1mainiac

I have friends out west who do it or at least they used to hv not chatted with any of them about it in a while. Good way to teach the kids how to navigate I have thought of doing it with my boat to help teach my wife how to use the GPS. My idea was to toss out several markers and log their positions and then have the wife go and find them using the chart plotter. One of the guys I work with has a son who is into boat navigation he told me they have contests on the big lake. Where they lay out a course with several turns the kids have to figure out course speed and time to complete each run. Then they take em out in a boat and only get to use the compass and tach to run the course they get scored by how accurately they run the course. Now give me coordinates to a school of hungry 20lb Salmon and I will geocach with the best of ya.

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Jim

Ok here is the latest I went to Shoreline services and talked to Bill this afternoon he said they are getting a few by the Coast Guard station jigging spoons off the wall. Starting as it gets dark so I drove down and talked with a couple guys fishing there saw several fish caught and released foul hooked. Pre dawn Steelhead bite has been slow but guys are getting a few and yep the waves are solid at 3 to 5ft making a few splash's onto the pier. Did not see any boats in the channel I am gonna go down to the pier and try it tommorrow evening. I allways have heard to use wax worms but was told they are not biting just coming in to spawn so just annoy them with spoons and they will hit it. Kinda like Salmon in the river you just gotta throw the snagged ones back. Will report back tommorrow night.

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Jim

let me know what day I will be there.

JIM

Cool pics My younger brother and I were coming back home after a long week in the woods up north without seeing anything legal to shoot at. Saw a nice doe go across the road ahead of us when we pulled up to chk her out there were over 40 deer standing in a factory parking lot in the middle of town. had to be 8 or 10 bucks in the crowd no wonder we got skunked they all came to town for the week.

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JIM

Well I started my winter vaction ( lay off ) early this year so I may wander over that way and give it a shot this week or next will let you know how it works out. They have been getting some Steel off the peirs as well so will be hitting that as well.

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Jim

True Randy but growing up around farms not much of anything we ever had came in a package. Chicken dinner meant kill it and pluck it first I knew the names of most of my meat till I was 17 and went in the Coast Guard Reserve. Every fall as a kid meant hauling livestock to my Great uncles farm to butcher was better than Thanksgiving.

I am not sure either Mike I know that the DNR site lists several private stockings as authorized by them. I also noted several rivers such as the White that have not been DNR stocked in the last 10 years at least not recorded on the stocking list. Can that mean the White is working on natural reproduction, lost fish swimming there by mistake or another group stocking the White not listed on the DNR site. Newaygo plantings on the Muskegon went from around 200,000 in the 80's and 90's to none after 2005 which is the last DNR recorded plant. What I did for my data was used 2003 and 2004 to come up with numbers for last year 2004 and 2005 for this years numbers 2005 and 2006 for next year. Looking at numbers for the plants for 2006 and 2007 as them being the 3 and 4 year olds we will will fish for in 2010 is where the numbers really start to drop off sharply as at that point we are fully in the plant reduction which is about a 65% reduction. The real question is will we see bigger healthier fish that have a better survival rate or will there just be less of them. One advantage with the program is they grow fast and the worst that could happen is we would have a couple of bad seasons till they got the numbers back up.

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Jim

Here is some numbers I have been looking at and thought I would get some input from others to see if there is any trend building here. There are 3 major areas of Chinook Salmon released that I feel affect my fishing so those are the numbers I use. Those being Muskegon river Grand river and Manistee area. What I did was go to the DNR stocking info and look at 2 year stocking to give me a idea of how many possible returning 3 and 4 year olds we should have. For last years Muskegon class the number was 289,092 for this years class it was 290,568 for next year the number is 156,832. For Grand Haven last year was 786,457 this year was 785,131 and next year is 586,949. For Manistee last year was 1,375,311 this year was 1,281,674 and next year was 1,089,987. So for next year we have a drop of 523,599 in the 3 to 4 year old fish class for those 3 areas based on DNR release info. Now this is raw numbers and does not account for any natural reproduction nor does it account for loss. But I am guessing at around 10% meaning for Muskegon in 07 season we had roughly 28,909 adults to fish for in 08 we had 29,057 and for 09 we should have 15,683. For the 2010 season the numbers would drop to 11,893. This was a strange year for me as even though I caught more total fish for the year than last year I fished a lot more and had fewer limit catchs. I only got skunked a total of 4 times for the year but because of high gas prices I did make some changes to my program and one major change was I began a short program which involved selecting a area I thought would produce and driving straight to it and fishing it. Most of the time completely ignoring what everyone else was doing. A lot of time it worked with decent fishing other times not so good. But the big differance for me this year was that if my program failed I turned and drove back in rather than running to another area and restarting as it was most of the time I got 2 or 3 fish so not a total loss and I cut my fuel expense and got to fish more often. Because of that many of my trips were around 3 hours total now if I had a long drive to the lake this would not work. Also I noticed people were more willing to fish with me as they became aware that they would no longer be stuck on the boat till either the box was full or I ran out of gas ( no I never have ran out of gas but have had to run in on fumes before ). In my old boat it was time to quit when the main tank ran out and I had to switch to the aux tank. Back to the original subject does anyone think I am close to being right about the fish numbers? Perhaps the drop will do as expected and bring in larger fish that would be nice. I don't have any real data on how many boats fish out of Muskegon but I am trying to SWAG ( sceintific wild ass guess) and using 3000 trips a season the 07 and 08 seasons would break down to just under 10 fish possible per trip 09 would end about 5 per trip and 2010 would come down to about 4 per trip. Of course less trip would mean more per trip and more trips would mean less per trip and this is not real accurate numbers mostly SWAG and personal opinion as such feel free to dissagree with them but if anyone else has a thought on this let me know.

