DanielG

Here in Maine, ice out mid to late April. Ice water though.

Ya know, there are just lots of good ones and for us boomers there are a ton of unforgettable one hit wonders. But over the past few years I've really enjoyed the rawness of AC/DC and ZZ Top. Kind of fringe, I know and yes, I love many of the bands people have already listed but these two really get me going sometimes. And for something fresh.... Ask your alexa/google device, or look on youtube because they are great to watch too. for a progressive bluegrass band out of Boston called 'Twisted Pine'.

They do amazing stuff today and what was emergency surgery yesterday is much more routine today. It will all go well. Have a speedy (and uneventful) recovery. See you on the flip side.

I have no idea... but it looks like the third one could be made from a double door latch and the last one from the strike plate of a single door latch. Someone seeing flat smooth metal and drilled a couple of holes in them for swivel and hooks?

Yes, I got that. I had the entire end. I think a loop of thread came off in the middle and then kept falling off as I was wrapping and I didn't notice till a bunch of thread was wrapped around itself.

Thanks... it's on my list then when I go to look for one.

Yes, the rotating vise thing would be nice. I figured I'd tie a few before I made that move. If I got one I'd want to get a better one but need to be sure the expense will be used. They seem to come in two varieties. Very low priced and very high priced. I'd imagine there must be a difference. Thanks for the barlows tip. It's hard to decide where some decent stuff is just from looking at pictures online.

A simple little post. I tied my first fly today. I have a very nice Dr. Slick bobbin and used it for the first time. Halfway through tying the fly I looked down and I had a backlash on my little spool of thread. Yup, a real nest. Just like a casting reel. Seems one of the loops of thread came off the spool someplace in the middle and as I wrapped the fly it just fell off the spool over and over. The end product was a bunch of dropped loops entangled into each other. So, I've got a Curado DC. I've never had a backlash with it. I wonder if they can do that with a fly tying bobbin? A DC bobbin.

My first fly with real materials. Not great, but a good start. With better feather choices I think I can do better.

My crappie are only available on the first part of my regular loop. From the dot, which is where I live, going south about an inch. where that little curve is. It's the only place I've ever caught crappie. Interesting thing too; as a kid crappie didn't exist in this lake. In fact I had never seen one till about five yrs ago. BTW, the weird trolling loop is this shape out of doing it for a long time. It's where the bottom rises and falls and seems to harbor fish waiting to pounce as forage comes over the underwater hills. The lake as a strong top to bottom current.

Well... except that my lake is 4 1/2 miles long and up to 90 ft deep. with no brush.

Recent reports seem to indicate that the mortality rate for Corona is much much higher than influenza 2.3% compared to 0.1% and we lose about 40,000 people each year to the flu in the US alone. It could be many factors more for Corona. "In the study published Feb. 18 in the China CDC Weekly, researchers found a death rate from COVID-19 to be around 2.3% in mainland China. That's much higher than the death rate linked to flu, which is typically around 0.1% in the U.S., " Japan just closed all education institutions in the entire country for 30 days.... That seems pretty scary. They haven't been reporting infections from this that long either. I wonder where this is all going.... kinda scary I think.

No tricks or tips, just what I see where I fish, and I'm simply unsure why it is.... In my morning trolling loop around my lake there is one area that always has crappie. It is in a deep water section (40 ft) but they are always within 10 ft of the surface. No structure and no cover. They'll bite on almost anything, but in the spring the thing that gets them for me is some simple 4" berkley swimbaits. Usually the whiter the better. The $2.98 ones from Walmart. Five in a package. I often snag three or four fish in a few hundred feet. Shad crankbaits do it later in the season. Halfway through the summer they eventually grow as big as a dinner plate. I love the fact that they bite so easily. The thing I've always been puzzled by is that after the initial hit, and they rise to the surface, it's like pulling in a dinner plate. Heavy but they don't move much till I get them on the boat. They sort of ride on their side as if saying 'okay, you got me'. I've never caught one anyplace else on the lake I live on. Bass, pickerel, an occasional trout but crappie in a 3 mile loop area are in that one few hundred foot spot. That's my crappie story. I catch 3-4 on the average my first 15 minutes out fishing almost every time. But, it's a nice way to start.

I was that kid. Twelve years old. I walked 6 hours on Thursday nights after school delivering 200 îpapers for 15 cents each. I had to knock on the door to collect. When I got home I had to roll all the coins and walk about a mile to bring them to the tribune office, and I kept 1 cent for each paper. I made $2 for that six hour walk. After awhile, I saved up enough to purchase a 12 lb thrust electric trolling motor from Sears. That was a big day. I had an 8 ft flat front aluminum boat at the same lake and same place I live now (thumbnail picture on the left). Rereading this it sounds like that story about 'when I was a kid', and having to walk to school five miles, uphill, both ways while holding off a bear attack with my loose leaf notebook. Yup, still got the faceplate from the square head of the motor. That was 53 years ago. Man, I'm old. And my boat is still electric.... sigh....

