CybrSlydr

Yeah, the point at which we took the pic was when the directions said to inflate it partially and attach the frame pieces. So we hadn't gotten it fully inflated. It'd be nice if the valve adapter it comes with would close the valve when you unscrewed it.

Question: It says to not inflate past 2psi - how can you check that? It doesn't have a valve like a tire so what kind of gauge does it take?

Just got back from Cabelas and got it put together. Bro got the copper version. Setup was si.ple enough and we can fit it in the trunk of my car. But we can only get one if we get a second. We're taking it out on the water tomorrow!

This one is pretty short. Went to Cutler Lake and fished from a few spots. Was some nice weather, so we went up after my brother got off work. Water was pretty clear, could see some ******* fish swimming around. Initially we saw what appeared to be a bunch of Bluegill/Crappie chasing baitfish under water (bubbles and surface disturbances). Once we moved to a new spot, I tried one of our Rapala jointed minnows and managed to foul hook what I think was a Crappie - pan-fish shaped and was black/blue/silver. Very pretty fish. I saw one of the surface disturbances and cast near it and drug the Rapala through it - managed to snag the fish on it's "forehead" with one of the treble's. Pulled it out and let him go. Went to a different spot but by now it' was getting dark and the bugs were just CRAZY. So we called it a day and headed home.

Woof - those Creek Company boats are quite expensive! $500 for the cheapest one and the next one is $900! I think that firmly places it out of our price range - but thanks for the idea! Anyone know of other inflatable pontoon brands?

Wow, those are some really nice fish!!! Color me jealous!

Initially I wasn't going to post a thread because... I didn't take any pictures. There also wasn't much of a story or anything to talk about aside from a few things. But I figured I'd do it anyway, just to keep up practice if nothing else. So, brother and I hit up Dow Lake yesterday in the afternoon when he got off work. Got to the lake around 4:00pm. Started fishing our usual spot, a wind-blown point near the top of the lake with shallow bits on either side. Didn't have much luck. Started off with a 3/8oz chatterbait in black/blue. Brother started out with a 1/2oz Red Eye Shad in what looked like Perch. I then swapped over to a Rebel Pop-R topwater just to get re-acquainted with the technique. Brother then switched to a Rat-L-Trap in orange crawdad or something like that. He also tossed a chatterbait. I didn't hit anything with the top so I switched over to a SPRO BBZ-1 baby shad 2.5". I'm not sure what was going on with it, but it seems out of balance as it wasn't swimming correctly. I tried with a snap and then tied on directly with a P-line CXX 8lb leader. It was a bit ****-eyed and it's swimming motion wasn't until it was traveling quite quickly. Despite this, I actually landed my first bass of 2017 with it. Fish waited until the last second to make a strike. You can see (I think) that it was actually hooked from the outside rather than in its mouth. So I think it was following it in and made a last-ditch effort to eat it but missed and got two of the trebles hooked from the outside. Regardless, got it unhooked and let 'em go and he swam off. We then decided to move down a ways as we were seeing some surface strikes near us. Brother put on the purple Rapala Joined Minnow and I kept at it with the SPRO. Brother managed to hook TWO fish but both of them were as the lure was almost reeled in and both fish managed to throw the hook - whether it was the same fish or not, we'll never know. But it's by far the most action either of us have managed anywhere. After that we decided to move down to the floating dock where folks offload from their boats and give it a shot. Brother put the chatterbait back on and I tried out the Ned rig as well as the SPRO. Didn't land anything either here and around 7:00 decided to call it a day. So, last week my brother caught his first bass of the year and yesterday I landed my first of the year. With a little luck, the Clark Fork pontoon will still be on sale next week and my brother will most likely buy one when he gets paid on Friday. Then we can really see what we can find! Stay tuned!

Went to Dow Lake with my brother today and scored my first fish of 2017. Caught it on a SPRO BBZ-1 Shad 2.5"

Do any of you have links for where folks mod these? I'm interested in what kinds of seats they suggest and would fit.

