Scott F

I love the new technology in today’s cars. Back up cameras, GPS, Car Play so I can play my music without listening to commercials. Not to mention tire pressure sensors, oil life monitoring, keyless entry, and push button starting. Old cars were nearly done if they reached 100,000 miles, now they last twice as long. They get better mileage and start every time. The aluminum body on my current truck won’t rust out like my last truck did. I don’t miss anything about any of the old vehicles I’ve driven over the last 50 years.

When you can see the bottom in let’s say, 5 ft of water, the light passes through 5 ft of water to the bottom then back up 5ft for 10 feet total. The bass is only looking through 5 feet of water. He can definitely see you. He can also feel you moving through the water. The transition has more to do with water temps than the amount of daylight. I was in northern Wisconsin around the 10th of October a few years ago, way past the equinox. We expected the bass to be transitioning but with 80° air temps, the fish were still in their summer locations. The water needs to be a lot colder, like in the low 50’s to really get any transition going, but it’s not something that’s written in stone. Depending on the river and how far they can move, they may not move at all and stay in the same section of water all year if their needs are met.

I’ll give another nod to the In-Fisherman series. If you are looking for a book to tell you when to use one bait over another, for the most part, all you’re going to get is someone’s opinion, most of the time not facts. What you should be looking for is how and where to find fish. THAT is the secret to being successful. $1,000 rods & reels or the best lures ever made won’t catch a thing if you are fishing in the wrong places at the wrong time. That’s why the In-Fisherman books are so good and have been around, still selling 50 years later. Technology and gear changes but the bass still behave the way they always have.

A friend of mine bought one. The boat was fine, but he had nothing but trouble with the trailer. Both wheel bearings failed in the first year, the guide ons were flimsy and bent over the first time he bumped into one and the cover on the fenders fell off while driving down the road. If you are buying new, spend a few bucks extra and get the spare tire, they don’t come with the trailer.

I’ve been using a Toro “Super Recyler” with the Honda motor. I’m not a big fan of their Personal Pace self propelled system. I’m not very concerned about having a golf course quality lawn, but I do want it reasonably good. I’ve got a guy who fertilizes and applies weed control. In the last two years, we had a lot of what I think are voles that made shallow tunnels just under the surface. Once we got rid of the grubs, the voles went away but their tunnels started collapsing and made a sizable chunk of yard very bumpy. A few days ago, I had a guy come out to help me get it smooth again. He used 3 yards of compost and spread it out on the bad areas. Our soil is already very sandy so we didn’t want more sand and I thought compost would provide better nutrients. Unfortunately, the compost was loaded with small sticks, pieces of wood and rocks. I’ve been picking out those bits for 3 days now. The lawn is a lot smoother but will look pretty bad until the grass underneath starts to poke through. I hoping any small rocks I missed picking up will find their way deep enough that I don’t wreck the blade on the mower.

I “used” to fish with a guy who I’m not sure knew his trolling motor had a speed other than wide open. Me being in the back of his boat, would more or less be skiing my worm back if I was foolish enough to try one with him on the motor. When moving through what appears to be unproductive water, going fast is ok with me. But, when you get to what has more weeds, wood or rocks and has the potential for fish, I like to slow it down and pick it apart for a bit. He hated fishing slow and would often speed up and go around fallen trees so I wouldn’t be able to fish them. His reluctance to slow down at all is the reason I quit fishing with him. If power fishing is what you enjoy, do it! If boating more fish is your goal, a combination of tactics may be needed.

It takes a lot of practice to keep from getting backlashes and birds nests when using a bait caster.

If you can sell it for $30, sell it. If you don’t want to go through the trouble, use it.

Here’s a link that might help you. https://www.pcmag.com/comparisons/starlink-vs-hughesnet-vs-viasat-which-satellite-internet-provider-is-best

I find a dab of superglue gel keeps elaztech in place.

