Eyefull

Water weenie for the boats that come too close? Great idea, not to mention fun in the slow times LOL!

Frank, good luck with your surgery, hope to see you out doing your part to keep the walleye population under control soon.

I can't fish Saturday (Daughters graduation party), but will be fishing Sundays event. I am planning on hitting it Thursday and Friday if weather cooperates. The areas you talked about have been very good lately. Not so much out by #1 but just south and east of there was very good last week.

Nice job Luke, I ended up not fishing at all. Daughter graduating Sunday and numerous must attend parties yesterday.

Mmmmmmm, yummy:thumb:

Frank I think your right on. We couldn't get the low fish to bite anything. It is hard to convince yourself to fish high in the water column, because you don't really see the fish on your finder up high (other than trash fish). I think it is because your boat pushes them out and away from the sonar, not being seen. We caught a bunch of fish with 25' of line out, never saw a one on the graph??? It is very tough to compete with the bug buffet going on right now, keep on them. Have you or anyone heard of any steelies being caught? Last year this hatch produced several for me out by 1 & 2.

Thanks Frank, heard you on the radio a couple times, didn't want to jinx your mojo by calling you, sounded like you were on em also.

Same to you, seems like the Thomas tourny was the same weekend last year also.

Percentage of pot from entry fees.

The Michigan-sportsman outing/tourny. It is open to all, good fun, great food, and nice format.

Hoping to get back out Friday to find some fish closer to Sebewing for the tourny there this weekend. Fished the slot Sunday for a couple hours and had troubles getting them to go on spoons. May have to dust off the crawler rigs for that outing, or make the run West if the water is flat.

Here we go again LOL, stay on them Frank.

I had Paul Vantol and Alan Mackey with me today aboard the Eyefull. We left the DNR dock at a few minutes after 8:00 am, and headed to 1 & 2 to see if any fish were out there. Never caught or saw a fish on the finder for almost an hour and a half. We put her in a southwest troll, heading for the west south west area of the black hole. We started hitting fish about half way there, first a huge flathead that required me to slow the troll for Alan to stop the dumb thing. Our first walleye came on the 80' Blood Run copper let out 200 feet beyond the copper and highlined straight off the back. After that, it all gets fuzzy, almost everything in the water caught fish. A solid third of the fish came on one of the two copper setups we ran. One problem I have to get figured out is that the fish can't really pull enough to indicate a strike with the copper off big boards, we towed a couple around at least twice on that setup. The longlined setup was much better, just back the drag off until it ticks periodically, then any fish make that sweet sound. Anyways, the normal Silver Streak Jr., and Minis in a variety of colors, mostly including pinks, chartrueses, purples, and UV's. Nascar hit a couple also. Pulling them behind the walker mini discs as normal. We also had a fish come off a slide diver and a UV Pink Silver Streak 25' back on 0. It seemed like the closer we got to the sailboat boueys, the action picked up, but the fish quality shrunk. Farther north, we only threw back maybe two. One thing we did notice is that the fish seemed to move around in the water column a few times. We would catch them deep for a while, then totally have to change everything up to the extreme opposite to get it going again. We caught them with as little as 15' lead to the diver to as much as 150' of line out. We got our three man limit around 2:00, and finished the day with a triple while pulling lines. That part didn't impress the DNR, we got a talking to about having two fish over our limit while clearing lines. Apparently taking them off your hooks is "possesion". Anyways, no ticket(thanks Chad), just a chewing out, so good day.

Here's a photo of a couple spoons that seemed to take more fish than the others, but really most of what we had in the water hit fish:

We ended up with our three man limit of 15, including a huge flathead thrown back with maybe 7 or 8 undersized walleye, and our overpossession keepers that we tossed back while discussing case law with the DNR. Don't get me wrong, they do a thankless job out there and from his vantage point, it must have looked bad, but in the end, we reached a friendly agreement.

I would like to thank mother nature for the absolutely glass flat water today, and for the bug salad we had all day long, really nasty hatch to go along with the 95 degree sauna. Big thanks to Alan and Paul for fishing with me today, without help right now, I am pretty much shorebound. Too much of a sissy to even fight a walleye right now! :oops:

Don, it fealt great. I had a great crew that was more than willing to do the heavy work launching/retrieving the boat, and they did all the fish catching. Still can't use my left arm much, therapy starts today. Working on getting a crew for this week to prefish for the tourny next weekend. It was also nice to see the Blood Run produce on a very tough day.

