Just Hook'n

Very nice Nick...way to go everyone.

Very sad indeed...43 is WAY to young.

Jesus gets another fishing buddy.

That is amazing.

Great work, and WOW, dedication.

Awesome work Nick...I think you are definately FIRST to the lake this year.

20 # Ande - almost unbreakable...almost.

June looks pretty open to me. I like the idea.

Gordie,

I am going to have my father contact you about the flashers.

He lives up your way (Baldwin).

Hydrasport is a tank...almost unbreakable in Michigan waters...awesome boat and you will NEVER regret a hard top.

Hope to see you at the slips at Yacht Basin in your big toy soon. Good luck Jon. Oh, and i second TJ's sentiments...I've been on Jon's boat and it is set up to catch a mess of Salmon.

Great story and thank you for sharing...it must have been a challenge...I know it would be for me. Welcome to the site. I think you are a little bit north, but anytime you are in the Holland area, just ask - there are always guys looking to take new people out and love seeing children catch fish.

Cool post and idea. Thanks for sharing

Capt Keeran is right...we have a 600 W Transducer (sorry I forgot that part).

The 1k will shoot right through the bottom of the sand in close and may be far too much for lake michigan. 600W is awesome for picking up details even out deep.

We absolutely love our Furuno unit...

My biggest recommendation - don't skimp on the transducer.

Get a good through hull unit - spend some money on it.

Then whatever screen you get will be that much more effective for you.

I use 20 or 25 lb Ande.

I've wrapped it around wire dipseys, downrigger cables, etc etc, and it keeps fish on.

Dang, that is awesome.

Dedication...impressive.

That was awesome Ed.

I'm going to have to start using my camera from the stand more.

Great way to share deer camp - thanks.

Impressive, how big a whaler is that? Almost looks like a pursuit setup. Thanks for sharing.

My thought was there was a lot of tension between the rod and the board (because they drag out so well) and not enough tension between the board and the fish... with a smaller board I think you are able to get the board straight to the fish (in other words a straight line from the rod tip to the fish with the board in the middle) faster than if the board was bigger. It was a weird experience. I really liked how they pulled the lines out to the side of the boat and I really thought they would do a better job in general, but we just kept loosing fish after fish on the 200's and 100's. Changed lures, sharpened hooks, tried a bunch of stuff, nothing seemed to help, so we changed the boards out and it improved.

Dave,

I just don't know what it was...could have been direction of troll and not being able to catch up with the fish....just couldn't figure it out. Kept getting strong bites...fish on for several minutes and then gone, before we got the board to the boat...it was almost like there was not enough tension from the board to the fish...at least that was our thought at the time. I'm still using the big board for 400+ coppers.

Hmmm...tasty...nice work.

Were the dock still in?

Interesting question...We sampled the TX44's this year because we liked them pulling 450s. They pull out to the side so nice that we bought 4 and ran them in tournaments with 2 TX44s per side and put our walleye boards away. Ended up having all kinds of trouble with landing ratios. We kept getting strikes on the 200's and 300's and could not for the life of us get the fish to the boat. Never burried a board, just for some reason had really bad landing ratios. So we switched back to the walleye boards and the ratios went back to what we are used to.

Nice work on the QDM guys...I do hope they pass the 6pt or better rule soon...It would help a lot I think.

That is AWESOME...great job...thanks for sharing

Well said Frank.