If you folks have followed my Fishing Reports, you see the kind of places we tend to fish - state park lakes are the vast majority of them. Not much in the way of fast currents or too deep, IIRC (60ft at Wolf Run by the dam is probably it). I figure something like this would be a bit small for larger lakes like Alum Creek Reservoir. A fish-finder is also something I'd like to put on these. But, those are also quite expensive. lol What kinds of watercraft do you folks have?

My main concern is comfort - something you can sit in for multiple hours without getting cramped or sore. The ability to deflate and store in a small space is the main reason we're looking at those. A lot simpler than having to also buy a roof rack and all that stuff to slog a kayak along. Granted, in the future, we'd love to get a kayak, but for now we think this sort of device would serve our needs quite well.

So, my brother and I were browsing Cabela's and saw this particular inflatable pontoon boat was on sale for $249.99. This is just about affordable for us, so I decided I'd ask you folks if anyone has experience with one of these? http://www.cabelas.com/product/boating/canoes-kayaks-small-boats/pontoons|/pc/104794380/c/104710680/sc/104508180/classic-accessories-clark-fork-pontoon/1907270.uts Personally, I think I want to save up for one of the Colorado XTs or something (with a transom mount for a trawling motor) than go for this guy. However, my brother has 0 issues with using oars to get around and has little to no interest in something with a motor. So, my fine finned friends, anyone used the Clark Fork and willing to share their experience with it?

When we first got my brother's Pfleuger President, the anti-reverse was off. We thought we'd gotten a defective/broken unit until I took a look at the diagram and saw all we had to do was flip the switch on the side.

I love that movie - and when he said that, it just came to me - some days are better than others for witticism.

I've never noticed while looking at rods or anything, but do rod manufacturers every post a "suggested reel weight" or anything like that to help with properly balancing them?

I typically pick it up there, but I can't get over the feeling that my poor little pinky is gonna get poked. lol EDIT: After using the Dobyn's and Okuma set-up yesterday, I think I have to state that the combination is simply a pleasure to use. I'm not sure what it is, but it just feels good. I don't want to imply that my Penn Battle II or the *** I also have aren't nice kit - they are and I enjoyed using them (and will continue to enjoy using them as my heavier set-up) and would recommend them to anyone looking for that budget-range. But I think it's a combination of me knowing more about fishing (ha!) than when I started looking for gear and can appreciate the improvement both of these items offer. For instance, the rod casts extremely naturally. It loads up great and can chuck a light lure pretty d**n far, not to mention the feel you get from running a crank at speed or bouncing a Ned rig off the bottom. The reel is smooth, the handle is comfortable and both are very light-weight. It makes the act of fishing almost effortless. I think choosing a 4000-size reel and not realizing how heavy it would get was a mistake. The Battle II is nearly 13 ounces. The Okuma is just over half that at 7.4. The difference that kind of weight savings makes honestly surprised me. I figured, ounces - psh, but wow. I even wanted to go lighter on the reel - the ISX-20B was $61 while the ISX-30B was $45 - but I wasn't going to pay $15 more for it. Consider me an extremely happy customer.

Thanks folks. My only real complaint is the location of the hook keeper. I really don't like it inbetween the reel-seat and the butt. Just awkward and I feel like I'm constantly going to stab myself.

So I've used the rod a few times now and I'm liking it more and more the more I use it. Thus far I've used both my Penn Battle II with Nanofil and my new Okuma Inspira ISX-30B with 10lb Sufix 832. This rod absolutely bombs 1/10oz Ned Rigs with 2.75" stick baits on it. It honestly surprised me - something so light I didn't think you could cast so far! With 10lb Sufix 832 and a 6lb Stren Flourocast leader I'm very happy with the sensitivity of the rod. Chatterbaits you can feel easily as you reel them in. I've also checked out weighted EWG hooks with Senkos rigged Texas-style and with a high rod-tip you get some great action out of this rod. Haven't tried weightless yet. Another bit that has me happy is the design allows me to split-grip the reel but still keep a thumb on the blank. This helps with feel as well as control. So far I'm very, very happy with my purchase!

