Far Beyond Driven

It's about recruitment, which is dropping rapidly. That said, my daughter will be 9 this spring, has a 20 single youth and a .22 youth model, can set a spread and stubble a blind. However, she will not be shooting yet this year, as she's not ready to kill something with a gun. Fishing is OK with her, but shooting something seems to bother her a little, and I respect that. That said, as long as she's willing to sit in a blind with me, that's all I ask. I know this, I have friends that are going to be all gung-ho about this, and seeing how their kids act, it'll be a cold day in hell before I go near them if they are armed. No doesn't seem to mean no about small stuff; I certainly hope they learn to listen before they are swinging a shot gun around.

It's spelled forschner, no luck finding a site, just lots of places that sell them. Nets: http://www.lindyfishingtackle.com/catalog.aspx?catid=beckman Releases: Same as the knives.

Tekota 800 full of core 3 Tite-lok rod holders Two yellow birds Dave missed 13 cranks 1 spoon 14 dodgers 2 dipsies 2 mag rings All for $114, figuring in the limited amount of stuff I sold. Andrea walked away with $18.25 in her pocket and 50 squids. I'll be fishing a lot of squids this year. Thanks to the guy that cut her the deal on those, even if she stuck them in her ears and nose and scared the crap out of my almost sleeping wife.

I was the only one out on the piers at night in December this year in Holland. Went 0/0, 0/1, and then finally hit it and went 7 for way too many in a couple hours. A net would have been a good idea. Kept a couple hooked in the face and let go the rest. You can tell once you hook up where they are hooked - if they come in pointy end first they don't fight a lot, if they take off they're probably snagged. If jigging, use a stiff rod so you can stay in contact with the jig. Up - down in about 6" strokes; set the hook hard on any thing out of the ordinary.

I've had a lot of plug wires short on the rally cars, would not want arcing in the bilge if there's any gas fumes around. Cheap insurance to buy the marine stuff.

Make sure they know it's a marine alternator. I had my wife pick one up for me and ended up with a standard, so I ended up taking my junk one and giving it to one of the guys we rallied with. He sent it to someone and they rebuilt it like the rally car ones that are used with 400-500 watts of lighting. My Four Winns came with Pertronix. In 12 years and 1300 hours I've replaced plugs twice, and they really didn't need it either time.

Would love to join if the work schedule would allow. I almost ended up in one last year when my buddy was on vacation and there was a make up event that he was not planning on fishing, and then he was looking for a sub. I like the rule to be honest - I've got a good network but there's nothing like time on the water and being close to people who are out every day to get you on top of fish. As for the observing, I was paid to be belittled, yelled at, threatened, and told to look the other way when a laker came in tail first, but that's another story.....

On wire, on a 2 setting, with a dodger, I get almost exactly 1' of depth for 3' out.

Alewives can still get messed up if the water changes temp quickly while they are in spawning. Per my logs, mild winters mean good first year brown survival, so lots of 2-4# browns in the spring. I was out there Saturday, as were a couple other boats!

That should be clarified to currently or this season. Lots of people have first mated at some point in the past. What if you observed on a pro boat in a tournie? I've done that and was technically paid to fish.....

0/1 out of Holland, one half hearted pull back on a gold hot and tot in about 6' south of the piers. Worked 15-20' hard with some hooks on the screen before heading to the beach. Hopefully this will be the only skunk this year, took until mid-September last year and that was fishing the piers in 66 degree water. Lake was perfect; fished many times in April and May that were more miserable than this trip.

Last year we pulled 6 limits in a row south of South Haven in late March, and it was a colder winter than this year. 2-19-02 we trolled all around the through the discharge (last year you could do that) and got nothing.

15' and I'll take the summer off until there's a NE wind. I catch more fish each year out of my 14' than my 22', piling up the coho and browns early, the kings and steelies when the lake flips, the kings around the piers in September and then more steelies and browns until we get iced out. I should pivot chart my log in Excel by depth but I bet over 50% of my fish taken each year are where you can see the bottom.

Private field frozen out this morning. Went up to MWW to close out the season up there. Went solo so I had to pick left overs, but ended up where I wanted. Birds didn't fly until about 4pm, then I had two blacks come in side by side. Too close to shoot just one, and they stayed in formation for two laps. Finally pulled up and shot about 3' to the side to spook them more than anything, but one caught a pellet and folded. Missed a drake after that, and then sat up after working a few, and had one jump out of the spread right behind me. Over the shoulder shot didn't work. Right at hours I landed 4 ducks and then a group of about 40 piled in behind them. Missed. What? Dropped a drake with shot #2 and then just held off ending the season with 40+ ducks well within range. Walked out and the guys in the other half of my zone gave me a drake - the second one - that I had lung shot and it fell dead just shy of their decoys. Nice hunt to close out the season on ducks - had a few chances I let pass, could not get any of the 4000 odd geese that flew past to look, but two drakes and my third black of the year - no complaints.

We fished crawlers for cats in the 'Zoo this summer and ended up with a pile of gills and sunnies, and none were small....

Oh please use my road to test if it will go 100+. Just because we're the only house around, we won't mind. And when you have to cross the 1 mile long by 1/2 mile wide corn field that I'm sure you have permission to run around, instead of crossing the middle, please run right down the edge of the field 40' from my house. If you can, time this between the hours of 9-10, when I'm trying to get my two small kids to sleep.

People with the money to buy stuff at West Marine don't tend to have to work the hours we do......

The FICHT became the e-TEC. When management changed hands, they reviewed the design and it was sound, but some of the components in the FICHT were either not specified to the tolerances needed, or not built to the tolerances specified. I recall reading that every part in WIP was measured and lots ended up being thrown out.

To some extent, the lakes are sterile, and some nutrients are good for it. Seems years we have heavy rains that fall we have piles of baby perch and alewive in the fall. I can recall fishing in the early 80's and the lake was green. We ran size 5 J's 3' off the cannonballs, as the cannonballs got the attention of the fish.

The start time is lines in time. If the bridge is a factor, plan accordingly. I learned the hard way that 9' rods will fit under the bridge in my boat but 10' will not. They're 9' now.....

Ice. Backed over / through the snow pile the city pushes in front of the launch, broke the ice out of the way and launched. Made it about 300 yards before it turned into solid ice. Turned and went upstream, lots of big ice that would have been bad if it broke loose. Decided not to head back down stream and go ice breaker as I didn't want to end up iced in like Shackleton. Sucks as the lake was dead flat and I wanted some lakers to smoke. Pulled back out, went farther up the 'Zoo and went 2/3 on steelies, releasing a 5# buck and a 9# hen. No tracks at the launch, never saw a boat, heard a car, heard a sled, the only other humans that existed in the time I was out there were the ones 7 miles up flying over us. Should have put on some sun block.....

Not many days I'm still trying all that hard after 10 am. I would just assume have less time to fish and get back home in time to do something else. Also, my kids (8 and 5) crew most tournies and they can get restless. I'm off the lake by 10 am most Saturdays, beating the pleasure boats to the launch. However, if people don't get to fish as much and want to make it worth their time, I can understand that too.

If you see me leaving the helm in a big hurry, then don't move. I've already planned my route around you, and all you're going to do is get us both hurt. I'm either going for a fish you didn't see, or going to blow chunks over the back of the boat. Either way, you don't want me not to get there.....

Ah, just park a rig across the road there and there will be plenty of parking. That road doesn't get that much traffic.....

Well I guess we all get to fish for second place this year. The results from last year speak for themselves.