Ham

The fuel bill for my 250 is normally about the same as it was for my 130. I'm really happy with the fuel costs on the Pro XS 250 HP. Oddly enough, I ran a little higher rpms on the 130 getting to the 50 mph cruising speed I like.

Green Sunfish. Jacked up colors.

Feed a fever, starve a troll.

Take a little trip down to K Dock and you'll see what's coming to TR eventually. The lakes are too close and people are too complacent. Hopefully, the Zebra's won't negatively impact fish populations. They will negatively impact the lure population in your tackle box. I don't know what scuffed up you line, but usually Zebra mussels just cut right thru. You'll see scuffing on the part you get back.

IF They do another one on BSL, the boats on the upper lake will have more company for sure. I ran further than I normally do as it was, but that would be a long expensive run. The water is so rough from rebound wakes you can't really run fully wide out until the crowd starts to thin out. I would love to know what the time to travel to Leadhill was for most people that made that run. IF I make that run though, I'm going past Tucker Hollow. In for a penny, in for a pound. 250 Horses does a lot for you, but they have to be fed. I started out with 52 gallons and I used about 35 gallons or so. I normally use about 7 gallons on a full day fishing trip.

NOT US! Winning weight was 36 lbs or so. The winners ran North of Tucker Hollow and back up creeks. They had very little company and fish that had not been beat to death. Good move on their part. I knew those fish were there. I just wasn't willing to run an hour plus each way on a 7 hour fishing day. we spent more than half our day running specific areas and looking for BIG Largemouth Bass. We came up Snake Eyes. At some point, I bailed on this plan because I based solely on vanity did not want a zero. We ran to some little stretches I like in the Oakland area and open a can of whupass on short fish. I think we lost a probable keeper that slung a jerk bait. We lost a couple of possible squeakers at boat side. Somehow on our 5 hours of sleep and the rush at the boat launch left Jihnny's wonderful net in my truck. Both those fish would have easily been netted. You can tell the guys that almost never fish tournaments. i did get a 16 and a smidge inch LMB that weighed 2.43 (I think). I'll have to look at our total later and our final finishing spot. It wasn't for lack of desire or effort, but being a tournament novice and questionable decision making that goes along with that a high finish was never in the cards. my boat ran great. The sailing was a little smoother and at one point I was skimming along at 71.3. thats about as fast as I need to go and much higher rate of RPMs and fuel consumption than I normally fool with. I had a good time. I appreciate the efforts that BassCat Boats goes thru to put this party on for us. I appreciate CajunAngler fishing this with me. I'm going to bed now. Back at work bright and early tomorrow.

Today was Day One. Johnny and I are boat #183 out of 390 or so. They did flights of 80 boats released single file with a 15 minute gap between flights. We will leave a little later tomorrow morning. made a long rough ride up to Big Creek. Our first keeper was a really nice Largemouth Bass. Our second keeper was a squeaker Smallie. We added another no doubter LMB and then finished with a stout Smallie. I had a Smallie that was just short and lost a potential keeper near the boat. We used Big Boy baits, but lots of little fish got in the way. We had around 40 fish. We had a handful of spots that would be legal keepers, but not in this tournament. We are sitting in 69 th after Day One. We are planning on swinging for the fences and putting all our eggs in the Big Bass Basket. That is realistically our only chance to cash a check now. We may drop in the standings some because of it. Fishing is tougher than I imagined. The lake is crowded and running your boat in that is a beat down. Stay away from BSL tomorrow. Come back after the Bass Masters are done. Trying to have fun with the stress. Not getting much sleep. Tomorrow's another Day.

Careful! You'll hurt her feelings.

Crummy time for me to decide to fish a tournament

I use a wind sock a lot and I am strongly considering adding a second one

Blackhawks were the better team and yet Blues find a way to win. I love it. My Pens had a good game.

Glad you got on them better today. That's what I get for trying to potluck your fish. I knew my numbers would be down during the OI and I was hoping to buffer that. Much has been said back and forth about his Seaguar vs my nanofil. I could not spot much of a difference in bites really. I can tell you one thing. He sets the hook VERY Hard with 6 lb line no less. He doesn't break off because he has a very well matched set up. I do have plans to set up a combo with 6 lb Seaguar for windy days. I have zero other concerns about Nanofil.

