boudroux

I broke my phone yesterday morning so no pictures. Yesterday my two boys (6&8) took a canoe out on their own to go catch some catfish bait, bluegill or red ears. Two hours later they came back with well over 30 freaking bombers! So many the bait basket was stuffed. Immediately I knew that that was to many fish to keep and we had to let most of them go. Boy I tell you reaching your hand into a bait basket with 25-30 ticked off bluegill is something special, its like reaching into a hornets nest. Later that day we went out to the main river channel with rip rap banks and threw small swimbaits for smallies. Both boys caught fish, I caught fish and couldn't take a single darn picture. Should have a new phone by Friday. Spending the summer 50 miles from anywhere down a dirt road is great, until you need overnight shipping.

Thank you. Memories for sure. Yesterday afternoon I watched a decent rod and reel combo disappear into the river when it slipped from my kids hand. He got hung up in the bushes on the edge and was trying to hold the line to break it off. All I heard was "ouch" and watched the rod disappear. The line burned his hand and he let go. Good times.

So I'm in my second summer of a business that allows me to spend two months on the lower Colorado River while my boys are out of school without the wife/mom around very much. We have the main river channel with it's man made rip rap banks that hold smallmouth. Last year my boys and I only fished the main channel and absolutely killed the smallies. This year so far I'm targeting the largemouth on the back waters. All this is still very new to me so each time I catch a fish I feel like a little kid at a toy store. The back waters look like this, I have direct access to approximately nine miles of this type of water, it's shallow from edge to edge, 6" visibility and in the middle of the CA/AZ desert so the water is warm and the air temps are 100+ all summer: So far I've caught em flipping brush hog type plastics to the reeds and have been catching a lot of small guys, nothing decent + yet. This past week the milfoil has started breaking through and creating big surface mats and I've been getting them on a frog along the edges of the thick mats. These have been my first top water bass and holy cow what a blast. So far the decent sized ones have come on the frog. When flipping the tules with the brush hogs I'm wondering if the bigger bass prefer a different type/area of cover since I've not hooked one yet in the tule edges. Is there such a thing as primary cover where the big boys hang and secondary, not as good, cover that the little ones get pushed to? I've also recently learned that if I'm in my boat solo (19' 20 yr old Ranger 396V) to only fill up the gas tank opposite of the drivers side or I feel like a there is a serous case of gangster lean going on when not on plane, or I just need to lose some weight. ha The other thing that has been fun to watch is my boys 6 & 8, learning how to use a bait caster. I got them both a Kastking reel with a price point ABU rod. Kids can't get it through their heads that distance comes with skill and me telling them to worry about properly casting before trying to zing the bait a country mile fall on deaf ears. However they seem to be having more fun fighting birds nest on their "adult" set ups vs using their spinning gear that their spinning gear has been relegated to nightcrawler rigs for catfish. It's Tuesday, we've been taking "river" baths each day and mom is showing up this Friday to resupply us with clothes so we are on tap to take a real shower and do some serious house cleaning. I'll start taking some pictures of our fish to post,. I'm not good at remembering to do that but the memories for my boys are important. Been a flyfisherman my entire life and it's nice to know there are other types of fishing that are just as fun. Also, at night the big ole catfish are prowling for bluegill, caught this 40 pounder last year and hope to get a bigger one this year: My 5yr old last summer with one of many smallies, hopefully we get into them this year like we did last because those little suckers are fun to catch.

I spent all of June, July, August in the desert last year on the water, every day pretty much all day and wore these plus a neck gater. Super cheap, spf and really made a difference. https://m.epicsports.com/Soccer/p/7693/index.html

Actually ran the boat today and couldn't tell a difference. I felt a little bit more resistance turning left but that could have just been my mind playing tricks. The link above is exactly what was on there when I purchased this boat and I'm not going to worry about putting it back on. The tab didn't stop me from getting in a hour of fishing before futzing around the property and catching 4 bass and thats all that matters. Thanks for the replies all, I really appreciate it. I'm closing the computer and going fishing right now.

Just got a call from my buddy about my boat. I have an 88 Mercury Black Max 200 on my boat and my buddy pulled it out of the water and forgot to trim the motor up. He said the little anti torque thing on the skeg broke off. The skeg itself is fine, apparently the bolts holding the piece on sheared off. The boat is located at our fishing camp hours from home and over an hour from civilization/boat shop. It sounds like the fix is easy, drill/tap the little anti torque piece, enlarge the holes a tiny bit in the skeg and bolt back up. My question is will running the thing without the anti torque piece for a week cause undue stress on the steering components of an older boat? I'm packing up and heading out there today with my sons for a few weeks (yea summer school break) and my buddy has to bring the piece home with him to drill/tap. He will be back next week with new bolts. I'm not overly concerned but am thinking about wear on steering gear.

