment. My .02 cents. Welcome back and good luck - I'd love to have some extra cash and get to start from scratch, sounds like a blast.

I'm sure I've missed some stuff but there is a lot of knowledge to learn from here.

+1....and absorbing all I can!

If you are wanting to start with a spinning rod, make sure to get one that can do the widest variety of techniques. Falcon makes their lizard dragger models in the original and bucoo series. They are good stout rods that you can fish c-rig, jigs, t-rigs or whatever. Get a 2500 or 3000 sized shimano and put some 30-50lb braid on and use a leader if the waters fairly clear or just use 12-15lb mono, I have pline cx premium 15lb on alot of my 2500 sized reels and it works great. Any larger mono and it becomes a problem.

Any type if plastic in wat/red, green pumkin, and june bug.

For crankbaits just stick with shad looking crankbaits.

Spinnerbaits you only need white and chart.

Tungsten weight are really cool but if you dont want to spend the money just buy lead.

Again, thanks to all that have responded as it has been a tremendous help. I have actually built a spreadsheet with all the lure brands, types, descriptions and when to use along with all the line recommendations.

I actually was on tacklewarehouse.com just today and had almost everything added in the ole shopping cart.... 120 items and about $900. You guessed it, the website took a cr*p and lost about an hours worth of work. So I will try again later.

I cannot tell y'all how much I appreciate this. If anyone else would like a copy of what I have compiled to date, just pm me with your email address and I will send you guys the excel file.

....watch it, buddy....you're treading on skinny water.....

Just playin'....lots of good advice...some of which I'm gonna be using on my next tackle purchase...

And yes...welcome back to the game...

Happened to me a few times too. Once I get over 100 items it wipes out my cart. Big waste of time. Made me so mad monster tackle got my $1200 that time!