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Jim

When I was a kid our whole family used to go to the UP to smelt dip. Since I was too little to dip net I had to help clean em. They would get em by the thousands and we had to clean em and pack em on ice in the truck full of 55 gal barrels God I hated them I still won't eat them to this day. I don't think we wasted any of them one year we had a 25cuft freezer full of smelt and dad got a deer so we needed the freezer space. We ate Smelt for weeks and gave a bunch to the neighbors. We still had a lot of them to eat but I sure did not like em any more. Funny how you remember those things but anytime someone mentions Smelt I remember being cold and wet and cleaning em by the pailfull for hours and hours. But then I loved Head cheese untill my Great grandmother had me help her make it, one more item no longer on my food list.

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Jim

Well I don't spear fish or chase Smelt anymore so those 2 won't change my life however the 3 rod limit will make a big diff in my inland lake and river fishing especially for Walleye trolling. But for a lot of what I do it will still be 1 rod at a time as I remember my father in law pointing out that we were allowed 4 rods between us so he set out a 3rd rod and spent the next 2 hours jumping for pole to pole missing fish while I hauled them in. I told him several times they were hitting real light and to stick to one pole. When the evening was over I had caught close to 50 fish and had a nice limit he caught quite a few but we sorted out most of his. So there are still a lot of times I would not use the extra rods.

Was anything mentioned about changing the Salmon limits there was a lot of talk of making it a straight 5 fish trout limit on the great lakes ending the the 3 of one species rule? Since the new size and slot limit will help to protect the Lake trout it would be nice to not have to target lakers to fill the box esp for the big tournies. Since I don't eat Lake trout I allway toss them back if they look healthy enough to survive.

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Jim

nice video Mike

Tony I grew up in Big Rapids when I was little we left in 73 but we allways fished out of Manistee or Pentwater. Too many boats out of Ludington and from Manistee you can run south to the point and lots of great fishing. Pentwater is also high on my list as I can't ever remember a bad fishing trip out of that port and we went a lot back then. Onekema would also be a good choice and you would have a home port advantage for Mikes big event. If I was not 15min from the lake here that is where I would be fishing.

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Jim

Yep they been selling spawn for a couple years I wanted some wax worms yesterday but all they had were long since dead. So I grabbed some leaf worms from the boat rental place on Half Moon and spent 3 hours getting skunked. But at least I got to go fishing. I gotta get me a small boat so I don't have to quit when I put up the big one. Either that or open up the front on my old 18ft Starcraft so I can use it on smaller lakes.

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Jim

true but when you fish most of the time with 2 or 3 in the boat would have to go after perch or Wallyeye to get a 20 box.

Well a 20 fish box would require a large enough crew to legally catch that many. As for the only time I had enough on board to catch that many no . We did limit out several times. Since I will not target Lakers we stop when we get our Kings.

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Jim

Report is they are getting a few outside the arms and inside still a lot of small ones but guys are getting some decent catchs. Wish I had a boat mine is in storage till spring. Will be happy to fish with someone if you need a body to fish with.

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Jim

I had to do some running around today so I stopped at Sportfishermen Center and looked at a couple of the Proline boats. They did not have a 190 on display so I talked to a salesman about it for a bit. He told me that none of the 190's they have sold had been reinforced for downriggers on the rod holders. The transoms are also not reinforced for a kicker motor. He said the first thing to do would be to remove the rod locker and see if the rod holders have been reinforced. After looking at the 20ft Sport they had I would seriously consider a track setup on each side then you could change setups any way you want. But no matter which way you go make sure the area is reinforced to handle the stress of downriggers.

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Jim

I have to agree with Nick 2 rod holders for 4 riggers is asking for trouble. I have been kicking this around in my head for a while. I am also not totally thrilled with my 4 rigger setup. I laid out the setup this spring to work with my canvas and was very happy everything worked as planned. Then I got to go fishing my setup does not work as well as it sounded. It works but not great I want my rear riggers a little further apart and my side rigger further back. But every thing I have tried gets in the way of my canvas. I am going see if I can afford a sliding track system then I can slide them out of the way for my canvas and get them where I want them to fish. Maybe you should consider the other option I am and that is to use 3 riggers one in the center and one on each side then you can get the seperation and put less stress on your mounts but it is still a lot of stress on the 2 rod holders. But like me you allready have 4 riggers so now you just figure out how to get them to work for you. Even though I know after fishing this season the 3 rigger setup would be less trouble I am still gonna get all 4 to work some how. Well as I reread this it may not be much help but as I told a friend a couple years ago when he counted every hole in his new boat based on how much it would cost to have them repaired later. Fishing is a psycosis we inheirit from our friends and family once we begin into this mind numbing state we are hooked like junkies we know that we can out fish anyone all we need is the gear. Sadly you have a beautifull boat so you don't want to punch it full of holes till you know for sure it will work. I don't blame you what you really need is to find a few guys with the same boat and see how they set them up and decide what you can live with.

