Midway97

I think most if not all of mine are Medium action with a line weight of 12-20 pounds

Not at all, unless you plan to spend money on something other than fishing. Buy her somehting nice once in a while and maybe even take her out on the lake, never know, she may want to spend money on stuff for ya. :cool:

I run pancake coated now but plan to switch to fish weights this year and give them a try. As long as they track straight I don't think it matters much, but the pancake weight give more surface area at depth and can tangle up in curents. Fish weights "seem" like they might be more hydro-dynamic in that same zone. :confused:

29 Kevin Harvick You just have to like a guy caled "HAPPY"

Welcome to the site Tony. Looking forward to hearing from you also

Sorry about that Steve. I got all excited when I looked and the check book receipt. Your right, I only paid forthem ,you have possesion and after all thats 9/10 of teh law right.. :D

Mounted 2 driving lights (halogen) on my arch and a smaller one under my riggerboard aimed toward the center to help net. last year when I fished with some of the other guys, we left the light on so your eyes wouldn't have to constantly adjust. all the light pointed aft so the driver could still see in the dark.. A very important thing in a little crowd early in the morning.

I have 7 cores... 1 full, 2 halves 2 3colors, and 2 2 colorsthe full color is on a diawa sealine the rest are all on convector CV 30's. Excellant reels

I bought a speed and temp unit late last fall. havent had a chance to use it, but I know Dave and Mark both have them and from i saw fishing with them, well worth the $$. especially later in the season when your searching for the thermoclines.

I would suggest joining some of the outings listed on this site as a rider, get out with a few different people, get an idea what/how they are running equipment used etc. This will give you some different views on brands, models and rigs before you put out a lot of $$. Then I suggest prowling around the equipment listed on various sites and ebay for the things you want and maybe save a few bucks. For the new stuff, I recommend contacting the FISHDOG guys, they can get pretty good deals and have access to almost anything.

Your realy in the smoke blowing mood tonight aren't you?? I can only imagine your "fav" port is "close" to home or are you telling a little white lie??

Man there's some smoke blowing around here Jim. As for the tin cans, I used then when i fished the other side of the lake back some years ago, I've been out of teh big lake stuff for about 6 years, alot of the current stuff we use now was hard to find if even on the shelf then. I like the fish catchers better than the older stuff myself.

For the most part I agree with what Matt says. I've used the smaller (I think size 0) dodgers in the spring in front of both flies and spoons. The leader length is about 3 foot as Matt stated. I wouldn't say they work all the time, but like anything else if it produces one fish its worth trying

I hope the trend continues, however, I think the reason for the increased January levels is due to the warm weather and snowmelt that usually comes much later in the spring. My fear is the warm weather means increased evaporation and lack of snowmelt in a couple of months is going to mean lower levels overall. A lot of the launches seemed very shallow this past year, seems hard to believe they could get much shallower and still be usable.

Looks like she can hold her own with the eyes anyway Larry... She teach you how she does it?

Yes, the guides do help give you an idea what speeds various spoon run best at. Trial and error and speed at the ball help also. But I think the general speeds vary from 1.5-3.5 (GPS)

Welcome to the site and loking forward to seeing you again this year at some of the events. hope to chat with you next wednesday night in the chat room.

Glad to see you made it over here. Looking forward to fishing with you at the Dreamweaver. Good Luck for the season.

Good to see ya here Matt, Hope to see you at some of the events this year.

I would have to say St. Joe is my favorite. Only fished this side of the lake for one season... Port Sheldon seemed very nice, but needs to deepen the area around the launch, ditto on Snug Harbor in Muskegon. I like Manistee, but not real excited about running the river from Insta Launch (again shallow water), so I guess I'd have to say that Ludington is my 2nd favorite port.

I have a 22 foot Starcraft Islander and I prefer to fish 3 but have room to fish 4 comfortably.

In the past, when I fished off the west coast of lake mi, we used dodger/flashers from spring to fall. Started out using the smaller ones in the spring with smaller flies/spoons and as the summer wore on moved up to the larger sizes, kinda coincided with baitfish size. Have only fished one season on the east side, and I believe the same thought process is involved. But thats only one opinion, other people with more experience may have others. Some of it is simply personal preference and trying different things... give them something they haven't seen.

I'm hoping their aggressive methods hold out for one more game. Don't want to see a blow out, just a well played game between 2 great teams.

Welcome Rich, Looking forward to another season with a few Caz Attacks

WEll its a good thing that Exxon was able to get record profits of 36. BILLION in 2005, what with all the refineries being disabled by Katrina, Crude Oil being so expensive, yada yada yada...