chowder

Great pics Jeff, looks like a fun outing. Different boat?

I heard about this fish (caught by 'some guys from Maine') at Screwy Louie's on Sunday! Enjoy being a living legend and congrats!

Well, I dropped off the riggers at Screwy Louie's, so we'll have to see what's wrong w/ them before going any further off the wall- it could just be they both had some sort of malfunction that had nothing to do with the power source. Double checked again and the starboard riggers work fine plugged into the port connections (now remember, it's the port riggers that both went on the blink.)

Sean Brown, ('Hooked Up') would be your best bet for a charter on Seneca Lake.

Hang in there bud! -Andy

It is really never too early to jig for lakers, (browns might be tough at this point in the season). In March,April and into May you sometimes need to use a 1.5 oz. jig to hit the lakers who spend the winter deep w/ the alewives, but we are moving away from that time frame pretty fast. In general You want to be setup w/ a 7' MH rod, decent quality baitcasting reel w/ 20lb super braid to 6' of 12lb floro . Tie w/ an Albright knot. Tie the floro leader directly to the jig. I like the 1oz gamma ball jig heads from Schuberts & Laketown . I like to use Zoom super flukes and also Gander Mtn's black & silver fat tail. Biggest mistake people make jigging is to drop the jig and jig it up & down a few feet 'off the bottom' a whole bunch of times. To consistently draw strikes you need to; 1. Find fish w/ the sonar, preferably in 45-75' FOW. 2. Make a drop to bottom. 3. Jig a few times by never losing contact w/ the jig (i.e. move the rod up & down w/ your whole arm, 'feeling' it hit each time. 3. After only a few jigging motions as described above steadily retrieve the bait at a pretty good clip. Strikes very often come on the way up, even 15' from the surface. Strikes vary in nature from; a.) "how come that jig is taking so long to get to the bottom" to b.) Holy S#**, I got one! and EVERYTHING in between. Strikes when jigging the bait may be only 'ticks' and require a lightning fast strike- that's why you need the super braid, a sharp hook, and a rod w/ good backbone. When the fish are active, many will strike as 'chasers' on the way up and sometimes these are swipes which a fast strike will hook. Don't let the fish get a real good look at the jig - this technique only works when you can trigger reaction strikes from the fish.

I originally had 3 riggers on my Islander but switched to 4 this spring b/c the kicker 'took away a bit of netting room and I just never liked the rigger over the outdrive. An 8'6" boat w/ a kicker and a chute rigger doesn't leave much room for landing fish, especially if you fish w/ kids and or green horns! I do have a track setup which greatly facilitates changing and adjusting rod holder and rigger locations so I have my corner riggers far enough away from the transom that they don't stick out that far out the back. Now, even w/ the kicker I have a pretty 'clean' area for landing fish. I will say this though, most of the time I run 2 riggers/2 divers (slide divers or dipsies)/ and 2 coppers or cores or flat lines off the boards. So far I haven't used the 2cd set of riggers that much but once the browns move out to the 40s & 50s for the season and I'm after them I'm sure I will. -Andy

Not too shabby for a shakedown cruise! Sounds like a pretty good time. -Andy

I'll kick in $10. what about putting the money into a gift certificate for a LOU sponsor (i.e. ATOMIK, LOC,etc)?

Here's some further clarification; 1.) The port riggers that quit do not work no matter what you do w/ the resets and they do not work on the starboard side 2.) The battery switch is on 2. 3.) Remember the starboard riggers do work when plugged into the port side connectors! So it's not a connection or splice issue in the wiring going to the connectors I suppose it's possible that a brand new rigger and an older one both experienced a problem on the same day that is similar in nature but dag, what are the odds? Guess I'm gonna have to take the riggers to somebody and see what's not functioning in them. I talked to the dude @ Screwy Louies , might bring them there.

Nice job in the Derby Jared! I'm sorry I didn't get a chance to meet you at the awards presentation, maybe I'll see you on the water sometime. -Andy (Blue/White Starcraft Islander)

I've got a pair of Cannon riggers on each side of my boat. Last weekend my corner port rigger stopped working (had to bring 13lber up from 100' by hand). This was only the 3rd time I've used this rigger b/c it was new this spring (replaced both older Mag 5 corner riggers w/ new Mag 5 HS units). So, I figured "typical of what you get anymore when you buy something new" and started using the other port rigger instead (an older Mag 5 Long boom). This rigger worked fine for 2 or 3 fish and then it quit working too! Today I checked the port connectors w/ a test light and got power so I took one of the starboard riggers over to the port side and plugged it into one of the port connectors and it works! What the heck? Now I've got 2 dead riggers and what looks like some kind of weird electrical issue that caused them to go "off" on me. Any ideas?

