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There are a few problems I see with this idea. One, the water is often moving, so your boat is often moving. It's hard to get that kind of scale to measure anything with accuracy as the scales is moving up and down or side to side against the momentum of the plate on top. The kind you hold work better because you'll naturally counteract much of that with your hands. Two, for those types of scales to be accurate, they have to be level. And finding and maintaining level in a boat won't be easy. And three, those types of scales work best when the weight is directly over the center. When you combine it with a measuring plate, you'll always want to put the head of the fish in the same area. So small fish will be centered on one side, and larger fish will be centered over the other. The kind where the fish hang below the scale is always centered, assuming you're holding the scale correctly. And lastly, they're going to be kind of bulky and not as easily stored out of the way when not in use. I'm not saying in theory that it couldn't work. Some of maybe all of these problems could be engineered around. Like perhaps you could introduce a gimbal to the system to keep it level, stable, and upright, like they've done with compasses in ships for centuries. In its most basic form, it would probably work fine for personal use. But I don't see how you'd be able to get the accuracy or consistency needed for tournaments without increasing the price to something far beyond what's currently out there.

I quit fishing from 1996 until 2019. So 23 years. In '96 I went to college and from then on, I neither had the time, nor the money. I also was playing a lot of music during that time, so most of what little free time and money I did have was focused on that. But I got married in 2019, and my band had just broken up, and I felt I was getting too old to keep going. Plus the life of a musician is rough, and I didn't want to put my wife through that. So I came back to fishing and then a year later the pandemic hit, and fishing was about the only thing I could do. I've kept at it because I like the peacefulness and connection with nature, and as far as hobbies go, it's really cheap! I don't own a bass boat, by the way, nor do I ever intend to buy one.

If you're using 8 lb test mono, I don't think you'll see any difference at all. Bass are pretty aggressive and rarely line shy. If you were using 20lb test, then maybe, maybe fluoro would present a tiny advantage under certain, rare conditions. But generally moving baits illicit a reaction strike. So the bass aren't really studying the lure and making a conscious decision, so much as just reacting to it out of instinct.

I've got some fishing gear I inherited from my grandfather. It's all stuff made from 1970's-early 1990's. Some vintage lures date back even further. I enjoy using them. They're clearly not as good as the modern stuff we have now. But, they caught fish back then, and they still catch fish now. I mainly use them to remember him and the old days. But they also make me a better angler and serve to remind me that fishing isn't as much about gear as we tend to believe. Doing more with less trains you to do more with more.

At first I though $11,000 was kind of expensive. But after watching that video and realizing that just sitting in one makes everything around you move in slow motion, it sounds about right. That kind of technology cannot be cheap!

I use heavy braid and light jig heads for mine. I don't run across bass above 5lbs. So I'm not too concerned about the hook straightening on a fish. And the light jig heads that straighten out fairly easily make it possible to horse it out of just about anything it gets hung up on. It might not be the most effective way to fish an umbrella rig, but it's the most economical. And I'll catch far more bass if I'm not afraid to use it.

I work for a print shop. We print a LOT of magazines. We're even printing new magazines that weren't around 5 years ago. The death of the printed media is greatly exaggerated. That's not to say that the industry hasn't shrunk considerably. But younger people these days love the old forms of media. Magazines, books, vinyl records, film cameras, etc. They grew up in a digital world where everything is 1's and 0's. So they tend to prefer physical media when available. It's more than just a novelty to them. It's something real in a world where not much is. It's ownership of something and an investment in your future. In fact, our company is busier than it ever has been in its nearly 50 years of existence! Part of that is due, of course, to the shuttering of so much of our competition. But a lot of that is due to the younger generation and their appreciation for the printed page. You can easily pull a 100-year-old book off a shelf and read it like it was new. Try finding a digital article written 20 years ago. As for the decline of B.A.S.S., I think MLF and the rise of the social media influencers has a lot to do with it. Even before all of that, B.A.S.S. hasn't exactly worked to keep up with current trends. They're too focused on appeasing their dwindling audience and sticking to the old formula and not focused enough on engaging with a new audience on their terms. Printed media will never replace digital media, but it can supplement it. A lot of older companies see print and digital at odds with one another, and don't understand how one can support the other for a greater user experience. It's a mistake that will hurt them in ways they can't understand. The world is constantly changing, and those who won't adapt, won't survive. In the end, nothing's really changed in this world, other than the pace of change itself.

Great for buzzbaits where a fast start is advantageous. As for whopper ploppers and other topwaters, it just depends on your ability to slow your retrieve. Personally, I have no issues slowing down or speeding up with just about any reel ratio to match the retrieve speed I need. I feel like the whole matching a reel ratio to a bait presentation is nothing more than creative marketing to sell more reels than you need. But lots of other people complain that it's uncomfortable for them to reel too fast or too slow. So clearly, not everyone is of the same opinion. Then again, I am a musician, so I am well trained in switching and keeping steady tempos. So I might have an advantage there over your average angler. So you just have to know yourself and what your tendencies are.