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Jim

Sorry for short response before first thing I would do is have it surveyed by a qualified marine surveyer. Then get repair est based on what they say even if you are willing to do the work yourself know how much it will cost. There are to many good boats waiting for buyers to get stuck with a dog 5 years ago I started on a restoration project of a 1985 Cobalt 21 BR a very nice boat with drive problems ( someone stole the outdrive ) i paid 500 bucks for it after 5 years and getting riped off several times on bad parts from Ebay and other sources I gutted the hull and gave it away this summer and I sold the trailer it was on for 300 bucks so now I still have a pile of mis matched OMC parts to sell and am about 2 grand smarter. Unless you are looking for a hobby buy a boat that is seaworthy cause used boat hulls are pretty much free you pay for the drive and trailer and options but the hull is just about free every time if you subtract what some of the parts are worth. I paid 10,500.00 for my 89 Four Winns 260 Quest this spring from Halls in Muskegon it books as purchased with the trailer and everything for 15,900 according to my Credit union where I fiananced it. They also stood behind the boat all summer and fixed every problem for free untill we got all of the storage bugs out as it had sat in storage for 3 years before I bought it. So you can take close to 30% off from book on nearly any used boat now just cause boats outnumber buyers. Do you have a trailer for it or how are you gonna get it home or to where you need to have it fixed? Could cost 4 to 5 bucks a mile to have it hauled I have not seen the boat but in my head I am down to around a grand if you really like it. My bet is you can get one that runs and drives under 10k easy maybe not that exact model there is a 26 ft Starcraft up by Marne MI that has sat there all summer the owner told me 6500 would tow it home it is sitting next to a 25ft Aquasport for about 10k also on a trailer. I am not sure if he sold his 26ft Renegade with twin Hondas it was also on a trailer he wanted 13,500 for that.

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Jim

Low Retail Average Retail

Base Price

$9,350 $10,650

TOTAL PRICE $9,350 $ 10,650

thats from NADA subtract 6 to 8k to repower and make seaworthy.

Great read Dan made me think of a post from another website pointing out the huge harvest of Lake Trout during the first 3 Tournaments on our side. One of the guys had noticed how many lakers had been taken in the first couple events his estimate was that between the pre fishing and contests close to 3000 Lakers had been taken. He also noted that a couple of the boats that had been bringing in limit catchs every day were having a harder time finding fish. So when you over fish a area and take fish like Lakers that grow very slow. They have similar growth rates to Brooke trout meaning it is very likely that the monster Laker you caught was older than you. A 8 to 10lb Salmon is usually a 3 year old fish with roughly a year to live no matter what and is a planted fish ( yea I know we get some natural reproduction but they are all non native fish ). The same size Laker could be between 20 and 30 years old. So it is not only how many but what kind of fish you catch every body of water has it's limits on what you can take without damage. Maybe all of the fishing report's are a little to blame as I can't say how many times I have told a few people where I was catching em at only to come back they nextday and find everyone in my spot.

Guys I have a few ideas some of them are even good. I am however tired of coming up with good ideas that others take credit for and even make money off of. Not that I feel I need to make a bunch of money off of my fishing buddies but if I give the idea away some one else will take your money in a hot second. So I am wondering if any of you have a honest connection at a company like Big Jon who would be interested in a new trolling product.

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Jim

Happy Birthday Joe

Jay I think 50lb flouro will be stiff as a ball bat in cold water. I don't do much tip ups for Pike or any other ice fishing for that matter. I can see the disire to not use wire leaders but have you looked at some of the tieable steel leader material I don't remember the brand name but I looked at some camo steel line last spring for one of my fly fishing ideas I liked the idea of the tiny dia to strength and flexability. Steelhead don't have the teeth of Pike but they will tear up the tiny leader I use when tossing Stonefly patterns in early Jan in trying to get better presentations I have been playing with a bunch of differant ideas. I often use leadcore in my leader setup it works great in slower holes and I don't need as much weight so using a steel line for a leader could add to the sink rate and increase strength at the same time. Something to think about anyway.

Jim

Thanks Terry I still catch fish with the old lures just like everyone else I have a obsession with new toys so admiting that my old lures will do the job just fine gives me no reason to shop for new toys. And think of how the lure companies will feel when we stop shoping for the next best thing. Quite frankly I own enough tackle to last several lifetimes so without the dream that someone can come up with a new color varition that will kill the fish and that they are compelled to bite even when not hungry I have no need to go to the bait shop. If our wives ever learn this we are all done. Anyhow I will do my part and not let my wife know about this.

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Jim