If you drill out the bottom of a Walker or LJ mag dipsy and substitute this for the slide diver bottom it will perform exactly like a reg. mag dipsy. I secure the Walker bottom to the slide diver top w/ a pair of small self tapping screws. This is not a complicated job and when you are done you have a slide diver setup w/ a mag dipsy depth curve AND no long leader when you get the fish to the boat. I don't even use regular dipsies any more now that I've got this hybrid setup.

I think you got it right w/ the Ugly stiks, I run 6 different cores and 6 different coppers to 600' on the med and MH 7' rods-no complaints!

Congrats! Sensational!

I use slide diver tops w/ a mag dipsy bottom & weight as my main wire diver setup. On these rigs I use a rather short 30lb flouro 'slider' leader (18'). After I thread on the sd, I use a bead in front of a high quality swivel (throw the cheap thing that comes w/ the diver out!) and then I use a 2-3' stretch of 30lb flouro to a big coast lock snap for my flasher.I usually run these out on a setting of 1.5-2.0 I also have a pair of super braid sd rigs I use for running spoons higher in the water column. The 20lb floro 'slider' leader I use on these setups is pretty long (50'+). For these rigs I use the reg size sd as it comes out of the package w/ and w/out the largest ring. On these I also slide a bead after threading on the diver and then tie on a high quality swivel, then a 2-3' 20lb flouro to a high quality 30lb+ ball bearing snap swivel. I usually run these out on a setting between 3 and 6.

We really pounded the fish up north yesterday w/ some back to back doubles & triples, but just couldn't find one bigger than our best from day 1 . Fortunately our best day 1 fish held on for a third place finish, so we got back our entry, paid for the gas and actually even made some money! Most consistent combos were the 500' & 600' copper w/ gator/black widow/diehard spoons out in 250-350 FOW. Riggers & divers were luke warm most of the time both days (even w/ the same spoons we were running on the copper and long leads) except when the fish seemed to turn on (11:00-1:30, both days). When the bite was hot, spinnies & flies hammered the lakers. I have to say that the best part of this weekend was spending two days hanging with my son Elliot on what he calls the "floating man cave".Thanks to everyone who put time into planning & pulling off this event.We had a blast! -Andy

Hey Buck Master, Happy Birthday!

Tried to keep w/ you on the radio and get you dialed in but kept losing you, sorry man. -Andy (sent pm w/ my cell)

I sent a pm last nite.

Hey Sean, I tried to get you on the radio but no go. Just gutted a dozen or so and there was one partially digested alewife in the whole lot but bait pods all over! Go figure? You gonna be back tomorrow?-Andy

Started out pretty rough today when we started to sink half way across the lake this morning. Yep, I put my block drains back in after draining the I/O in my Islander last weekend but forgot to reattach and tighten the hose clamp on my upper coolant hose . We went from that disaster into a series of fish that came unbuttoned right at the boat. When we left after weighing in some of our better fish we had a thin hold on 3rd place with a 10lb 6oz laker. Hopefully we can pull ourselves together tomorrow and hit em hard!

Hey Split, when you gonna have that fish fry ready on Fri? I'm going to stop at Barney's & register at some point and I'm hoping to time it so I can pick up some fish dinners on the way home. -Andy

I'd get the advice of a competent marine mechanic who has done a lot of kicker installs b4 you go very far. I just went thru 2 kicker installs on 2 different boats & believe me there is a lot more to getting everything to work right than it looks at first glance. Spending a few hundred on a bracket is the least of your worries, remember when you are done you want a setup that didn't break the bank but that works well and is ultra dependable. P.S. You should look at the Yamaha T8 or T9.9 (I've got one next to a Merc and they get along just fine!) and also remember; you get very sensitive speed control from a tiller model compared to a factory remote throttle setup.

LZ have a great day & thanks for the advice on my kicker project! -Andy