jbmaine

thanks, I can understand the fishing maps not being super accurate, but I thought the navigation maps should be.

hi all, I have a garmin echomap chirp and have been noticing inaccuracies in their maps. For example, today I was on a lake and the map showed a couple of islands that just weren't there. At one point it showed me going right thru an island when I was in 10 ft. of water. Anyone else notice anything like this? Thanks Jim

I have limited rod storage in my boat so my rods are mostly " general purpose " rods that can throw different baits acceptably well. I catch fish. That's good enough for me.

nicely done, easy to see the attention to detail.

Can't stand anything around my face but I have a hat with flaps all around my head, neck, lite weight Columbia shirt and pants, and when it's really hot and we want to relax in the shade, a sun top for our boat. best thing we bought for it.

I'm not quite sure how to express this correctly, but here goes. When I was a kid ( 60+ yrs. ago) we had a camp on a lake. My folks gave me an old Zebco rod and reel, put on a worm and bobber, and I was fishing. Loved it from the first moment. I would sit at the end of the dock, staring at that bobber, waiting for the fish to make that bobber bounce. Couldn't be happier. One day a family friend stopped by, came down to the end of the dock, cast out an in line spinner and caught a fish. From that moment on a worm and bobber just didn't cut it. I saved up my money and bought one, then this, and that, and so on. It's been a slippery slope ever since. I'll never be able to afford the best of everything but I have decent stuff. Sometimes I miss the "good old days" when sitting on a dock, with a worm and bobber, satisfied me, but If I did that now I know I'd be bored in no time.

Biggest LM we've ever caught ( 7.1 ) was in mid September on a t- rigged Senko in 6 ft of water.

Noticed the same thing. Water temps are a little higher than normal, and I'm seeing weeds in places I don't normally see them at.

I always assume other fisherman are ( like us ) out to have fun and catch some fish. When they are close enough I'll engage them in conversation. Most fisherman are friendly and we'll talk about what a nice day it is, fishing conditions, etc. and I'll let them know I'll go out around them. On the rare occasion they are less than friendly I'll stay put and let them make the first move. I always try to treat people like I would want to be treated. I've never looked at fishing as " us against them " but as just, we are one of many who enjoy this wonderful thing called fishing.

Haggard lives close to me and I am blessed to call him a friend. Thank god he and the other driver are OK. He spent a lot of time and sweat turning his tracker into a good fishing machine. Hope the insurance will make good. As he said that stretch of road has been very dangerous lately. Really makes you not take anything for granted.

Welcome to the forum, It would help to know what type of gear, baits you are using, do you fish out of a boat, from shore? Generally speaking, with the structure you describe, I would try shorter casts so I was pulling the bait up from the structure and not horizontally thru it. Less chance to get hung up. Also I would use weedless baits, like a T-rigged plastic.

Use star-tron in everything, boat gas, mower gas etc. never had a problem.

I must admit that the bat, duck, rat, etc. looking top water baits have , to me, seemed a bit much but now, maybe not. We were out fishing an area between an island and the main shore, maybe 30 ft. between the two. My wife says " what's that in the water? " I caught a glimpse of something as it ran onto the island. A while later she says " there it is again." We moved closer and saw it was a red squirrel. The darn thing was swimming back and forth between the island and the main land. Nothing got it, but it sure looked like it would have made a good meal for a LM. First time I've ever seen a squirrel swim.

They seem to fight above their weight class when hooked at depth. And when they barrel out of the water and tail dance it's so cool.

Guess I've always been backwards. Spinning is all I use. Never had a problem catching fish.

braved the summer heat to try for deep water SM. Ned rig in 25ft of water did OK. Nothing big but a lot of fun. Here's one of them

Thanks again for the replies and info. It sounds like generally speaking, if there is a large cove full of lily pads in 2-4 ft. of water next to a deeper weedy channel. On a sunny summer day I would be better off fishing the deeper channel. And early morning, late evening, or overcast days lily pads would be a good bet.

In Maine you can not operate a water craft greater than head way speed within 200 ft. of any shore and must operate in a manor to cause reasonable minimum impact on other vessels.( or words to that effect ) In other words he was way to close to shore and too close to me to be going more than headway speed.

Thanks for the replies, I see videos of people busy all day catching bass in lily pads, but have not had much luck up here doing so. It got me to wondering, was there a difference in the depth of water pads grow in to explain why bass were, or were not in them.

Lily pads and LM go together like bread and butter. I've seen countless articles and videos about fishing lily pads, but there is one thing I'm not sure of. Around here ( Southern Maine ) all the lily pads I've seen were in about 3-4 ft. of water. Is that normal everywhere? In other words when I see a video of say frog fishing down south, are the pads, and LM in this same depth as up here? I guess when I see videos like this from other parts of the country, I'd like to know how closely can I relate this to conditions here. Thanks Jim

My wife is my fishing partner and better half, but she has hand, arm strength issues and can only fish for short periods of time, and only with a lite rod and Zebco spin cast reel. However this doesn't keep her from showing me up on a regular basis. Yesterday was a perfect example. We were fishing for bass in shallow weedy water. The bass weren't cooperating but we caught the occasional pickerel. I was doing OK with pickerel when I heard her say " Fish on ". As our usual practice she handed the rod to me to get it in. ( she doesn't have the strength to do it ). Got the fish in and darned if it wasn't the biggest, thickest, pickerel we've seen in years. 3.2 lb. 26+ inches of muscle and slime. No one will ever convince me a Zebco can't do the job. Here's a couple of pic's. the first one is the average I was getting, the second, I'm holding, but it's her fish.

Ya, it was pretty cool to see that happen. The inlet itself is only about 25 ft. wide then opens up to a big basin . When I saw the jet ski coming out I went to idle outside of the entrance to wait for him to pass me. Marine patrol boat was about 100 yds. behind me. Must have been inline with me so the jet ski didn't see it. Soon as the jet ski took off and passed me he got nailed. ( Marine patrol had to chase him half way around the lake before he could catch him) I believe in public water being open to the public, but this is an 1800 acre lake. He had plenty of time and space to get away from shore and me before opening up and having his fun.

Was out fishing today, Started to go into a narrow inlet and saw a jet ski coming out. Waited for the jet ski to exit the inlet. Right at the entrance, 20 ft from shore, 50 ft from me, the jet ski goes WOT and races past me. Hear a siren behind me. Marine patrol pulls him over. I love it when people like that get caught. Also, noticed he didn't have a PFD on.

He catches fish with this gear because no one ever told him he wasn't supposed to be able to.

I'm a believer in the coffee scent on Strike King baits.