Osprey39

Well the nice thing about the square bills is that they run pretty shallow so they work well for fishing over weeds if they aren't too close to the surface. I love the KVD square bills but I bought a bunch of Bombers from BPS because they had them on sale for $1.99 each. One other thing about a square bill, they seem to have a different wobble than a round bill so you're showing the fish something different.

I've seen a lot of good comments about the Symetre and Stradic reels. Stradic is a bit more than I like to spend on a reel but the Symetre is right in my wheelhouse plus Cabelas is offering free shipping on reels right now so I think I will try one out. Thanks all. By the way, it's not the lures I'm using. This thing will get twisted up fast just fishing drop shot rigs and I don't think those put a whole lot of twist in the line.

I'm currently using a Quantum Incyte on my lighter spinning outfit. I like this reel but for one thing. I can only use it for about half a day before the line starts twisting badly. I know you're going to get line twist with spinning reels but this one seems especially bad about it. I've used several different kinds of line on it and none seem to lessen the issue. So basically I am looking for the best spinning reel for alleviating line twist. I'd like to stay at about $100 or less and I am totally open minded on brands. Let me know your suggestions!

I looked up a 2000 triton tr20 that was priced with a 200 merc efi on nada the base price was $10,600 but figured with the extras the boat has it had a low value of $13,605 and a average of $15,465 and they said they would redo the compression test while I was there and insisted that I lake test it and they give a thirty day warrenty I looked up a 2001 because that was the year you stated in your original post. Sounds like you have a deal there if they are insisting you lake test it. Good luck bud!

NADA lists the low retail value on that boat at $11,640 but that is based on the boat having a 225hp motor. Since the one you're looking at only has a 200hp, it's value is going to be less. It sounds like the price is very good if everything is in working order. I'd try to get my own mechanic to check it out if I were you and get them to let you take it out on the water or at the very least take you out in it. If they are reluctant to do that, there may be a reason why.

Interesting Wayne. I was looking at the Humminbird units but they aren't for sale at BPS and BPS has 6 pay option (ends today) that I can take advantage of. I really can't afford to shell out $650 all at once right now with Christmas coming up. Do you think keeping my x125 and using it in conjunction with the DSI unit would be a viable option?

I'm thinking about upgrading my Lowrance x125 on the bow to a Lowrance Elite-5 DSI/Chartplotter. For those not familiar with the unit, it only displays in downscan imaging. I've never owned a unit with DSI (or sidescan) so my question is two-fold for those that are familiar with them: 1) Is there any reason you would want to still have the traditional sonar display (like the x125)? 2) For those that have used side scan imaging, how important do you think it is? To get a unit with DSI and SSI plus GPS, it would cost a whole lot more. My budget is kind of limited but I don't want to spend $650 on a unit that I'll want to upgrade again right away. Please let me know what you think.

It has nothing to do with corporate greed and everything to do with the falling value of the dollar. You can't inject $600 billion into the economy and not have inflation. The prices are going to go up on everything until we start tightening the money supply again, be prepared.

Thanks for the feedback guys. I've never used buzzbaits much but my normal topwater go to baits haven't produced much all year so I am wanted to give them a try. Ordered a couple today so next weekend I'll see how they do!

I've always heard they were primarily a summertime bait but I'm curious if anybody uses them in fall. If you do and have had success with them, any changes you make from the warmer days?

To each their own and all but if I found out I had a friend that was a PETA member, they would not be my friend anymore. I have zero use for leftist wackos. Of course, the odds I would have ever become friends with them in the first place are extremely long.

So it's not just me. I can't remember the last time I got a Bassmaster mag and I had to buy the current Bassin' at the grocery store.

