chowder

Got to Meyers yesterday(4/11) about 1:00, 15-20 mph N wind, spray from the waves was coming over the break wall, made a short loop - too rough for a 16', maybe just too rough period!

If it's raining we will be there, otherwise that's our 1st cutting hay window for peak quality. I used to be miserable and hate it when it rained during a harvest window but now I just go fishing. Sure is more comfortable now w/ the full enclosure and the cuddy!

I might buzz over a little later today. I guess it depends on this 9-15 mph N wind that the weather service has booked for today, it was so nice in late March, feels like we're going backwards now! I put together a mini ultralite center pin setup w/ a 2 wt fly rod, been amusing my self w/ some stream fishing but would like to get back out on the lake asap!

Zeke, don't you mean there is always a couple "maniacs" on Stinger's boat?

What am I doing wrong w/ these little things? I hear good things about them but last year when I tried to run them along side rapalas or storms they seem to turn on their side and lose their action -Do they all need to be tuned (a lot), or should I remove the split ring, or do they need to be run that much slower than other stix?

The Off Shore boards are nice for surface applications, especially w/ the tattle kit installed for the FLX where you have weeds and more dinks- that can be a problem w/ the inlines. In my humble (and inexperienced) opinion, the Church "Walleye" board seems better for handling lead and copper.

Do many people use a bungee type shocker on their dual boards as a general practice?

Some questions about stained water in reports (yes, I do know what it looks like!). Is the "stain" created by temp differences, current differences, suspended solids, or light refraction caused by a combination of any of these factors- or is it something more (or less) tangible? When stained water sets up will wind of almost any significant magnitude, and from any direction "break" it up?

Just something to think about: Copper setups(22' down/100' line out) will put you to depth using roughly 1/2 the amount of line that lead core(11.25' down/100' line out) uses, which eliminates a lot of hassles.This is why there is so much interest in copper now. If you are going to target depths below 40', and especially if you intend to use flashers, you may want to think about using copper instead of lead. For relatively shallow presentations the core is cool but if you want to go deep the copper is tough to beat!

Rainbow pattern rapala worked well for me late last summer, it took some nice salmon on the riggers.

Got an Islander w/ a 2 battery setup in which the 2cd battery is charged w/ a 110 charger and used for electronics & riggers and the main is charged up by the I/O and used for starting & factory gauge pkg. The aux is shot, it is a trolling type battery. I am going to have a dual battery switch put in asap so I was figuring that the new battery should not be a trolling type, am I right about this and if so what are good specs for a battery used in a dual battery setup w/ the Perko switch? As far I can tell the main battery is fine. On tractors they always tell you to replace both but I have replaced them singly lots of times.

Hit it again yesterday(3/28) w/ my 10 yr old and his buddy, good thing the fish cooperated cause the boat felt like a floating gym any time we didn't have a fish on. I apologize to whoever we forced into the middle of the lake at 2:30, we had a double and things sorta got out of hand (did two 180s , tangled everything but got em both in the boat!) Marked more bait yesterday, but except for the lakers, fish seemed to be anywhere from 65' to 20'. I wanted to give the shallows a good going over but I had no confidence I could keep the boat from going ashore.

Got over to Long Pt. at noon, woke the Islander up from hibernation mode , had a few minor weird things to deal with and worked 100-250 w/ 1 wire & 1 rigger. Gotta get the Simrad installed asap, this lone wolf B.S. is getting old but I managed 2 Salmon, filled out my quota w/ some lakers and called it good, forgot the cable from the the probe to weight, but ran 2.5 -2.8 surface, temps up to 37.5 (surface). Really nice day on the lake.

I have an Islander w/ a nice low profile canvas zip on wheel house enclosure, can you haul a boat w/ one of these up to keep rain & road dust out? We have hauled it w/ just the bimini up and that was fine, I can't really see why it would cause much more trouble to leave the sides and the back on w/ a couple of good bungees to take the whip out of the back section, but there must be some reason why I don't see more boats going down the road like that?

Wow... pretty slick !

I am by no means an expert but when I run more than 1 line out per side on boards, I put the shallowest running line the furthest out to the side reasoning that when I have to bring it in w/ a fish on it or to reset it, I am reeling it in over the deeper set line and so far this has worked out ok, but I have not had a double doing this yet and I am not positive that this is what a "Pro" would tell you. One neat trick for the copper down the chute might be to use the set up shown in GLA with the 4" float to get that line back away from the congestion in the netting area, I just made up a couple of these and I have heard that it works well but I have not used it yet myself.

I would like to get in an early browns trip out of Wrights or the State launch in Mexico soon.Has anybody been out of either-what presentations worked,where were you? etc. The earliest I was up last year was May 30- at that point for us most of the hits were on shallow riggers, not the stix on boards. I am guessing it's a surface program if anything at this point but I am not sure what spots to target,etc.

The few bait pods I marked on sat 3/21 were in 250-150 FOW, but I wasn't there long enough to explore a lot .

Cayuga veterans: What temps do we need to see for good surface action in the shallows? Last spring we used inlines in the south end in mid April and then worked our way up the east shore, staying fairly close to shore. Is there much of a stix board bite out over the deeper water simultaneously w/ a shallow board bite, especially later in the day? What pattern will the alewives follow for the next 2 months? When they spawn how does that affect the trout and salmon?

Anybody got info about open launch sites at Oswego or Mexico?-Thanks

Guppy, to make the flasher/ fly work best for Lakers you should use them on a wire or super braid dipsy setup. Search this and other forums, the info is all here.

Are you set up to; 1. troll, 2.drift/cast & jig, or 3.shore angling? Also, what species are you most interested in trying to catch? If you are set up to troll, give us a basic idea of what you have to run (i.e., wire or super braid dipsy setups, 2 riggers,lead core or whatever you got on the boat- then we can give you some nuts & bolts info)

I had my 16' yesterday but I could have gotten the Islander thru there, stay starboard as you approach, pass under the bridge, and head out onto the lake (opposite coming in) plenty of room- there was no wind and I could see the bottom very clearly, you could trim up near the bubbler if you want but it did not seem difficult getting out of there at this point.

Got off to a late start, finally put the boat in T-falls at 1:45. Lakers no problem on the usual program, the rest of the action was very slow, caught and released one decent salmon. I was alone so I just ran 1 rigger and or 1 wire. Tried just a board for a bit - nada. I was seeing temps like 35-36 on the surface. Very little wind, really nice to be back on the water even if it was only for a couple hours.

Never made it over to the lake last weekend, gonna try again tomorrow (Sat), can you get in at Treiman or is it too low?