Thanks folks! Seeing him finally catch his first bass was 1000000000000x worth it! I haven't seen him smile that big in a long time.

Today was a pretty long day for my brother. He works at Subway and had to open the store today. That means up at 5:45ish and at work by 6:30am. To top that off, we decided to go to Cabela's in Wheeling, WV and get him a new fishing rod. Ever since we've started fishing, he's used the rod that came with his Pfleuger President combo. It's a 7ft IM8 rod (apparently that's a decent blank) but he's never had much confidence with it. Seeing as the combo was about $90 and the reel is a $70 reel, you can tell the rod is nothing special. So my brother gets home a little after 3:15pm and we make our way towards Wheeling (about an hour and a half drive). We decide we'll stop off at Barkcamp State Park (Belmont Lake) on the way home as I scoped out what looked like a pretty good spot to do some fishing and try out his new rod (and I get to try out my new reel [Okuma Inspira ISX-30B] on my new rod [Dobyn's SA702SF]). Barkcamp is about 30min from Wheeling. First order of business, however, is to get some food. My mom is originally from a suburb of Pittsburgh and we all love Primanti Bro's. It just so happens there's one in Wheeling next door to the Cabela's! He got the same thing as me - Angus Steak and Cheese. I don't like slaw, so I got lettuce instead (no tomato). Top it off with some mozzarella sticks and a giant pickle each (and two pints of Blue Moon for him lol) and we're absolutely stuffed. Time to head over to Cabela's to walk some of this off! So, I'm telling you this next part so I can tell you another part. On Thursday I went to drive to work and it sounds like I was either low on Power Steering Fluid or the PS pump was going bad in my car. I bought some PS fluid and brought it home and opened up the PSF reservoir and saw that it was indeed low. Unfortunately, I managed to drop the lid to the reservoir through the engine bay and it's now laying on top of the plastic sheath that protects the oil pan and what-not. ****. The car needs a PS flush anyway but I don't get paid until Friday this coming week. My parents said they'd cover the cost so I could get my car back - wooo!! Local shop quoted about $70. Not bad. My brother got paid on Friday and was going to buy a new rod anyway - but my parents being the awesome parents they are, said that since they were going to pay for my car fix they gave my brother an extra $100 so he could go buy a really nice rod! They've seen how little success he's had and knows he doesn't really like his current rod much. The great thing about that is it essentially doubled his budget for a rod. Prior to going over we'd done some research and he'd decided to get a 7ft St Croix Premier. 1/8-1/2oz ML just like my Dobyn's. However, with my parent's addition, he now had a little over $200 for a really good rod! So we went to the fishing section and looked at the available selection. Being that it's in the middle of their spring Fishing sale, rods were pretty picked over. We looked at the St. Croix Premier, a St. Croix Avid, a St. Croix AvidX and a G.Loomis E6X - all in the 6'6" to 7'1" 1/8-1/2oz ML range. After a good amount of going over and deliberation he decided upon the G.Loomis E6X in 7'1" 1/8-3/8oz ML rod. He says he picked it because it felt better balanced and a bit more stout and strong. He also cites that he felt it was better made - and it did not have the micro-guides that both the Avid and AvidX had (we often use leaders and those guides could have been trouble with leader knots). So now he has a G.Loomis E6X rod with a Pfleuger President spinning rod - an outstanding setup! Just how outstanding? Well, let me show you. After we left Cabela's, it was getting late. Sundown was around 8:00pm and it was looking like we'd hit the lake around 7:30pm. Not a lot of time to fish. We decided to do our fishing up at the north west end of the lake near the two bridges. There's a nice patio area with a dock and boat ramp and plenty of places to throw some lures. At first we both were chucking shallow cranks from this area. The water wasn't very deep near the picnic area (maybe 2-3ft) and had a lot of vegetation. I couldn't really do the Ned rig as it was always coming up with