MN Fisher

1. None of the lakes I fish are smallie hot-spots - Tonka has them, but finding them is a pain. 2. Hope you got 'padding' as the front-seater will be on a 'cheap' strap-on stadium seat over hard wood.

Might be something, somewhere on their site - but I haven't found it.

Meh...

It all depends on how much surveying they've done on the lake. Of my three lakes, only Minnetonka has the advanced overlays - Dutch and Little Long just have the contour maps. However - Navionics is good about placing things like docks, emergent vegetation and other tidbits, even in the lesser surveyed lakes. I-Boating seems to neglect those details in a lot of lakes...even some of the major ones.

Last year I was in exactly your situation - a Hook 2-4 and an 8" tablet. Used I-Boating's app and it was very good. The contour maps were very accurate based on my sonar, and the 'tracking' function worked well. This year, got a Striker 7CV, but no decent maps of my lakes from the Community, so still needed a tablet app. Went with the Navionics - and I'll be sticking with Navionics until such time as I can afford a sonar with built in maps...ya, it's that much better. I-Boating - you get contour maps...that's it Navionics - you get contour maps with overlays such as bottom hardness - invaluable to finding the right spots to fish.

I'm running a Diawa Fuego CT-H (6.3:1) loaded with 12# Yo-Zuri Hybrid.

(Raises his hand) If I pulled my old Cardinal 562 off the display shelf (yes, it's been serviced and is eminently usable), I could set up an even 16 rigs without left-over rods. Still leaves the Pflueger 640 on the display shelf (yes, it's very usable too) without a rod...but it's a left-only retrieve and I've gone to all right-hand retrieve. So yes - reels and rods I'd use are of equal number in my house.

Looks more like one of the Shiner species.

10# braid on my President 25, 20# braid on my Avocet RZT-3000...yep. You don't need to pinch it hard - just firmly inside a cloth to prevent burning your fingertips.

With a weight on the end, it won't 'flip about' to untwist, it'll be locked in orientation...that's why you use bare line. You can test this in a short way...lay out 15'-20' of line, pinch it near the first guide and reel it in while watching the end...it'll flip about as the twists come out. I've been using this method of untwisting line on spinning reels for 50+ years - it works.

Medium size topwaters - Whopper Plopper 75 & 90 and Zara Spooks as examples.

My Fury 702SF is my general finesse rod and I have no complaints...excellent rod for the money.

First intro to fishing? My uncle who would take his three boys and me out ice fishing for pickerel and panfish on Stoneville Reservoir, Auburn, Mass starting when I was about 4 or 5. Fished summers on Indian Lake, Worcester catching LMBs, White Perch, Yellow Perch and Sunnies. Back-tracked the stream that fed into the NW corner and found Brook Trout. Conned dad into taking me to Wachusett Reservoir a number of times (pic I've posted a couple times.) Even surf-fished Cape Cod for Stripers during vacations there. Lake Winnipesaukee, NH was also another vacation spot while living in Worcester. For many years, I was a multi-species angler - moving to upper Minnesota in 1974 added Walleye and Northern to my repertoire. Straight River in Park Rapids kept my Trout habit alive. Fished occasionally while stationed in Omaha in the Air Force, but basically wet lines with little to show for it. After I bought my house in 1986, shore fished Minnetonka for what-ever I could catch. Targeting Bass started when I bought a old 14' runabout with a 40hp. I still sometimes go after Crappie and Sunnies, but Bass is now my main target when I take the canoe out...though I am looking at getting a boat probably next spring which will expand my range on the lake.

Two of the dogs Nora and I added to the family were shelter dogs. Taking one in that someone else 'discarded' shows how big of hearts you and Lynn have. All the best to the new addition to the family, Andy, Nothing wrong with that...

(whistles) That's it, everyone...off my lake!

The only species of carp that will eat filamentous algae is Grass Carp - which is considered an invasive species. I'll put up with the native algae rather than have another invader muck up the waters. Muscles, clams, etc are filter feeders, so the only algae they eat is the type that floats free in the water. Anchored algae like F.A. is pretty much ignored.

My biggest questions on using a different lure to untwist line are: 1: Which way is it twisted? How do you know if it's a right-hand or left-hand twist? 2: How do you know when it's untwisted? Do you know how many turns have been put in? Playing out the line without weight on the end then reeling it back onto the spool under finger tension is the only way I know of to get the twists out the correct direction and amount.

10-to-1 what's happening is what they're pumping out is their gray-water tanks (shower water, dish-washing water, etc). That adds things that filamentous algae LOVE - more nutrients for them. Dozens of species of this type of algae exist - quite a number are native to NA - so the algae itself being transported isn't the issue...it's the introduction/expansion of nutrients in the water that enhance the growth of these algae that's the problem.

Sounds like a couple species of filamentous algae...they do that, smother the water preventing light penetration and producing an excess of oxygen. Just like humans, too much oxygen for too long can create problems in fish. "Hyperbaric oxygen: toxicity to fish at pressures present in their swimbladders B G D'Aoust PMID: 5762189 DOI: 10.1126/science.163.3867.576-a Abstract When juvenile Pacific rock-fish, Sebastodes miniatus, are exposed to oxygen tensions equal to those in their swimbladders, they exhibit symptoms characteristic of oxygen poisoning in mammals and ultimately die. Thus their central nervous system appears to be as sensitive to elevated oxygen pressure as that of higher vertebrates, whereas the cells of the gas gland tissue inside the swimbladder must be insensitive to the partial pressure of oxygen which they help to produce." https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/5762189/ Another reason to make sure the oxygenter in your live-well is performing properly.

I did exactly this to a 40 year old Diawa 1312 ML/F rod I had sitting around still in good shape. Cleaned the cork, then sealed it...now it looks almost new.

I dunno about that - as I said, I fill to a smidge (1/16...1/20...who knows) below the rim and I still backlash occasionally - even on the Patriarch...but I can't remember the last time I had to cut out a bird's nest.

If it's a #/0 - the larger the number, the larger the hook if it's just a # - the larger the number, the smaller the hook A #1 is just slightly smaller than a 1/0 A #20 is a trout hook - I use to tie flies on hooks that size. For sunnies and perch, I use a #6 or #8 as a matter of course when using worms under bobber.

Looks about right to me. I spool mine up to just under that edge - so a smidge more than 1/8" from the top-top. Your IPT (retrieve rate) goes down and you might have shorter casts - that's about it.

Dropshot, jerkbait on a 3/0 EWG Springlock (weighted or weightless), T-Rig, trailer on chatter or jig...it's used in a lot of techniques for me.

Mid-size topwaters - WP75 & 90, Zara Spooks, Yo-Zuri 3DB Wakebait, etc