How do you know definitively that pressure makes fish line shy? Couldn’t they react to boats, trolling motor noise, splashing from constant lures landing, other fish being caught and released or a list of other disturbances? What makes you say it’s fishing line?

Tieable wire is ok for small lures but if you’re after musky, and the larger lures generally used for them, you’ll want something heavier. What the leaders are made of is more important than brand. Make sure they have heavy duty snaps, welded rings and ball bearing swivels. Length will depend on the size of the lure you’re throwing. They should be a bit longer than the bait. If you choose fluorocarbon, 100lb test is the norm for musky leaders but those are more expensive usually than steel.

I fish in wood and weeds all the time. Why don’t you think my setup would work? The leash isn’t so long that the fish will get down in the weeds or get tangled up. But even if it takes you a while to get to a place where you can set up, the fish stays in the water and healthy.

I used to struggle trying to take good selfie fish photos from my personal pontoon the same way you have. My solution was to first buy a “donkey leash”. It attaches to your canoe, and then to the fish so he can stay in the water until you are ready to take his picture. I use a lightweight camera mount on an arm also attached to my watercraft which is pushed out of the way until needed. My camera has a front facing view finder so I can see if the picture is composed where I want, then grab the fish and hit the self timer. The donkey leash Ram camera mount Results

If you are only really good at 3-4 things, you won’t always be in the money. When conditions get tough, and your 3-4 go to patterns aren’t working, you’d better be able to have other things to rely on to keep you cashing a check.

I’ve been seeing ads for these shoes. I think they’re great but not sure if I’d actually buy a pair. They come in different colors, but these are the best looking. What do you think?

There was a time when we’d be catching a lot of bass in a day and I’m terrible at keeping track in my head. So just like @herder above, I started using a clicker. It was never about bragging rights, but for my personal information that I’d keep in a fishing journal. Years later, I can compare “how it used to be” with today and knowing the info was accurate and not just inflated due to a faulty memory.

It’s about time someone came out with a bait that cost 3-4 times what a normal spinner bait cost and has clear arms because nobody was able to catch fish with metal arm baits. 😂

I was doing it when I caught the bass in my avatar. I used to live 200 yards from a great little smallmouth river. The fishing was great there until runoff from all the suburban, over fertilized lawns caused massive algae blooms made it impossible to wade.

My wife and I don’t eat a lot of tomatoes so we only had one plant this year. I checked on it in the morning a few days ago, everything was fine. When I saw it at 5pm, there wasn’t a leaf left on it. A dozen hornworm caterpillars had devoured all the leaves! No more tomatoes this year.

I was told by conservation officers in Canada that the #1 cause of drowning in Canada is people relieving themselves over the side of the boat. Seeing that most of the waters in Canada seldom warm up enough for swimming, few people get in the water voluntarily so I believed him.

FYI, putting your wet phone in rice can cause more damage as dust and rice particles can get inside. Not recommended.

Having a smallmouth come unhooked is part of the game. It’s what they do.

In Northwest Indiana, runs the Kankakee River. Back in the 17-1800’s, the Indiana portion of the river was the center of the Grand Kankakee Marsh. A huge wetland, people came from all over the world to hunt and fish. Developers bought up the land and dug ditches to drain the marsh into the river which was dredged and channeled. These days, in the spring when the river is high, smallmouth and northern pike swim up the ditches to spawn and often get stuck there when the rivers levels drop. As a teenager, we used to fish these roadside ditches and would catch 5-10lb pike in water you could almost jump across. Even today, I have neighbors who have caught 20” smallmouth from these roadside ditches. There are miles and miles of these ditches that run through cornfields. The biggest problems trying to fish them are the steep banks and are almost always 10’ or less wide making it difficult to cast.

Italian beef can be purchased at dozens of places around Chicago and the suburbs. Most are pretty good. Portillo’s is easily the most famous. Mr. Beef and Al’s Beef are also tops.