Pete Collin

Hee hee!!

Hey Guys, That's a dandy rainbow. I was out Sunday morning. got a late start, launching on the south end. Not impressed with the new dock. Tried a shallow program for the browns without a touch. Other boats fishing out in the middle, so checked for bottom blips in the deep water. Saw a tight gang of them in front of Vine Valley in 160'. By then it was flat calm, so i jigged and got my first vertical fish of the season - a real fat 26 incher. Then a hat -snatching wind suddenly kicked up that made it tough to steer, so bagged it for the day.

I would really doubt if your problem is your motor. In my boat, I hve caught fish trolling with the 70 hp 2-stroke main motor, a 6 hp 2 stroke kicker, an electric bow-mount, and currently my 5 hp 4 - stroke. I bet if i came aboard your boat I could find something with your tackle or presentation that you could change to increase your odds. One major thing I can think of is the time of day. I have had way more luck at dawn than in the afternoon. A lot of folks don't like to get up early. Do you see fish on your graph? Finding them can often be a challenge. But a few years of trolling the same lake can teach you spots where you can expect to see them at different times of year. If I am on Seneca in the early morning and I see plenty of marks on the bottom, I am expecting action. BTW, I usually target lakers. Can't help much with the salmon browns or rainbows. Maybe you should target the easier to catch lakers until you build up your confidence. Pete Collin

Sk8man, I think that is the setting I am looking for. Thanks! Can't wait to try it. Pete

Hello All, I have a Lowrance X125 graph. The background seems to have gotten darker - like there is less contrast with the pixels that are black. is there a contrast setting for these graphs? looked around a bit but couldn't find one. and the fishing last weekend was steady enough so i didn't take the time to work on it too long! Pete Collin

Hello All, On the Cabelas website, each product gives the public the chance to review them, and you can read what everybody wrote. I recently wrote a review of an outboard motor I bought. It was critical of some things that gave me problems, but was pretty fair I think. In a 5-star rating system, I gave the motor a 3. Cabelas immediately emailed me saying they were sorry I was unhappy with the product, and had problems. i wrote that my problems had been taken care of for the most part. But the review never got posted. If you look around, you will find almost everything has a 4 or 5 star rating. Most reviews are written by guys that just bought the thing and used it a couple of times. You all know that longevity and reliability are big components of how you appraise something like a boat motor. So be wary when you read the reviews - the ones that might be helpful have been deleted! Pete Collin www.pcforestry.com

My friends and I have a battle cry that we have used for years. When you have just landed a big one, or have had a really awesome day, you yell, "TROUTENHOSEN!!" It is said with a german accent and a rolling "R". It's a little hard to explain how i came up with that word. It was about the time that "Fahrfeignugen" was all over the TV and radio in Volkswagen's ads. And to "hose" the trout is to catch a great deal in one session. It caught on, and is a fun thing to bellow. We leave it on each other's answering machines so we know that a good fishing report is to follow. It can be a greeting and a parting word. Or it can be real primal, like the time my buddy Moose landed a three pound Broadback River brook trout and double fist pumped while yelling "Troutenhosen!" above the boreal treetops. As rituals go, it has served us well.

http://www.grindtv.com/outdoor/blog/506 ... +aquarium/ Bass Pro Shops beware!

I'm just glad the whole thing didn't quit while you were out there on the lake. In the fall, there's often few people around to help if you need it.

Sk8man, My kicker is in the cellar, I haven't yet refilled the main motor's lower unit, and there is a big pile of firewood in front of my boat in the garage!

Al, Wha did the problem wth your motor turn out to be? Pete

Hi Steve, How have you been? Did you have a good fishing season? The power trim raises and lowers, so I never tried to fiddle with it. I really don't know anything about hydraulic systems. Just thought my problem could be solved with a shim of some kind. Will have to fiddle with it some. Thanks for the comment guys. Pete

Hello All, I have an interesting mod. I need to make to my boat. For the longest time it pulled hard to the right, even though the adjustment fin was set as far as it could go in the opposite direction. Finally figured that the trim was too far down. It has power trim, and when i raise the motor, it tracks properly. Eventually the forward force of the motor will push the piston in and it will be too far down again, pulling right. Like all motors, I have a rod that acts as a stop on the motor mount to set the maximum the trim can be lowered. However, even with the rod in its highest pair of holes, the trim is too far down. This baffled me for the longest time. I finally figured out the the motor mount is intended for a boat whose transom is plumb vertical. My transom tilts rearward slightly. So that keeps me from setting the stop high enough. Is there some easy modification i can make to set the trim properly? Pete Collin www.pcforestry.com

The most common weedkiller is glyphosate, or Round-Up. It is not toxic to aquatic life, according to every class I attended. That rumor may have come from the incident that occured at the salt plant this summer, where a brine line burst and spewed brine into the lake. There is an insecticide that can be used for emerald ash borer that you soak into the roots of the trees you are treating. I understand that it is hard on fish. Don't know if they were spraying that at Meyers, but parks would be places that might treat ash trees. There also is an infestation of hemlock wooly adelgid in Watkins Glen State Park. Not sure what yo use to treat them. So it is not unimagineable that they would treat trees in state parks with insecticide. Pete Collin www.pcforestry.com