So far so good. I have a Mercury Optimax and the compressor went out on it. Cost me a good chunk of change and there's exactly one certified Mercury Master Mechanic in New Mexico and he is covered up with work so it took awhile to get fixed. It was probably a good thing that it took so long though because I got laid off from my job the last day of April and didn't get another job until the end of August so it kept me from blowing all my funds on gas

I'm not completely new here, started posting early this year but I took a hiatus when my boat was in the shop for an extended period of time (basically all summer.) Odd as it may sound, I didn't even want to read this forum when I couldn't get on the water because reading it always gets me amped up to hit the lake to try new things that I picked up here. There are a lot of really knowledgeable folks here and I've gotten some really good tips from this forum. I still read my magazines but now I will be back here picking the brains of all you again. It's been long enough that I thought a reintroduction was in order 8-)

I dunno, there's a whole lot of places to fish in this country. I think I can live without the hassle of inland piracy, lol. I know they have some big fish in Falcon but they have big fish in other Texas lakes too.

That was kind of what I was driving at when I asked why would you want to do it. Not only is there the hassle of getting it set up but now you have two motors to break down instead of one. I mentioned that I've only seen twin screw setups on ocean going boats and I think there are a couple of reasons they are used on them. First, having two or more engines when you're fishing way offshore is actually a good thing. Getting stuck without power when you can't see land is a whole lot different than getting stuck on a lake where you likely have cell phone coverage and can call someone to help you out. Secondly, the size motors they run in tandem (or more) on ocean going boats typically add up to more horsepower than you could get in a single engine. That's not the case in your situation.

Tracker PT series livewells have a handy feature that allows you to use the recirc pump to drain the livewell (much faster than draining by pulling the plug.) The downside is that if you forget about to put it back in the proper position you can inadvertently drain your livewell. I've done it several times. Make sure if you are using the recirc pump that the nozzle is in the right position. The nozzle pushes in and pulls out and I can't recall which one is drain and which one is recirc (boat isn't here or I'd check for you) but I think pushed in is the drain position. PS: after re-reading your post, I would bet that what I stated is your issue and not the drain plug in the livewell. There is no way it would drain that fast (if it would even drain at all) manually if you weren't running the boat up on plane.

Well I got an email yesterday that stated the winning weight for the 2 day tourney was 11 pounds and change. Not saying I would have won because the conditions last weekend were pretty brutal (high wind) but man, it was wide open and I had fish staked out

In the past, I have always tried topwater in tournaments early because it is a very effective way to fish for active fish in the mornings. I usually have something else in mind for when the blazing hot sun gets up here though.

Did you get it fixed in time to fish the tourny? I was pretty bummed when they told me they probably wouldn't even be able to look at my rig until after the 1st. Then I figured if they can't fix it right now, what difference does it make if it's 10 days?

This is a little more intense than I would have put it but I have to admit that I was thinking about the same thing when I first read this thread. By the time I was the OP's daughter's age, I had seen many fish die. In fact, I had seen many fish flopping around on the point of a gaff and then clubbed into submission so they could be safely unhooked (talking saltwater here.) I never felt bad about it. In fact, I was happy because I knew we were going to have fish for dinner in the near future. Of course, I was taught from the time I was about 4 years old that when fishing and hunting, you eat what you kill or don't kill it. Catch and release was something that was advocated heavily by Ray Scott so that BASS wouldn't get bad press by having a bunch of pro fisherman come onto a lake, catch a ton of fish that they kill and then leave. That tends to tick off the locals. In their Largemouth Bass book, the In-Fisherman guys actually advocate selective harvest over knee-jerk catch & release, stating that it is better for the fish population to take some of the smaller fish to eat.

I'm no expert but I'm gonna say yeah, if you have 5 more hp from one engine you're gonna push to the opposite side of the more powerful engine because it has more thrust. That said, why would you even want to do that? The only multi-screw setups I've ever seen are on larger ocean going boats and the engines are usually 150+ hp.

Sounds like you're describing a front coming through and post frontal conditions. A lot of times that makes the fish inactive and they tend to either go deeper and/or hold tighter to cover.

Interesting news, funny video but what does this have to do with tacklemaking? lol

If you want to make it so, it can be a huge advantage. You can position the boat so that the guy in the back can't throw at spots until you already have, maybe multiple times. I personally wouldn't do that, even to a guy I don't know but you certainly can. The only time I would do it is if they guy kept cutting me off by casting by throwing out in front of the boat.