slabseeker

Honkerfest 2025 sounds like fun

If I get to make this trip I will update with the Grennel report. Might save you a trip. They sure are fun to catch. It is kind of a desolate looking place though. My nephew is afraid we might hear banjos about half way through.

Interesting. I doubt that stretch has been fished much. I'm intrigued to see what you could catch.

It definitely looked like a slough before. They did remove a lot of trees. Looks like they cleared the bank back about 20 or 30 feet of trees and brush. Being a swamp paddler, I have had the idea to float that stretch in my kayak between Aquilla and the bridge at AB for some time now, but it just looked too wooly with a lot of down trees I'm sure. But now... looks much better. You can even see a little current. My idea is to get my daughter, her friends, and my nephews to organize that trip. We would call it the Aquilla Flotilla.....

I go over the Castor River a lot at Aquilla on Hwy 25 going to Cape, and on Hwy. AB near Clines Island school. I have noticed they have really cleaned off the banks on both sides, and appears cleaned out the river also. I was wondering if @jdmidwest, @al agnew, or someone might have some information. How far are they doing this? You could see the machine I believe they used sitting beside 25 just north of Aquilla. Interesting looking machine almost looked like it was on pontoons.

Makes me think of the Progressive Insurance "Unhidden Gems" commercial.. one of my favorites. https://youtu.be/WDcPBIC8P2o

I know when this came out on SNL it was meant to be a bad thing. But if it was one of these on the White or Buffalo that might be OK.

All along hoping you will die before you ever collect.

Being a swamp paddler I'm not too familiar with the James so I researched (Wikipedia of course). I wasn't aware there was an Ozark Bass. [The river contains bass, catfish, crappie and bluegill.[9] Four of the five world record Ozark bass were caught on the James River. The Ozark bass (Ambloplites constellatus) is a species of freshwater fish in the sunfish family (Centrarchidae) of order Perciformes. It is native only to the White River, Sac River, James River, and Pomme de Terre River drainages of Missouri and Arkansas. The species is commonly referred to as “goggle-eye”]. Sounds like fun.

Julie Brown...a true classic

......and letting her go to spawn! 👍

In looking at the original Bass Tracker logo created over forty years ago, maybe JM was more of a visionary of the future than we knew. Bass Tracking with a bass in the crosshairs. Maybe the next thing.. FFS will lock onto the target fish of preset minimum size, emit a electronic pulse that will stun the target fish causing it to simply float to the surface. No casting required. Crazy right? or is it....

You might be able to rent one that would be pretty cool. You would probably see several bass boats with operators staring at livescope screens that wouldn't even notice the eclipse.

Thanks Phil, we plan on being there. Wish we could stay longer. Going to come by and get some jigs. I even worked it into Valentine's Day so it's a win/win.

Where is the best place to get outboard spark plugs? How often should you change them?

Good to hear, I thought you might like it once you got used to it. I need to try the smoke tube. I vacuum seal left overs also especially pulled pork, works great. I picked up a 6 lb. prime rib roast at Walmart on clearance for $5.97 per lb., can't wait to try that. I haven't done a turkey yet been wanting to. I picked up an 18 pound Butterball at Aldi for 69 cents per lb. gonna put it on next weekend. What temp did you smoke your turkey at?

Hey Maverickpro...gonna fire up mine today for some chicken and ribs. Was wondering how yours is going?

Hey at least your berries are still above your knees 👍

No as far as climbing poles I could never do that for sure. I watched a squirrel have a bad experience with that once at the top of one. Good video thanks for sharing. I got to visit the Buffalo a few years ago but no one in our group would float with me. Absolutely beautiful. I always wanted to hike the trail to that cliff and stand on it now not so sure..🤔

That might be a record for the fastest post hijacking

I ditto most of the above. I read about all the issues and watched all the videos & kept putting it off. Three years ago my wife pulled the trigger for us and got the 850 at Academy we have loved it ever since. We keep it on our covered back deck with a cover on it year round and have had no issues (knock on wood). We use it two or three times a week. We use it for stuff we would normally bake in the oven also. Especially in summer when we don't want to heat up the kitchen, but we use it year round. As mentioned I like it better as a grill/oven than a smoker. Doesn't give that classic hickory smoke flavor we like for pulled pork, ribs, beer butt chicken. I still use my Akorn Kamado for smoking those. I only use Pit Boss pellets. I get the 40lb. bags at Menards when on sale for $12.99 + rebate. For me there was a learning curve, it took a while to get use to it. I grilled on a Weber with charcoal my whole life. Now I don't really like the charcoal taste. Pit Boss is just a cleaner, juicier taste and much more convenient in my opinion. After each cook I let it run at 450 degrees for a few minutes for cleaning to dry out any schmutz. About every five or six cooks I scrape off the heat shield and vacuum it and the ashes out of the burn pot with shop vac.

Poking out my mind's eye now...

Your boat might not have depreciated in the last few years. We bought our boat used in 2017 at a reasonable price at the time. I look at used boats on the internet all the time and have for several years and it appears at least the asking prices have really gone up, as the price for new ones has gone up. Based on what I'm seeing at least in our area the asking price for our boat would be more than what we bought it for.

Wow did not know this, thanks for posting. That would have been quite a shock when we come next weekend. One of our favorite places to visit. Can't wait to see the new building.

Saw one Sunday about 2 pm. Stopped at our back porch feeder for a drink then continued north.