Some of the different fish I catch I am NEVER going to really be able to ID because I am NEVER going to do scale counts or fin ray counts. I haven't done a great job of photographing suckers so that I can see fin shape and mouth shape to try to work them out. Great job John!

He'd notice the boat was riding nose down and figure it out PDQ. I suspect he'd adjust the TM height and KOKO.

That's a freaking giant from a pond that gets a ton of fishing pressure. Kudos.

"LGB" T? Just kidding. I have the Blues playing for the cup in my NHL bracket. Sorry

It was my privilege and absolute pleasure to get to fish with Dave "He makes the best Ned head ever" Reeves on his part of Table Rock. We fished all day within a couple of miles of the Hwy 13 Bridge. I can promise you all that Dave will forget more about Table Rock than I will ever know. To say I was impressed by his knowledge of that area, is such an understatement. I'm kinda embarrassed by it because it makes me feel like Jon Snow. I apparently just roll up to Bull Shoals and throw my baits at the water and hope for the best. We started fishing about 0800 and quit fishing at 1945. He gave me every chance to catch one more, but after one pulled of on my stated "Last Cast" I regretfully said lets go. The fish were just a little off their feed. You had to pry their mouths open and slip the Ned in there and even then you would still miss most of the bites and had a much higher than normal amount of fish come off. Including my biggest smallmouth and spot that I had hooked all day. Word to the wise, when Dave asks if you want the net, the correct answer is Yes Please. So, it was a tough bite. I caught 21 and Dave caught more than I did. So a slow day anymore is 50 ish fish. We had some real good ones, some just squeaked by keepers, some good chunky shorts, and some really small ones. We caught fish as shallow as 5 foot and as deep as 25 foot. Sorry I cant say we narrowed them down any better than that. I brought 8 rods. I could have brought one. I fished with 7 of the 8, but only caught fish on one of them. I did fish the Snappy Crappy a while in some good looking spots, but never got a look at it. I think the water temp was just a little too low. I never got comfortable with my zinker color I was fishing. The abnormally dingy water at TR threw me off my game. well, that and the slow bite. I never felt like I had a "good" color one. The amount of tackle Dave carries is awe inspiring and his level of organization is pathological. It simply must be seen to be believed. By comparison, I am a mere beginner that has a couple of baits. Makes me want to buy more and less at the same time. If you are going to have that much stuff, you darn well better be uber organized or you aren't ever going to find anything. Dave has to run a 21 foot boat to tote everything. I wished the fish had bitten a little better, but I loved every minute of our day on the water. Dave is a good solid citizen, great fisherman, and a wonderful host. I hope I am able to host him on Bull Shoals or the White River one of these days.

Glad to see that Dale Carnegie course is paying dividends for you.

Your numbers are probably improving. You can see an improvement based on how many you catch over the course of a year or per trip or per hour fished. There's always guys that are going to catch more or bigger or whatever. It's a fool errand to try to out catch a guy fishing 5 days a week. I'm trying to be completely accurate and honest about what I catch and compare one year of my fishing to the next.

Ahhhh Golf.

Imagine my Dad at 84. I really would rather he no longer went by himself.

Which is why I say "To each his own." There is a lot more to fishing than just catching the fish, but I'll never say that I don't care if I caught any fish or not. Catching fish is central to my fishing.

It's not a game I always want to play either. I've caught BIG bass and I always like when it happens, but I just flat like catching them. I'd much rather have 20 smallies over 14 inches than one largemouth over 20 inches.

Guys like that are in every sport or hobby. They give all the other guys a bad name. I wouldn't do that for any reason at all and most tournaments have rules that specifically state that you must display courtesy and Good Sportsmanship at all times. They could and should be DQ'ed for that behavior. They absolutely do not have any more right to that water than you did and could have fished behind you or elsewhere.

I have proof positive that Salmo trutta will hit a Ned as well as our friend the Rainbow trout.