Or it could have the opposite effect. If fluorocarbon has more uses with higher profit margins, then there will be more factories making it. It might increase the world's supply of polyvinylidene fluoride pellets and suppress prices. The fishing market isn't very big compared to the automobile market.

Maybe I show one to my wife and convince her that a Hobie is reasonable.

Tie a catnip infused plush animal to it and make a cat toy?

If you can surf, you can stand on a kayak. However, they're not the same thing. With a kayak, there are primary and secondary stability points. At the primary stability point, where the kayak is level to the water like a surfboard, they're not very stable. So you'll feel it want to tip over on you pretty easily, unlike a surfboard, where your primary concern is keeping your balance over the board. The surfboard won't roll so much as get out from underneath you. You also can't push a kayak around with your weight like you can a surfboard. However, at the secondary stability point, the kayak is a lot more stable. This is where the kayak will be tipped over maybe 5-10 degrees on its edge. But it'll hang there pretty solidly so long as you keep your balance over the kayak. And that's a lot easier to do on a kayak than on a surfboard, as the kayak won't want to shoot out from under you. My point being that it'll still take some getting used to. You'll need to develop some confidence in the kayak's secondary stability point and learn how to take advantage of those stability points. Since you've got experience with balance on the water, it probably won't be a tough or long transition. But just don't expect it to come easy the first time you're out. So you might wonder how anyone can actually fish standing in one on your test drive, but after about a dozen or so trips, it should be no problem for you.

Practice. I can pitch with my Abu 5000D on it's 5'5" pistol grip rod from the 1980's. You'd be hard pressed to find a worse setup for pitching than that, and I don't have any problems using it (other than it backlashes like crazy if you're not careful and is harder to make long pitches with). My point being, gear won't fix technique problems. Besides, shorter rods are actually easier to pitch with. They're just harder to pitch far with.

Wherever you can. A lot depends on the type of wood, how much you're looking for, how quickly you need it, and how you plan to use it. If it's just for a single lure in balsa, I'll often get the wood at a local hobby shop, just because I can get it same day. If it's cedar, then the local home improvement store will usually have that. If it's going to be a bit more than just one lure, I might order online somewhere. If I'm buying other parts at the same time, I may buy balsa from McMaster-Carr and get combined shipping. Or I might buy from Amazon and get free shipping if it's just the wood, but need to make 30 or so lures. If I'm buying a lot of wood (and not balsa), I'll get it from a local hardwood distributor. Or if it is balsa, I'll shop around online to what deals are out there. It all depends on how much you need, how fast you need it, and how much you can spend. Usually, the lower priced stores will fluctuate in their prices for wood, as wood costs are highly volatile. So it pays to shop around and not always just rely on the same place every time. Typically, the places that charge a consistent, flat rate tend to be a lot more expensive. And shipping is expensive, so you'll want to find a local place is possible. Plus, it's always better to check the wood out before you buy it, especially if you're investing a lot of money into it. But if you're not buying a lot at once, it's probably going to be cheaper to buy one or two 2x2x4 blocks at an overpriced hobby store than to buy 10 board feet of 5/4 rough sawn lumber that you'll have to prep and store yourself.

The Reveal line of Lowrance fish finders will not share information with any other fish finder, regardless of brand. They have no networking capabilities. So while it's usually important for that reason, I think in your case, you can go with whatever you like. In the future, when you go to step up from the Reveal unit, it may become an issue you'll want to consider. You'll probably want to match that fish finder's brand with whatever you choose now so they can talk to one another. But for this moment, it's not gonna make any difference, other than having to learn a different menu system. Well, I guess you could save waypoints to the SD card and then copy that SD card to another SD card on a computer and then put that copy of the SD card into the new fish finder if they were the same brand, so you'd have your waypoints on both fish finders. But that's a lot of hassle and doesn't offer much reward for all of that.

How do you plan on paddling with four rods hanging off your kayak? To me, that would be an issue I'd want to work out first. For instance, if you put two in front of you and two behind you, it would seem to me that you'd always have at least two lines in your way. Or maybe not. I haven't tried it myself, so I can't say how it would work in practice. You could go with four rods in front of you and paddle backwards. Or you could go with four rods behind you, but you wouldn't be able to keep an eye on them. You could do four rods to the side and let the kayak drift (mine always wants to drift sideways in the wind anyway). That's a picture of the rod holder setup I made. Originally it had four holders, and they fanned out for trolling. It might be something you could consider. Later I switched it to hold 6 rods straight up to make it easier to navigate around trees. But you can see all of the extra holes from the first rig setup. Also, the aluminum reinforcements aren't required. I put them in place when I had my trolling motor attached to it. I've since mounted the motor off the stern and cut off the side mounting plate. But if you just want an off the shelf one and you've already got how it's going to work figured out, I would think anything from Yak Attack or Rail Blazer would work fine. I've never used either, but I've researched both a bit, and they both seem to be well regarded. And just being made of cheap plastic, I'm sure none would stand up to much force (and neither would your mounting rails), but we're talking crappie here, so I doubt that would ever be an issue.