Thank you for the replies. I tried fishing with it this past weekend and the problem got worse so I'm sending it in to a shop to have a look. I took it apart and reassembled a third time and it seemed good to go but after fishing with it for a little while the casting distance dropped like a rock no matter what settings I used on the brakes and it refused to go into gear unless I really jammed the handle hard. Hopefully it isn't anything major and someone who knows what they are doing whips it into shape.

Last night I took apart a Citica that is a year old to do a service. Holy cow the amount of grease that was in it from the factory was amazing. It was caked with a metric ton of grease everywhere and was a complete mess. So after cleaning it all up as best as possible it went back together easy. When I put it in free spool and turn the crank with a quick motion everything operated like it should. However if I turn the handle softly/gently the thumb lever comes up half way and sticks leaving the reel in free spool however if I continue turning the handle the level wind goes back and forth like it should even though the the spool is free. The slightest little touch with my thumb and it clicks the rest of the way into gear. So I took it apart again and everything looks like it did when I disassembled it inside. I checked the best I could externally for an obstruction in the groove of the thumb release and all looks well. I'm not sure what else could be hanging the thumb release up like this since I can't see anything in the groove of the release, the little rod that slides inside the thumb release groove is clean and looks normal. Not sure why it goes into gear with a quick turn but hangs up on a gentle turn. Any suggestions? Is it possible I bent/damaged one of the two little springs next to the pinion gear or something? Thank you in advance for any suggestions.

Just did a quick google search and found this thread. I've been lucky to fish the last two days in a row using a Daiwa Tatula CT that I just got. All my other reels are Shimano. With the Shimanos I've been using a long leader and have not had any issues with my conection knot going through the line guide hole. Day one with the T wing was spent cussing and undoing bird nests after my knot continually hung on the T wing system when casting. I used a blood knot on day one. Day two I retied my leader with the FG and the exact same thing happened. No big deal, just cut the leader down so it didn't go into the reel. It seems counter intuitive when looking at the Twing system that the knots hang on it but I certainly experienced it with two different knots. On a side note, I'm really digging this Tatula CT. To me it seems every bit as nice as the Curado 200I's I have for a little less money and the mag brake seems to do a good job.

Thanks all. After posting I found that thread above and did a bunch of reading. I've ordered up a 7' MH/F. Great stuff here, thanks again.

Howdy all. Great site here with tons of info, since finding it last week I've spent more time on the video section then I'd like to admit. Been trout fishing all my life, mostly by fly however I've now discovered how much fun bass fishing is. I picked up an older Ranger bass boat and my boys and I have been hitting it hard this past year. I'm from the Riverside area (SoCalifornia) and am now spending a lot of time on the lower Colorado River between Yuma, AZ and Blythe, CA, because of my business the Lower Colorado will be my primary fishing area. This section of the river and it's backwaters is mostly sand/mud/thick muck bottom, nothing to deep, mostly 1-4' with some deeper holes up to 10-12'. This area is packed full of dense tule/reeds 10-20 feet out from shore with lots of little pockets and breaks in them and in the summer when the water warms up the backwaters get choked full of (I think) milfoil. This stuff gets so thick it's crazy. It does make for killer frog gigging in the summer though, they sit on top of this stuff everywhere. With the boat we will also be hitting as many of the Southern California lakes we can for bass. I'm now looking to gear up with another rod. I like the Curado I's and will stick with those reels. I can spend between $100-150 on a new rod right now and will be able to do it again early June so even a couple different suggestions would be appreciated. Currently I have the following rods. A price point Abu Garcia Vengance 7' M rod. It says it's a fast action but it seems a hair soft in the tip then what I would consider fast paired but who knows, paired with a Curado I. A Dobyns 7'6" MH flipping stick with a Curado I A Rogue 8'6" Heavy with a Ambassador C3 I've had for years that has an amazing, soft first 3rd and the backbone of a elephant. I've caught everything from 40 pound flathead cats to 25 pound dorado on it. I'm using it for big swimbaits and it is awesome. I have tons of spinning gear and am good there. Being so new to bass fishing I'm a little overwhelmed on what I could use to round out my bass rod quiver from here. Frankly, at this point I'm not even sure what I should be throwing with the Vengance rod and what direction to go for another setup. Considering what I have currently it would seem I need something in the MH to Heavy range but holy cow reading about bass fishing set-ups makes choosing fly fishing equipment easy. HA. From my research it seems like the summer fishing on the river, with all the milfoil, weedless frogs would be the ticket but we have had success with smaller, shallow diving crank baits, spinner baits, curly tails on a jig head if we can keep them out of the darn milfoil. We also discovered killer smallmouth in the fast flowing main river which is an absolute hoot! It seems Dobyns Fury rods are a good bang for the buck in my price point but I'm open to other suggestions on brands however my main hangup is weight and action and what sort of rigs this new rod would be good for. I truly appreciate any suggestions and thank you in advance for your time. A couple shots of my little fishermen.