cart7t

Cart7 - could you give specifics about the whereabouts of a good area for spots? I'd love to take my ulta-lite and catch a mess of those fightin' SOB's. There is bank fishing above and below the low water dams at House Springs, Cedar Hill and Byrnes Mill. The trophy smallmouth area runs from St. Genevieve county into Jefferson county. I'm not sure there are many bank fishing spots in that stretch but you should be able to find some canoe liveries if you're intested in floating it. I fished the Big around Parkhills down a few miles, caught some nice smallmouth and that was before the 18" trophy sections were announced. Go to the Missouri conservation Dept website to get more info. or the best idea is to call Fords bait and tackle at 636-285-2564 in Cedar Hill. He's located right on the banks of the Big in CH at the low water dam. He could fill you in on the best bank fishing spots and probably hook you up with a canoe for a float through the trophy SMB section.

First things first, have you pulled the prop to make sure you're not wrapped with line? If that's not it I'd say your motor sounds terminal. Since it's a motorguide that's not surprising.... :running:

I don't usually mess with large marina's till the fall of the year when the bass are ambushing schools of shad back in the coves. That's when I pull out a prop type topwater, Zara Spook or Lunker lure and work the dock ends. The bass position themselves along the dock ends a wait for schools of shad to go cruising by and then lower the boom on them.

I've never tried crappie steaks in bed. I usually like to have mine at the kitchen table. Can't help ya, sorry.

You can rent boats from most resorts down at LOZ. DO NOT plan on fishing from a rental boat on the weekends not even this time of year. There is serious large boat traffic down there from around April - Oct anymore that really gets that lake rocking in a serious way. As for bank fishing, The Big River down in Jefferson county has many access points to bank fish from. There are several low water damns that have blown out over the years and each one has access to reach above and below the d**n for fishing. You can also rent canoes if you'd like to try your hand at floating. The Big has a trophy section for Smallmouth bass on it's upper reaches. You can also catch skads of Kentucky bass on that river and keep them. They're somewhat a nuisance fish on the lower sections and the conservation dept. encourages you to keep them. Very good fishing BTW.

Why not mount something like Minn Kota's power drive TM's front and back? If I'm not mistaken they've got infrared remotes to control the things. At worst, you'd have a couple of their flat foot pedals up by you fishing.

The 8" clearance is merely for airflow around the charger. You could get away with less but I wouldn't go jamming the thing into a tight fitting area. If you can find a spot in back that gives the thing 4-6" around it you should be OK.

How far away is the boat from the nearest receptacle? They do make 100 ft extension cords ya know.

What's that gash back by the tail fin he's trying to hide with his thumb? ;D

I keep a couple anchors at home which I bring along when I think I might need them. Mostly if I anticipate I may be doing some crappie fishing over deeper structure or when we used to take the kiddies out for a summer afternoon of skiing or swimming. As for an anchor, whatever you do don't ruin the look of the boat by sticking those anchormates on the thing. Just keep a couple of 10 lb mushrooms with around 30-40 feet of anchor rope neatly coiled in a storage box if you think you'll need them.

I've seen that in person (bass eating a duckling for real and the video). Pretty cool.

It would be easier if I was along with you showing you what would work best. How far from Missouri is this and I'll bring the beer.

When it warms up I'll walk down and see if there is any interest in a Wiggle Wart. That would be me. I live down in Arnold and yes, I was shocked as I waded through my old yard, in about 6-12 inches of water, at all the LM bass fingerlings swimming around. I've caught plenty of LM bass on the lower river, the problem is getting to them. The river is really only full of decent, runnable water only from around the end of April till the first week in July and the past couple years the only time there's been enough water was when the river was high, muddy and full of debris. When you can fish, I look at bends in the river, creek channel inlets, mud banks that suddenly have some rock on them, anything to break the current. If the rivers up, look for the fish to hold on flooded bushes along the current edges. Another good place is the sewer treatment plant outlet pipe directly across from the mouth of the cove where Meramec Marina is. As for the old sand pits? I've skied and tubed around in those sand pits many times. Partied on the sand beaches. They're around 20-40 feet deep in most areas. The banks drop off fast. The bottom is mostly sand and mud. There is virtually no cover at all in either of the 2 "lakes". Those big pits would be the last place I'd look for bass.

All I can tell you is the company is out of business and they used more wood than many companies to build their boats.

If it's that far up off the bottom of the transom you're getting a lot of turbulence along with air once the boat starts moving. Those skimmer type transducers need to be below the water line. Try and find a flat part of the underside of the hull to mount it to. I've found if it's mounted around a chine you can get turbulence that interupts the reading. Understand though that those outside hull mounts will eventually lose the reading as the speed increases. It's very hard to find a spot on the transom that won't cause the finder to lose signal once you're up on plane. The only was to completely fix the problem is with a thru-hull xducer.

Any idea yet on the lake or lakes you'll go to?

I'd say a 19 is about as big a wheel as you could turn on that rig. If you can find someone to "loan" you a 19 I'd start there and look for a target of 5500 rpms. If your holeshot is too laggy or you can't hit the rpm figure you might as well figure on a 17. IIRC, I used to run a 21p 3 blade on an older 17 1/2 foot pad hull boat running a 115 Evinrude back in the late 70's. I was just able to spin up to the recommended RPM's with that prop. Tip, as you go up in pitch RPMS drop, going down raises them.

You should not be able to put your fist into the mouth of a 4 1/2 lb bass with room to spare unless you've got really small fists. I've caught fish like that before, my guess has always been they were sick or possibly had a parasite or infection causing them to grow abnormally.

Bill Dance Jimmy Houston Orlando Wilson Hank Parker

You are correct. It's an old wives tale and your reasons are valid. The plastic case acts as an insulator. If the plastic case was actually conductive, you lose more charge between the positive and negative posts than you would into concrete. Besides, for a battery to discharge through a plastic battery case into the concrete would require there to be some sort of conductive path from the positive terminal on the battery to the negative that caused it to conduct. I pull my batteries every winter and store them in the garage on a concrete floor. They've never discharged. Old wives tale.

I just picked up some rod socks and tried them last week. They worked well and I'll be picking up a dozen or so to cover all my rods.

Ebay would be the place to look that's for sure.

You never mentioned your finances but if you could swing it, a nice used 17-18ft fiberglass bass boat would be the way to go IMO. The difference in the ride between an aluminum and fiberglass is like night and day. The fiberglass will give a more solid feel and a smoother ride should the water get rough. Having your wife and child bang around in rough water in an aluminum is a quick way to have them not want to go out again. Since you're only a mile away from the lake, towing won't be an issue. Forget the marina charges, keep the boat garaged and fully loaded ready to go, it's a matter of hitch n go. Good luck and stop by if you have any more questions.

As you can see from the picture, it's pretty cut n dry. You should see what you've got to do to replace a transom in a fiberglass boat.

Here in Missouri the low fifties water temp gets them moving. We usually go from a shad die off (jerkbait bite) to a crankbait bite as the water warms. There is a short week or so period inbetween when both methods work on the same lake.