TOXIC

My opinion is just my opinion and Tom is right there are a lot of worms getting out of the can on this subject because there are a lot of hired guns promoting livewell additives, treatments, etc. My only point is that no matter what you do that alters a bass' natural state is going to have a repercussion. Cause and effect. Simply loading the well with fish causes stress so you start in the hole so to say. Add temp, depth caught, dissolved o2, rough water runs, etc., and you get the picture, the odds are stacking up against the fish. Don't get me wrong, I'm not against tournaments (I've fished plenty of my own) but I'm still not convinced additives are anything more than a stimulant to keep them lively until release. The repair of slime coat claims and others, I'm even more skeptical of. As for the peroxide, there's no doubt it alters the livewell chemistry and probably for the good but what happens when you put that fish back in its natural habitat? In all the years I fished tournaments in all seasons, I had 3 fish die and all were from gut hooks. When guiding, my sponsoring marina always wanted pictures of bigger catches so I routinely carried bigger fish around in the wells before pictures and release at the end of the day. I never treated my livewell water. I am getting close to retirement and may hit the tournament trail again but the only thing I'll be adding to my livewells are vents on my livewell lids to help expel the toxic gasses that build up in a sealed well. I haven't added them yet because I do not well fish.

An old crappie fisherman once told me the best scent for a crappie jig was to rub it on the side of a crappie. I assume some of the slime coat gets on it. We joke about it........but we still do it.

Some of the lures I have caught bass both in Florida and Wisconsin are: Spinnerbait Crankbait Rattletrap Senko Dropshot Shakeyhead Jig etc...etc.... None of them required any special modifications for either location. Granted the fishing conditions were different and the color selection may be different but not the baits.

All joking aside, you didn't ask a "simple" question. You asked a very complicated question. You do realize the infinite number of rod/reel/line/bait combinations that are possible correct? You do know that temperature/wind and any other of a hundred factors play into it as well? For me, max cast is different with every setup I have and I "rarely" ever use max cast because it makes a hookset all the more difficult in most cases. Bottom line, practice and get good at what you will use 99.9% of the time which is accuracy. Your casting will increase in distance and accuracy as you throw the baitcaster more. Good luck!!

Long casts are not brute strength. The key to a long cast is loading the rod correctly. Trying to muscle a long cast is where a lot of your backlashes will come from. It’s no different than the sweet spot on a tennis racket, baseball bat or golf club. The grunt is secondary to the proper form.

Just to be clear, a 24 volt will have 2 batteries dedicated to the tm and 1 battery dedicated to the big motor and all accessories. They should never be wired all together. If you have a selector for the 2 tm dedicated batteries hopefully it is on the foot of the tm and not in the boat wiring. My 67lb thrust was a 12/24. Most of the new motors will not have that option. They are straight 24 volt only.

I’ve never heard of anyone saying that they wished they had a smaller trolling motor but plenty say they wished it was bigger. I had a 67lb thrust MG on my guide boat that was a 20ft glass rig. It was 24 volt. I upgraded to an 80lb thrust and it was well worth it. My current 21ft Ranger has a 112lb fortrex and is 36 volt. Normally your biggest consideration is if you have room for the extra battery. I would hold off until you replace and get the highest thrust your battery situation will allow.

The other thing he told me was that he didn’t know that having confidence in a bait would catch more fish but that he knew for sure if you didn’t have confidence in a bait you wouldn’t catch fish with it.

There’s no way to avoid a wet tackle bag when you fish in the rain. Once you open it to get a lure it’s wet. You put wet lures back in the bag and it’s wet. It sits on the floor of the boat and it’s wet. When I go as a coangler, I have a portable bag made by Plano that is a fold over top and has a rubberized bottom with the rubber coating coming up about an inch on the sides. The material the bag is made of is also waterproof. With all that being said it still gets wet inside. After a trip in the rain, I always take my boxes out of the bag and open them up to dry. For my hooks and weights box I will give them a squirt of wd40. For my cranks, I use some pieces of sidewalk chalk or desiccant packs in the boxes. I do this even when fishing from my own boat and my boxes are out of the bag. It’s amazing how much condensation can accumulate even if you are not fishing in the rain.

The absolute best medicine is to keep the fish in as close to their natural habitat while in the live wells. Recirculate fresh oxygenated water often. The downside to live well additives is that while the fish appear lively and healthy for weigh in, once they are released and the chemical wears off they crash and there is a delayed mortality. How many bad press pictures have there been showing dead fish after a tournament scattered around the release point? None of those fish were dead at weigh in and you can bet there were a majority of them in treated live wells. In the big tournaments they have release boats that take the fish to parts unknown for release. Is that for the health of the fish or to mask any that have delayed mortality? Probably both. Summer tournaments in hot water and catching fish deep without fizzing before release add to the problem. We are all about preserving the resource and I think we have a ways to go.