I take EV-ERY-THING, I mean everything! Both poles, all seven crankbaits, both packages of swimbaits, my chatterbait, and both pairs of pliers, the small ones and the big ones. Yup, you heard it... two pair even when I can only use one at a time. I've been collecting stuff for years. Ashamed at how only very little of it actually hits the water. I'm a hoarder I guess. I've been working all winter (can't fish now so gotta do something) to try to thin it out a bit. Having very little luck. You guys are funny.....

Strange to say but I gave up mono/floro just to get rid of the annoying coiling aspect of it that always seems to build up over time and I have to straighten it out. That being said, I was weened on mono and really like it for fishing. The stretchiness feels right to me.

And even though I never catch anything with a chatter bait, there's somehow a very satisfying feeling of that tip vibration when reeling it in. In fact, it's the most enjoyable bait I never catch anything on.

Nothing like a good dog. When I got married the wife would greet me at the door when I came home from work. When I had a couple of little girls they would grab on to my legs when I came home. After awhile.... when I come home, it's only the dog that acts as if I was the best thing since bacon. Yup, nothing like a good dog.

Let's hope for a good ending to this. Usually there are a lot of people affected.

When the Bait Monkey bites, I love it when I can bite back. Here in Maine we've got a series of stores called Mardens. They scour the country buying up water damaged, hurricane, going out of business, etc store merchandise. It's semi organized but they purposely know people like to hunt to see if they can find that next big thing on sale. Usually it's marked down 30% off the original price tag. Now, it's funny that some categories of items are often marked down a lot more. Fishing stuff is one of them. Today my eye caught this 70% off Lunker frog in a bin of USB cables. In the past I've found a bunch of KVD shad and other crankbaits, Superslick 8 braided line. The 30 lb green braid on my spinning reel was 300 yds for $13.95, and Lot's of hooks and sinkers. This frog today says $7.95 but I snatched it for $2.39. A little thing but it's fun to grab it and think you know something no one else around you does. The other people are there for the cheap USB cables in the same bin not aware of the gem they passed on. (Like they even care right?) Anyway, my first frog. I've been wanting one. Deep fast water on my lake. Not many froggy areas like weeds.

Probably the same few biologists that are climate deniers. Actually when I was teaching science, Years back when the oil issues were in full swing and it was a new thing, I was talking with the kids about how clean, fresh, palatable water was going to be a big issue some day. And sure enough, throughout the world it is a huge issue now. It's regional but it's the cause of most of the worlds premature deaths each year. The World Health Organization estimates that 3.575 million people die from water-related diseases a year. And, 1.6 million of those are children. So, it would seem that those few scientists were right. I had my septic system replaced this year after a 50 year run with the old one. That's a long time. I live at a lake. The hoops I had to jump through were quite formidable to get it replaced properly. A big headache but without it we'd be in more trouble than we are now.

I live in Maine.. a few years ago we traveled the country and when I was in Oregon we decided to have some west coast seafood. I ordered my favorite, the fisherman's platter. It consisted of muscles, prawn, and salmon. I'd never heard of such a thing. I ate the prawn. It was a huge fried shrimp. We don't have them here. A platter here is Maine Clams, Haddock, sea scallops, and shrimp. All fried of course. Also, I noticed the price of Maine lobster to be triple the price almost everywhere else. And it's already expensive here. I found out that people in other parts of the country think we have lobster like people elsewhere eat chicken. Actually we don't. It's usually for tourists. Most Maine people might spring for some once a year in the summer. Another interesting factoid: The gulf stream is warming up. They're selling their lobster boats left and right here. The lobsters are moving north. Biologists tell us that by 2050 there will be no lobster industry here and it will be greatly diminished before then. Sigh..... Heck, it's on our license plate. Maine and Lobster are almost like soup and sandwich. Gonna be funny when it's not. Right now the other issue is that lobster were part of the Chinese tariff thing. They purchase 60% of our catch. The amount shipped out went from 300,000 lbs. to 30,000 lbs in one yr. China went north a bit to Canada for them. Since the tariff thing was lifted a bit, the worst happened. They stayed with Canada. The lobster industry in Maine isn't healthy right now from the coastal trappers I talk to. That's my fish story....

I've had the fury for awhile and it's pretty good for the $. It's a spinning rod though. Another note, and a totally different rod and price range. I've got Dobyn's champion 735c glass in MHF. I keep using it over all the others. I don't have tons of rod experiences but right now this one has me.

What's that line from the movie True Lies? "Can't live with 'em, can't kill 'em."

We camped at lake Champlain state park last year. From Maine so no license but I watched an older gentleman jig a little plastic over and over off the dock and pull up mid sized bass each time. Jokingly I asked him, "do you get a fish every time you put your line in the water?" He said, "Pretty much."