When it comes to frog fishing, wait until you feel the weight of the fish on the line before setting the hook. If you see a strike, reel up some of the slack and lower the rod and wait to feel the weight. Getting a lot of strikes and not a lot of hookups is kind of par for the course with frog fishing. Which is why I generally try to avoid it unless I have no other option (there's not a lot of weedless topwater options out there).

Agreed. You can watch some YouTube videos of other anglers and see the advantages and disadvantages for yourself. However, I've never seen a POV fishing camera that didn't annoy me. Everything is always out of frame or in the way. The view feels claustrophobic. There's just no control. It might be fine for things like mountain biking where you're trying to convey the thrill of speed or something, but for fishing, it just feels like amateur hour. Get your camera up on a pole or something set a few feet back. That way you'll be able to actually see what's going on. And you can get your pretty little mug in the shot. A POV view for fishing adds nothing other than distractions.

Try turning your wrist so the reel handles are facing up when you cast. That's assuming you're using a right hand reel and casting right handed. The problem is likely coming from, as others have noted, the rod not loading properly. By rotating your wrist, your wrist will want to move more straight up and down, as opposed to sweeping across at a slight angle. That should help correct the leftward hook you're getting in your casts. It won't cure everything, but it might help a bit. Plus, I find it a bit easier to get more wrist snap and more distance this way, with a bit less arm effort. And that increases accuracy for long casts. The rest just comes with practice and feel. Learning to get the timing right. Eventually, you'll pick up on how to feel the rod load and learn how to adjust your cast to that. You won't even have to think about it, just like you do now with your St. Croix. The transition for that rod was just quicker for you because it's naturally loading properly with your current casting style and baits.

I'm not a wakebait aficionado, but I like the BPS Egg. Color is simple. Chartreuse and black for any and all crankbaits. But I fish a lot of stained water.

I have no idea. I just tie things on and throw them. Is there something that would work better that I'm not throwing? Probably. Darned if I know what it is though.

Lots of scary moments. Don't know which was the most scary. But nothing got too far out of hand. Once ran across about 100 cottonmouths in a mating ball. They were coming in from all around and carpeted the ground. I was completely surrounded, and none of them cared I was there, so they had no problem getting up right next to me. Of course, they weren't focused on me, so it wasn't as dangerous as it felt at the time. Had a few chase me in my kayak as well on other occasions. But a hard thump of the old paddle on the water when they get close changes their mind about their place on the food chain pretty quickly. Been caught out in a few violent pop-up storms that had me question whether I should beach the boat or kayak and just wait it out in the woods. Gone from sunny and nice to 40+mph winds and lots of lightning in about 5 minutes. Each time I made it safely back to the dock though. Had a meth'ed out pimp yell at me and chase me off the lake. I guess he saw me call the cops on them. It's a city lake in the middle of nowhere that most people don't know about, so there's a lot of crime that goes down there. But I've called the cops out enough times that there's less of that type of stuff now, at least during the daytime when I'm out. Lots of stuff that could have gone sideways very quickly, but luckily never did. But that's life!

In the America's Cup races, they now have hydrofoil sail boats. I can barely believe that something like that is even possible!

The good thing about Dakota, is they're U.S. based. So they're more likely to stand by their product and probably easier to get a hold of if something goes wrong. However, keep in mind that there are only a handful of companies that actually make the cells, and they're all made in China from companies you've probably never heard of. So the brand on the outside of the plastic box is probably not who actually made the meat and potatoes of the thing. I'd check out Will Prowse's YouTube channel. He really knows what he's talking about. He buys a lot of lithium batteries for solar systems and tears them down and goes over what makes one good or bad or whatever. And while his focus is solar power storage systems, they have virtually the same requirements as trolling motors (high drain, exposed to temperature extremes, etc.). Here's a link to the Battle Born battery he broke down: https://youtu.be/G5E30u-66VI Personally, I went with a Weize brand 50Ah. They're a lot cheaper and still pretty well made. Well made enough that I could buy a second and still come out ahead if this one fails on me. But it's been nothing but reliable so far. I'm not entirely convinced that a lithium battery that costs twice as much will last twice as long or be twice as good. But that's just me.

Get an AGM. They handle the cold better than gel cell, lead acid, or even lithium. And they have higher cold cranking amps, usually. As for brand, as other's have noted, it doesn't really matter. The chemistry behind them is old, proven, and standardized. There aren't that many manufacturers out there anyway. One might have a better warranty than others, but if you've ever tried to make good on a battery's warranty, then you'll know that warranties aren't worth much more than the paper they're written on. Last time I had a battery die prematurely (two years into a three-year warranty), my "warranty" was worth about $15 toward the purchase of a new battery.