Super flat water, high sun, and no fish= tough fishing. Lots of buddys did real good to the west.

Finally finished the re-rig on the Eyefull and got out last night. Despite getting good live information on an active school of fish out of Bay City, I decided to roll the dice and fish Quanicassee due to it being the shakedown trip, and not wanting to deal with the DNR launch crowd in Bay City on a weekend. It turned out to be a nice evening on the water, but very slow fishing. We ran out to the slot in about 13 fow and set down in pretty decent stained looking water. Huge crowd of boats trolling was a good sign. But after 45 minutes of trolling and not seeing any nets used, I knew we were in trouble. I had 5 people on the eyefull, and all of them newbies, so picking up and moving 7 miles wasn't in the works. After about an hour of trolling, the 60' Blood Run rods clicker started ticking. Pulled in the first keeper walleye of the 2011 season on a Silver Streak Mini UV Watermelon. We ended the night 2 for 6, throwing back three undersized fish and losing a possible keeper a few feet back from the net. We fished from 4:00 to 8:00, running the inside, outside, and one pass through the huge pack of boats to be sociable. Marked maybe 5 fish all evening! All in all, a good evening, all of the new rigging worked flawlessly once set up, and my daughters exchange student friend from Italy caught her first Great Lakes fish:

She did great work with our first fish of 2011 and the first one on Blood Run Copper.

Nice plump eater fish:

Arm is pretty sore today, even with everyone else doing most of the heavy work. Hopefully can get back out today or Tuesday. There is a really nice school of active fish on the west side out of Bay City that I want to get into. I also have to do some scouting for the Michigan-Sportsman outing/tourny next weekend out of Sebewing, two fish won't cut it for that:eek:.

Don't feel bad. I came out of Quanicassee for my shakedown trip last night about 4:30 and fished to 8:00 with little to show for our efforts. We fished in the pack, and on either side of the slot, not marking fish or seeing any nets working. We managed 2 keepers and threw back 3 sub legal fish. Silver Streak spoons behind Walkers was our program. One bright spot was the 60' Blood Run copper setup hit the first fish with a Mini Streak in UV watermelon.

Keep those fish herded up for the week before July 4th!

I heard it was a nailbiter. I'll post some photos when I get them from Capt. Tim. You guys can't tell I'm excited can you:D?

I just wanted to congratulate Tim and his entire team for winning the Onekema event this past weekend, completing the three peat. I am proud to be even a small part of their success, they keep making me look good. Keep the pedal to the metal guys, you rock!

It appears to be a spray expanding type of foam. Yep, I did exactly that with the adhesive. Thanks everyone.

My own question was just answered. I pulled the speaker out and the entire space between the two walls is foam filled, no way to get at the bottom of the gunwalls. Totally foam filled hull! #14 SS Sheet metal screws all round, we'll see.

Thanks guys. I guess I really don't have much to lose here. The one side I can use thru bolts and backer due to the speaker hole. I think I will use the #14 ss sheetmetal screws on the other and keep close eye on the status of the mounting over time. If they loosen up or show weakness, I can always remove and cut a hole on the inside gunwall like suggested. Good suggestion, I actually have one of those covers in the floor of the boat, and they are readily available. Like others have suggested, I had my planer masts mounted with ss sheetmetal screws, again because of no access to the area they were mounted in. No issues.

I have a pair of Traxstech tracks that I am trying to mount to my Striper 1851 Walkarounds gunwalls. They are designed to be mounted using through bolts and backer from the under side. The right side will be easy enough, I can remove a speaker and reach up inside and do whats necessary. The left side however has zero access to the inside of the double walls. I may be able to get couple of thru bolts in the very back by reaching around from the battery compartment, maybe. The freshwater piping may be in the way.

If I use 1/4" shank stainless self tappers and epoxy the threads will this be sufficient? The tracks will never have downriggers mounted on them, just rod holders. The downriggers are already hard mounted. The glass in this area of the top of the sidewalls is almost 3/4" thick. I don't see a way to get inside on this boat, short of cutting an unnecessary hole on the inside.

Looking for some ideas.

Glad to help, thanks.