Boomstick

I have had back pains for most of my life. I don't let it stop me, but sometimes I have to sit down when my back starts acting up. Usually this does not affect anything unless I'm doing a full day of flipping or pitching cover.

I have found that your experience is fairly normal. When the water isn't too warm yet, a drop in water temperature usually means the bite drops off pretty hard and it can be tough to get any fish. But usually a day or two after the initial drop in temperature you can catch them again. That's been my experience at least.

Don't worry about the best time, just get out there and fish. If you can put baits in front of their faces, you'll get a few bites it's just a matter of finding them

If the internal memory is shot, there is a chance a card won't work depending on how the unit is designed. However for the price of a SD card (around $10 if even) I would definitely give it a shot.

Our Fedex packages usually go through two sorting facilities. One is over a hour away and they usually arrive a day or two after arriving there. The other is much closer but it will sit on the truck at least three days before the attempt delivery even if you paid for next day shipping. I would say I prefer UPS, but any package that goes through Shrewsbury MA has a 30% chance of never arriving at all. They should probably close that facility.

The Old Town Sportsman line is pretty solid and very competitively priced. My youngest son has the Topwater 120 (older version of the Sportsman 120) and it's more than stable enough for me and the way it handles chop on the water keeps it from being rickety so it's easier to stand on than my Bonafide SS127. However you have to work to get it rigged out as nice as my Bonafide - but he does have a pretty nice setup.

I was just down in North Carolina last week. All the fish I found in the southern portion of the lake were on beds and would not hit anything. Others who fished a tournament on the same lake told me they had the same experience. As I hit the middle of the lake, I started finding more "active" bass. Regardless of location, most of the bass were on points whether it was bedding fish or "active" fish. I wish I had another day or two on the water, but I'm fairly proud of how well I found the bass this trip.

What is true is the way that acid batteries and lithium batteries drain is different. When acid batteries drop in charge so does the power output which is lower to begin with so they can no longer power your device. Lithium batteries power output hardly drops with the charge so they produce enough power to power your device until they're essentially dead. As a result, my 18ah battery gets me maybe 30 hours of use per a charge, where on my 12ah acid battery (which is a little larger in size and the largest acid battery I can fit in my drypod) only gets me about 12 hours of use. As a kayaker, the lithiums make sense because they are smaller and lighter, and one battery lasts me a week long camping trip for the most part. The other thing that is generally true is fully discharging an acid battery reduces its life somewhat. Where with a lithium, once your device turns off it'll generally be fine unless you try to turn it back on again without charging it. So far I'm on season three with my lithium and it seems to perform well. At some point, they do stop holding as much of a charge, just like your cell phone but my Amped Outdoors battery has beat out any cell phone battery I have owned.

I am not sure what the issue is but I can say that on a full charge, my Echomap UHD reads 13.1v for a few minutes then drops down to 13.0v for a hour or so and will remain at 12.9v for the next several ours. I am using the stock cable. I am using a 18ah lithium battery from Amped Outdoors.

I have a 9" Garmin EchoMap mounted on the dry pod of my Bonafide SS127. It's a pretty standard setup for this kayak. Because it's center mounted, the 9" unit doesn't get in the way. My kids have the 7" EchoMap that is side mounted. The 7" units work but the 9" might get in the way on the side track. I definitely like the 9" screen, it's easier to see especially when I am running sonar, downvu and sidevu all together which is a common display for me

This winter, I was in a similar boat. Mainly since I haven't made it out in a while and have been super busy. Last week, I went to North Carolina and went fishing and refound my love for fishing.

The 704C will throw a frog in open water and it will do that well, but if you introduce thick lily pads it will not have enough power. You can get the 705c in the Sierra line (which is a worthwhile step up from the Fury) or the 715C in the Kaden which is 7'1".

You are going to have a weight limit with swimbaits. That said, you probably do want a rod on the heavier side. I normally recommend something like a Dobyns 735C in whatever line you can afford or the 7'1" Tatula Heavy rod for an all around heavy, but something a little heavier like the the 7'4" Mojo Bass or Bass X is probably a good choice here.

Where I live, I can usually tell you what the water will look like before I get to the lake (clear!). How long I keep a lure on depends on if I am seeing signs of life or not. If I am not seeing signs of life, it's either going to be a long day throwing a search bait or it's time to move locations.

I would sell it and replace it. There are plenty of other rods with a comfortable reel seat waiting.

My kid has the Mojo Bass/Glass version of that rod. It's pretty solid for pretty much any treble hooked lure in its weight range.

I use 12lb Sufix Advance but I'd be willing to downsize that to 8# or 10# if it was just 1/4oz poppers.

Yup, used Big Game on a few baitcasters.

Basically this. If you want to cast and not think about it, go Daiwa. If you want to hit max distance and win casting competition, go Shimano.

I went to North Carolina last week on a lake that is a fairly ambitious size for a kayaker, especially this time of year. I started by looking for baitfish. There were a few on the channel I was on, but not a lot. The channel north of me was essentially a giant flat, so I figured that would be a potential spot to find fish during the spawn, but there were no fish at all in that area. So I moved up the late another channel and found found higher concentrations of baitfish and even saw some bass in my sonar, but still couldn't get them to hit anything. As soon as I switched from a small tube to a wacky rigged deception worm on a drop shot, I started getting bites. I found more fish on points in that general area afterwards.

Definitely not a common choice, but I was once shore fishing and nobody was catching anything besides this one kid who caught maybe 8 bass using a spoon.

My largest two were both caught on spinnerbaits.

I have braid on a spinning reel that I believe I put on at the start of the 2019 fishing season. It's losing color but still works well. I only replace it when the spool gets low or if it's been dragged along rocks. In the latter case, you can usually cut off the 10 feet at the end and just worry about when the spool gets low.

You ever use the SK skipping jig? That has a nice flat head that stands right up on the bottom too.

I usually go with a swimbait trailer, although swim senkos work as well. I really like the 4" XZone lures swammer, the tail seems to vibrate perfectly in sync with the blade on most of my bladed jigs where with a Keitch I have to trim the tail or rig it upside down.