tons of weeds. I threw my purple Rapala with no success. I also threw the 2.5" SPRO BBZ1 shad but it looks like the snap I was using was throwing off it's motion, so I grabbed this snake-eye thingy from our most recent LTB shipment. No real luck. So, I decided to go out on the point you see in the third picture above and cast out. I was still using the snake-eye thing with no success. Light was getting low, but I saw a couple surface strikes out there. I decided to go back and get one of our topwaters and see if it'd work. In the meantime, I told my brother to grab one of the chatterbaits we bought and go where I was and give it a go. Well, he didn't use one that we bought, but one from our LTB - it's a black and white spotted chatterbait with no trailer. He cast about 6 or 7 times and didn't get a thing. While I'm going through our new giant tackle box, I hear splashing. I look over and my brother is feverishly gesturing at me to get over to him because HE HOOKED A FISH!!!!! With my rod in hand, I start running over (it's a couple hundred feet from where I was) so I could get there and grab a picture of him. Somehow, I manage to get that damned snake-eye lure thing stuck on a tree branch as I'm running over! I hear the drag pulling and a simple tug wouldn't un-stick me, so I just set my rod down and keep running. When I get there, by God, he's got a fish!!! He's not exactly sure what to do with it though. lol It's hooked in the top of it's mouth - he says that it didn't go after the lure until it was nearly reeled back in, so it followed it from quite a ways away. I tell him to put his thumb on the lower lip and pinch there so he can hold it up and use his other hand to get the hook out. Unfortunately, he can't quite seem to get the hang of how to remove the hook. So he asks me if I can get the hook out for him. It wasn't too difficult, but it was his first fish and adrenaline can be a ***** in those situations. lol I managed to get the hook out and hand him back the fish. It's not a giant by any means, but it IS a new PERSONAL BEST LMB for him!!! (let's ignore that it's his FIRST ever LMB) This is also the first fish he's ever caught by himself (technically). He's been fishing just as long as I have but has never managed to actually land something. The only other fish he caught was a catfish while we were trout fishing - and the guide got that fish and held it up. Broski didn't even get to touch it! I can't tell you how happy I was - but you can easily see how happy he was in that picture above!!! FINALLY, after ALL THOSE TRIPS where he came up empty... His first trip with his brand new rod and he lands his first LMB! About this time it's getting close to 8:30 and the sun is nearly gone from the sky. All the other people have packed it up and left. So we decide that we're going to end on a positive note - our first positive note in a long time! We embrace and bump fists, clean up our gear and stow it in the car for the ride home. There's the winning lure for the day! And the info-bits from his new rod!

I'm having similar issues. lol I started with Trilene XT. I then tried some 15lb SpiderWire, then Flourocast, then Nanofil, then Fireline, then Fireline with Flourocast leader... Now I'm going to be trying out Sufix 832 with and without a leader (10lb on a spinning setup). I've not erally "disliked" any of them (aside from the SpiderWire) but have been curious as to what the others are all about and if I'd notice anything different or better.

I've only been stopped and asked once, and that was on Labor Day weekend (I think) when I went with a buddy to fish the Alum Creek reservoir in Columbus. Thankfully I had my license (as did all of us) so it was a short interaction. However, being a holiday, I saw a couple of them with other people who apparently did not have theirs. Most often they were taken over to the DNR vehicle and run through their computers - I assume checking for license status. I saw one get ticketed but no gear confiscated. Regardless, in Ohio anyway ($19/yr resident license) it's a trivial fee that goes towards keeping these great places fishable. There's no reason not to get one.

Thanks! Appreciate the help!

Would you put a swimbait on there as well? Like a... super fluke or something similar? Or fish it bare?