Alex, Question - do you mostly target lakers or silvers? And which lakes do you mostly fish? For lakers, a "meatball rig" set up to bounce bottom is deadly, but is best suited for Seneca and Cayuga. It's basically a truncated Seth Green rig with wire, a 1 pound ball, and a single leader. Pete

Fluorocarbon is marketed as being superior because it is supposed to become invisible when immersed in water. Take a glass of water, and put in a piece of regular mono and a piece of fluoro and compare the two. Reach your own conclusion whether it is worth the expense, shorter shelf life, and tendency to be brittle. I use 15 pound leaders while trolling, 10 when jigging. a rule of thumb is the deeper you go with the downrigger, the closer the lure can be to the ball. I have seen fish on the graph actually swim up to the ball to look at it. When laker fishing, you can put the lure 10 feet behind the ball. While targetting rainbows last summer, I sent the lure out 50 -100 feet back before clipping it on the release. Worked just fine.

From what I understand, copper will give you a bit more depth for the same length of line. Mike Wenz' copper rig sees a lot of action.

Mike, I love how you go fishing, weather be damned! Nice slipping in a trip before the hurricane. Pete

DtD, Yes, the wind did lie down some later on. It got to be pretty stiff around the time you checked the launch - I wouldn't have wanted to motor 6 miles into it. But the fish actually bit the best when the wind was hardest. Any pix of the 9 pounder?

Hello All, The last time I fished with Guff, we totally got skunked. It was blowing hard and cold rain oozed into our goretex. What made it worse is that it was my suggestion. It was calm and rain free from where I called Al and talked him into trying Seneca. He was skeptical, but we went anyway, and fishlessly shivered for several hours. That was back in May. Yesterday was the antithesis of that trip: Sunny, warm, gorgeous day, and the fishing was on fire. He and hermit set a high yardstick two days before with their 60-something fish catch. Nothing will kill a trip faster than expectations. But everything worked out. We didn't even get an early start - arriving at the bluff around 9:00 AM. Never mind that i woke up at 2:30 AM and couldn't get back to sleep. It just felt much more relaxed than setting a ridiculously early alarm to have all your lines in the water at first light. We had great sport with the sonar graph. The trick of cranking up on fish you see chasing on the screen worked wonders. That anticipation of a strike is the jigger's analogy to a bird hunter walking up to a pointing spaniel. We'd watch suspended blips turn into lines streaking sharply up towards our falling jigs. When the two got close, we'd start on a fast crank - toes curled, leaning forward, arms cocked, eyes glued to the converging lines on the screen, muttering,"Come on, baby. Take it. Take it. Come on....HAH! THERE HE IS!!!" If the first fish missed the strike, there was often a second or even third banana that would bitye right after the shakeoff (don't get me started on bananas). So we stayed out the whole day. There was no reason to leave. The feed had few lulls, and aboard Al's boat we neither sweated nor shivered. The lakers averaged much bigger than my previous trips. Plenty of 24 and 25 inchers, Al got one that went 26. I carried my little counter/clicker, so we celebrated the passing of the 20 fish mark, the 30 fish mark. Poking our way along the shore on our ride back to the launch, we brought the count up to 47 - My second greatest two-man catch on the Fingers. It's hard to write a unique story about jigging the Bluff, because there is a certain amount of sameness to trips that you make there. The high fish count, the smallish fish size, the great natural beauty. But fall on Keuka is just one of those things that make you glad you live in New York. Pete Collin www.pcforestry.com

Hi Mike, I'll lead the charge. Took my buddy paul jigging on Keuka yesterday at the bluff. We got 20 fish up to 25 inches. it was slow- steady througout the day. the fall colors are absolute peak and it was an awesome day to be out. Met some bass fishermen who were saying the smallies are biting like hell too. Will have to file that away for future reference! My brother Phil is coming this weekend, and i am taking him jigging on the Bluff so i won't be available to join you Sunday. I thought of you when my wife and i were walking our dogs on the trails in letchworth Park that get groomed for XC skiing in winter. We'll have to have you over then! Pete

biglaker, Man, they act like park pigeons for you! I missed another great photo opportunity last week. I was driving to work and passed a herd of deer that included a piebald. they were fairly close to the road and i would have gotten a great shot. Pete

Biglaker, I learned about slow digital cameras when i was trying to photograph steelhead jumping over a weir dam. None of the pix came out like I wanted.

Biglaker, You're making me sorry I didn't get the camera out fast enough! It's so cool that eagles are making a comeback. I was trying to think of when I saw my first eagle..... can't quite remember, but it must have been when I was into adulthood. there is a nest within a couple miles of where I live now! The one I mention in this story was on Canandaigua. there have been eaqgles nesting on the south end for a few years now. They tell me they stay throughout the winter. You often see them right from the launch.