slickwater

This crazy. All of this for a fish. I have never entered a tournament because I can't afford it and I will probably never enter one because of all the stuff that happens.I know of a guy that won a tournament because he had friends on other boats helping him win. Because he needed the money. A cheater is a cheater no matter how well liked and how good they are at their sport. I am not saying Best Chance cheated because i don't really care if they did or not.I just won't fish a tournament because of all of the cheating.

I would have just called after the second stop.

I know Bob. Most people don't pay any attention to signs.

Ya you are probably right.Well how about all launches have a boat prep area with a sign that says do not block traffic.Oh but there is that sign again. We always park the boat and truck at the back of the paring lot and get the boat ready so we are out of the way of others. And then sometimes and idiot goes by us and is in the launch getting his boat ready and we still are waiting.

I think there should be a sign at every launch about launch etiquette. Placed well before the ramps and in big letters say." READ THIS BEFORE ENTERING RAMP AREA!"

Just curious, why do you think your electronics is the reason you aren't catching fish?

Because my catch rate has gone down since I got it last year.

Rick, if I read your totals correctly than, you only have a total of 9 salmonoids in 5 trips. It looks like your fishing areas that don't hold a lot of fish? Percentage wise how dose the core compare to the other setups?

Core really shines at low light times. Are you fishing those times?

Core is not the end all, but rather an additional tool for taking fish.

The steelhead are not from fishing on the boat they were from surf fishing in the spring.I guess where I fish doesn't have a lot of fish in the area right now I am fishing northern Lake Michigan and Northern Lake Huron . I would have to travel 3 hours to get to even Manistee. I have been running the full core and have only gotten 2 lakers on it, which I could care less about; the salmon have come off of the riggers.I always fish low light times always the afternoon until a little after dark.I don't know maybe I am trying to hard.

Fished St. Ignace yesterday. With the strong SW winds the surface temp was 40 in close and 57 a little farther out. Lots of bait up high. But only managed 1 laker and 1 7# king.

Well I have used my new leadcore set up 5 times now and I can't see what all of the fuss is about with it catching a lot of fish. I have only caught 1 laker on it. I even did what i was told not to do and clip the board to the leadcore and fish all different amounts of core out.Every one says that it usually catches fish when nothing else is.But not for me.

Well I tested the boat last night with everything running and all I get is about a .27 -.35 volts between all 4 downriggers.I even scrubbed the anodes on the boat.So i don't have stray voltage coming from the boat just low voltage according to the black box people. I would like some of you guys that consistently catch a lot of fish to check your voltage on your riggers while you are fishing.

I can't imagine fishing without one either. My handheld Gps quit working that I use walleye fishing and now I am lost without it. What sucks is I can't even get any of my way points back because it won't even turn on.Hopefully I can get out today and do some more tests on the boat. I am not sure if the wind will let me or not.

I got a new fish finder last year. And it seams that ever since then the catch rate on the boat has gone down a lot.So I was thinking it was from stray current in the water around the boat like they claim the black box cures.

http://www.protroll.com/books/?id=5&p_id=4

I have done some of the tests protroll said to do and i have these results so far with using a voltmeter. Has anyone ever tested their boat. I even tested the anode on the transom while boat was on trailer and got a reading of .35 volts. i will do the test with the fish finder this weekend .

Downriggers:

#

1. .33 and .35 with boat in gear

2. .27 and .32 with boat in gear

3. .36" .37 "

4. .40 " .41 "

I was thinking of going there this Sat. too.But i am not sure yet. I just want to catch some salmon. I actually don't care where I go as long as i have a good chance of catching salmon.

I just talked to my boat Mechanic and he says i should try and get this mercathode kit.But he is not sure about it for fishing. There is anodes on the boat and lower unit already.My boat is a 1995 221 Starcraft Islander I/O.Does anyone have any suggestions about this.

Check this out.

http://www.scotty.com/scotty-support/documents/BBox%20Booklet%202003.pdf

Thank you for this.

I got a new graph last year and I think that we are not catching as many fish as we did before we got the new one.It just seams that i get a report on where to catch salmon and we go there mark all kinds of fish and don't get bit maybe 1 or 2 hits all afternoon. I know there are other boats catching fish in the same area.What is a good way to test this?Without shutting off the graph.

Sounds like one heck of a time. Maybe that will happen to me tonight. But I won't hold my breath.

Bob fished with me on Sun. Evening. And we only managed 1 about 8#.

Where are you located?

If he was interested, we could meet in Dundee, Mi.

I will let him know.

Well he lives in Cadillac,MI that might be to far for him to come get it.

I have a friend that would like to trade his 1997 15 hp for a 9.9 hp short shaft.As long as it is close to the same year.He lives in Cadillac,MI

To all of you guys that think every launch was a pay launch is wrong. I fish at a bunch of different lakes that have no money collection tube. So that makes them free. I don't mind paying to launch but if you want to get a launch sticker now for the ones that were free then you still need a state park sticker to get into the state parks to launch.

Yes the $10 is fine. But this stuff with just now starting to charge at launches that were free before this weekend is a crock.

It really depended on the Manager of the specific park. When the money that the DNR collect stopped going right into their coffers and into the general fund is when a lot of things get let go. I can tell you horror stories from the fisheries dept that we just didn't have it in the budget at times to do what we needed. anyways another time for that. each district was given a certain amount of dollars per month to work with. that money was significantly cut from when the dnr raised their own money. and is the first thing that is cut whenever they talk of cuts, hell even when their not talking of cuts they cut the DNR. we were all against giving the money to the general fund but you know politicians all they see is dollar signs. this left a lot of the areas within the dnr to cut manpower to just enough part time people to hardly do their jobs. That is why a lot of the managers jsut let these out lying areas go. they used to have part time high school kids that used to drive from lot to lot just checking vehicles and if no sticker you got the ticket envelop on your windshiled. well that was the first thing to go. Some of the bigger parks like pontiac state, sterling state and jackson still had the budget and still can employ these kids to do this. that is why some of the parks you can get away with it at. At least Jenny has finally seen the value in the state parks, My uncle was one of the founders of friends of pontiac lake and they have been fighting tooth and nail to get the parks back. More money is flowing into the dnr again and that is why you are starting to see things like this. but you are also seeing vast improvements in all the state parks. I know it sucks that you have to get the sticker now but technically you should have had it all along. that little bit of money can do a lot to rebuild the parks to what they once used to be. now i am going to bed

I am sorry but I think you are wrong about always having to have a sticker in the past. You show me a document that states that i needed to have a sticker to launch my boat at the Dutchman Bay launch in the past or any lake for that matter that is a free launch with (no money collection tube on site).I can name off a lot of lakes that have no collection tube.And Dutchman bay never had one until this weekend, because i was there last Sun.Now at East Jordan you have to pay when when last week you didn't have to.I am just ticked that we now have to pay to launch our boats at launches that were free in the past.I know there were some that were pay launches that the DNRE maintained,like Higgins.