Just remember professional anglers are paid to promote. Lure manufacturers want to sell baits. Many times new baits are just a tweak to an existing bait or technique. How else are the bait manufacturers going to get the consumer to buy what they most likely already have? I tend to categorize my baits into what technique I want to offer. Top water, crankbaits, spinnerbaits or plastics. The multitude of baits in those categories can be overwhelming. I always go back to what Gary Klein once told me......if I can find the fish there is never less than 5 different lures I can catch them with.

That ought to keep him busy for a while!! Great info.

Did everybody forget one of what I call the big 3 reasons a bass bites? 1. To Eat 2. To protect 3 REACTION STRIKE.

In my totally unscientific opinion, I have seen the difference mainly in crappie fishing. I use Smelly Jelly on my crappie jigs and my catch rate goes way up compared to not using it. I have also tipped my little jigs with Berkley Crappie Nibbles and also noticed an increase in strikes over just a plain jig. As for Smelly Jelly on a topwater....you got me there. Possibly the oil sheen left by smelly jelly looks like an injured baitfish?

I have been receiving a lot of feedback on the Natural Shad color so I ordered some in the 5" senko, 5" pro senko and the Shad Shaped Worm to try in my applications.

Normally 4 inch because the gamakatsu football head jig is only a 2.0 hook.

On our annual trip to Lake St Clair those smallies see their fair share of tubes and to be honest in the early years that's the main bait I threw. As time went on, I found some alternative plastics that gave me 75+ fish days. Not suprisingly, the Yamamoto double tail Hula grub has been a top producer on a 1/4 oz gamakatsu football head jig. Likewise a 5" senko on the same jig head has been my secret bait for years. I rarely throw a tube anymore.

Awesome progress. Just an FYI, I have made many a run to Radio Shack to get oddball connectors. Last time was replacing my old style Water Pressure Gauge with the new style. Ranger sent the wrong wiring pigtail and we headed out and made one ourselves. Depending on the level of oxidation in the gel, it will be well worth you time to wet sand. Some products will make it look new only to have the dull finish return in a month. Been there done that.

I know in certain conditions a battery can reverse polarity but it is rare.

Honestly, they are very heavy and unless you are going with a very recent model year they are slower. The new boats, once set up right are much faster. Complaint on the older boats is also a wet ride. I have been in rougher and smoother riding boats, Ranger falls in the middle. Rangers shine when the trolling motor is in the water. They are an excellent fishing platform.

There are a group of us that go to St Clair every year and meet up with some friends in Michigan. We rent a cottage on Harsens Island and spend a week fishing like fools. One of the Michigan guys is always lobbying for us to take a day trip up to the Bay. It's just hard to leave St Clair.

Well, I have owned both and have a personal perspective that may be unique to me but here are my thoughts. NITRO - I was on the old NITRO State Team through Bass Pro Shops and ran the flagship at the time (the 929). Loved the boat and eventually it became my guide boat when I went that route. That boat never failed me in the years that I ran it. It did lose its "showroom" look very quickly and there was nothing I could do to stop it. I am anal about cosmetics. Tracker does not stock parts. Get 3 years out and you are on your own trying to find them (boat parts). Overall quality was fair. I had some things that bothered me like the quality of the carpet, the trailer build (tube) and the fact that every other month I had to re-tighten the shoebox hull back together. Newer NITRO's may be better and I know that quality has improved. When it came time to look for a new boat I had many friends that were in Rangers and it was not because they were smitten with the "status" of the manufacturer. They bought them because they held up, fished well and had customer service that was way above the norm. Not a Kool-Aid drinker in the bunch. A lot of my friends run big water and Ranger was the boat of choice. I decided to look for a used model since I didn't want to take the depreciation hit of a new rig. With used boats comes used problems. My boat was an FLW Pro's boat that had been sold to another individual and that person sadly passed and I bought it from the estate. Ranger has amazed me with their customer service and parts availability. They sent me, at no cost, 2 new fully dressed axles for my trailer when they had a bad run of axles. Go to any fishing site and you will see a lot of Rangers 10-20-30 years old still being fished and the great thing is that Ranger still carries parts for a lot of these models and they will actually manufacture a part for you in some cases. My friend that helps me with a lot of the mechanical repairs on my boat has had the opportunity to crawl in the guts of a lot of manufacturers models and he tells me that there is where a lot of the difference shows itself. Wiring, connections, bundling, material quality etc., is evident. Bottom line, if I could afford either in a new model I would go Ranger only because they have earned my business both in product quality and service after the sale. That's not a knock on NITRO either. As for the Johnny Morris purchase, it is a non issue. The same folks in the same factory are building the same boats. It's funny because if the Johnny Morris purchase is a negative it's because everyone is afraid that the quality will go the same way as a NITRO.

Big thank you for serving!! Fishing is what I call "recharging my internal batteries" no matter if I catch them or not. I am getting ready to retire in a little over a year and looking forward to having my batteries "charged" 100% of the time.

Patiently waiting for the Dogwoods and Redbuds to bloom.

Now with the camera's in the tailgates, I've been told that there are a lot of tailgate thefts. Luckily I can lock my tailgate with my key fob. Another thing about the portable camera's is that they are level with the bumper/hitch whereas my tailgate camera is much higher up on the tailgate at the lift handle.