Kayak Koz

Dogs are the best.

I've got to say, I have actually lost motivation the past 3 or 4 weeks. Work has been taking up a lot of my time, and I'm either too tired after work or I have chores at home or shopping to get done. But I will also say that even though I really like my kayak, I miss bank fishing in the lagoons back in SC. I could hop in my car or on my bike and have dozens of lagoons at my disposal all within minutes of home. With the kayak I have to haul it down to the lake, and then it takes me 30-60 minutes to pedal to my fishing spots. That doesn't leave much time to fish after work. While I have more time on my days off, the recreational boaters and especially the jet skiers are in full force and I just don't feel like contending with that. And then it seems like whenever I have the motivation we get a line of thunderstorms that come in. But I will try and break my funk this weekend.

That's one of the reasons why I prefer to fish with 40 pound (or sometimes 30) braid. I also have more confidence throwing braid, and that's part of the battle when you hook into a decent sized fish. As for the OP asking about hook size, I've caught 6+ pound bass on tiny beetlespin hooks. I would also assume that a bigger fish can generate more power to try and shake a hook. And as the OP later mentioned, slack in the line is deadly when it comes to bigger fish.

That’s why I don’t understand wearing a mesh hat. I prefer full coverage, and better yet a hat with a decent UPF rating.

Welcome to the boards. Whereabouts in GA?

I have two words for Florida summertime fishing: Live bait.

I stayed off the water this weekend. I was really tempted to head out on Sunday, but decided that the frustration would not be worth it.

We were back at it with Fishing with the GM this morning and the turnout was disappointing. We normally have 8-12 people fishing with us, but we got hit with a huge number of cancellations on Thursday and Friday for Friday night, How many? We went from being full to only 2/3 full. We had a grand total of one kid join us this morning. The good news is that the streak continued that every participant has caught at least one fish. Again, it was only small bluegills but at least it's something. With only one participant I had time to fish off of our docks myself for bass and crappie and didn't even get a bite. We're in the back of a shallow cove and the bass just haven't been there since the water hit 80 degrees. I'll be out on my kayak first thing in the morning on Sunday before the pleasure boaters show up and hopefully I can find the bass. The good news today is that I got my son to come out and help me. Because he's 15 he hates most things dad likes now. After being an avid bass angler himself he's just not into it anymore. But tomorrow morning I'm forcing him to take out one of the hotel kayaks and join me on the water for a while. He's the giant in the photo below.

I have a great BPS 1972 ballcap that I like to wear when out fishing but it's a tan color and when I wear it with my hotel logo shirt that's the same color I look like a zookeeper, so when shopping today I was looking far a darker color fishing cap. Just about every cap out there is a mesh trucker style cap. Did I time warp back to the 1970's? (And before someone chimes in about sun protection and wide brimmed hats I have those as well but I prefer a ballcap and a gaiter. I also wear the ball cap when we do our Fishing with the GM at the hotel.)

Gumbo: Overrated Underrated or Overrated: Etouffee

He keeps stalking me here on BR telling me to buy a truck ? It's turned into a running gag.

If I feel that I've picked up some grass I'll let it sink, then lift hard trying to free it. If the blade engages again I'm fine. If not I just rip it in and start again.

I could attach my transducer to my rudder and get a full sweep of the lake around me ?

Hockey: Underrated Man, that was a long, long time ago. Bonus points if anyone can guess which one of those motley members is me. I'll give you a hint - I'm in the first row.

Right now I still have the strength to move my kayak around. When I get off the water I empty, lift and spin it to drain it anyway. I also haul it up and down this hill from my hotel to the water and back. With the kayak, pedal unit, seat, electronics, and gear it's around 130-140 pounds. And trust me, the hill is a lot steeper than it looks in the picture. That being said, I'm in my late 50's and there will come a time - probably sooner than later - that it won't be easy to haul this thing. That's when I'll opt for a trailer. One reason I bought the pedal kayak was to help me get in better shape. I just didn't realize a lot of that would be hauling it around.

OK. let's play a little game. I'm going to throw an item or topic out there and you respond underrated or overrated. You can respond to your own items as well. Then if you like throw your own topic or item out there for others to respond. What kind of topic or item? Anything. A band, food, car, beer, sports team, anything you like. When you post your own it might be best to use the format Underrated or Overrated: XXXXXX Just so we can easily spot new topics/ OK, I'll go first - Underrated or Overrated: Derek Jeter

"People say that ideally chatterbait works around grass" What people? Chatterbaits work great everywhere. If the blade stops moving and you can still reel it in, that's not a fish on the end of your line. If the blade stops moving and you can't reel in for seconds you're snagged on something hard. If the blade stops moving but your line starts moving left, right, or back chances are there is a fish on the end of your line. ?

Mike Trout.

I prefer to cast to the left as well, but my unit presents more of an obstacle on the right. Because there is no in hull storage or openings in my kayak, - and I have the side scan - I can't have the transducer through the hull. So my battery box, transducer arm, and fish finder mount are all mounted together on the YakAttack Cellblok. So that stacks fairly high and interferes with my hooksets.

I currently have a Genesis Coupe with a sunroof. It's not designed to hold any weight and there are no manufacturers that make roof rack system for it. I had a hell of a time trying to find a bike rack for it. Truth be told, it's been a fun sports car for a while, but as I age I'm tired of the stiff ride and the engine and exhaust noise. Well, most the time. Today the road temperature was a pretty good combination with my soft summer tires and I was ripping along the windy country roads at 80+ on the way home from work today. I was looking at a solution like this to be able to load it myself.

Since my little car can't carry a 100 pound, 12 foot 3 in ch kayak I'm looking into buying a new SUV. And since I've never had a kayak before let alone loaded one on the roof of a vehicle or even had a vehicle with roof rails I have some questions. I see a lot of SUV's with sloped roof lines but it's hard to tell from pictures if the rails fully or partially follow that slope. I would think the rails are leveled, right? If they weren't then the nose of whatever you were transporting would lift unless you used adjustable crossbars to level the cargo, correct? Wouldn't a sloped roof tend to act like a wing, creating low pressure and lift along the backside of the roof? That would seem to put a lot of stress on a long kayak. Right now I'm leaning towards getting a Subaru Crosstrek, Forester, or Outback. Unfortunately, supply chain issues and inflation have dramatically increased the price of new vehicles and dealers aren't budging on MSRP. Some are even charging more than MSRP.

I watch the MLF broadcasts and at one event they did a segment on how braid has changed and that many of the pros were **almost** exclusively using braid. I'll take their word for it.

Bank fishing and had a nice 5 pounder putting up a good fight with my Lew's Mach II baitcaster. Pinned the butt end against my rock hard abs (!) and the butt end snapped off. I managed to wrestle the fish in without impaling myself. Lew's said it was such an unusual break that they provided me another rod for free even though my Mach II was out of the warranty period.

I strongly disagree. In fact, more and more pros on the MLF tour are using braid for all applications.

If it’s on your kitchen table have your pets and kids walk by the transducer ?