fishinwrench

It has already hit here. The bride is on a cooking strike, so it was rolly-polly's and dandelions for my dinner tonite. Luckily I found a half stick of butter.....so it wasn't all that bad. The kids ate crickets, and I think there's a few left in that paper towel over there.....if you're hungry.

Nah, you ain't getting off that easy. If that were the case then all KC Strips, or Ribeye's would be the same. Guys get a tough piece of meat.....and want to blame it on the butcher, or on the chef. I'm convinced it's something else. I have no eye for good beef. A steak that looks delicious to me always has a 50/50 chance of being tough as a wading boot. For that reason I only eat beef steak if I can order one from a fine restaurant......and that doesn't even work in Georgia or Florida. I don't think you can get a good piece of beef in those states, at any cost.

Boy isn't it ! In a conversation about river maps and river fishing a little while ago, a guy asked if I knew who a certain author of a book was. I said, Oh yeah I KNEW him, have copies of all his books and used to smoke dope with him. 😂

Oh look at that !

Just charred flesh for you, hu? I never understood the phrase "good cut of meat". What difference does the direction the knife moves, make? I've never seen a hunk of meat that tasted better if you cut it a different way. Especially one with no seasoning whatsoever. School me on this, will ya. 🤔

Looked? Are you kidding me? Who just looks? Why NO! I hopped in the stream with a tape measure, measured the depth and cross-sectional area, then determined the gradient.....then set down under a shade tree with a calculator and a scratch pad. If my calculations didn't exceed 100 CFS I called it a day, left, and headed to the nearest Kentucky Fried Chicken. I'll be darn if I was gonna scuff the bottom of MY canoe ! Now that it all can be checked online KFC's are going broke, and will soon be as rare as a Pizza Hut

I don't even remember having to do that. I just remember thinking......"Well, we haven't had a gully-washer in awhile, should be fine".....and it always was. Except for my first trip to the 11pt. 🙄 that ended up also being my first trip to Crane. The 11pt. was blown out.......and Crane was dry as a bone.

Appreciate the offer. I wish you could drive, I'd gladly pay ya to transport these powerhead blocks back & forth to the machine shop over there by you.

The Patriot Act y'all voted for. 😅

I gotcha. 👍🙂 It makes perfect sense. I just never plan a float on a river that I'm not at least fairly familiar with. And I, like you, have been doing it for 30+years longer than cell phones, the internet, and river guage apps have been around. 😉 Was there even a place you could call and hear a recording of river guage data before we all had THIS.... If so I bet it was a LONG DISTANCE CALL. 😂 And you weren't gonna see a graph that showed "median flow". LMAO ! Somehow us Dinosaurs managed to find a fish or two. Remember? How was it even possible? 🤔

Just for this I'm gonna start reporting how many CFS of rain and snow falls here at Sims Marine this Fall/Winter. And I expect all of you azzholes to fully grasp the severity of it. 😋

Ha! If I could match Sugarbritches' random expenditures with fishing gear purchases I could open up a tackle shop. That gal spends money like it's going out of style. I dare her to EVER give me that "You bought WHAT?" line of BS. 🙄

No plastics allowed, you rebel !

Alright, you win. But my guage method still works ! And I'm gonna leave you with one more piece of Idiocracy........ If the knuckleheads can't set a series of simple water level guages correctly then how in the Sam Hell can you depend on them to get CFS calculations right? I mean good grief 😂 Somebody needs to pull their yardsticks out of the mud, and slap them upside the head with them. If you tell me that a river I'm familiar with is running 2'high and falling out.....then I know exactly what to expect. But if you tell me that she's running 780 CFS then I haven't the foggiest idea what it's gonna look like, or how I might plan to fish it. Or if I even want to.try. I have an automatic and immediate understanding of what 3" or 3' of water looks like. But I have zero understanding of what an additional 300-600 CFS looks like. Am I REALLY the only one here that feels that way? Somebody help me out here ! 🤷‍♂️ NO! Nobody is gonna chime in and bail me out.......Cuz you phuckers just LOVE to see me struggle. 😅

The glory of the WP 130 is that you can cast it a mile and cover ALOT of water fast. An active fish will give away their location......then, if they don't get hooked, you can follow up with whatever bait you think might get bit better. 👍

Well.....Did you get enough for EVERYBODY, or you just teasing us with it ?

The original motor only lasted 6-7 years? What was it? She's pretty! If it was Red I might have to make you an offer. I have a reverse affinity for blue boats. Rangers in that class are darn nice boats though. 👍

I have won a bit of money in quite a few derby's over the years, and have only had to file a 1099 two times that I can remember. Even regatta permits are free. Until all of these payouts are monitored more closely than a neighborhood poker game, I don't see the courts getting involved much. If you want to cheat in a tournament, just enter with no insurance coverage, and if by chance you get caught cheating then your shrewd lawyer can turn the charges right over upon the tournament organization for taking your entry money and allowing you to participate in the first place. So there's that. The so called "organization" doesn't even have the authority to ban you from future events...... assuming they survive their own legal liabilities and are allowed to ever have another one. None of this BS is "legal" if you wanna get right down to it. 🙄 They are allowed to exist only because it generates a bit of revenue for the county/state. This is the same reason why MDC and other conservation departments always turn the blind eye. If there was nothing in it for them, do you REALLY THINK that MDC would allow 119 tournaments per month, and the Water Patrol issue regatta permits for FREE??? Hell NO! So see, any of this can be turned around and thrown in the face of anyone threatening LEGAL ACTION.

On the lower ends of creeks/rivers that feed into impoundments, if you're paying attention, you'll notice the water level going up and down. Some days as much as 8-10".... which is pretty significant. And even on calm stable days with minimum generation at the dam there is a constant fluctuation of 3"-5" Up & down she goes. It's always either creeping up, or creeping down, just like the tide. And paying attention to that is a major factor in any fishing pattern you are attempting to execute in those areas. Just throwing a little tip in there for ya that I know the majority of people don't even realize. How can the lake level remain consistent, yet the feeder creeks don't? By almost a foot!?!? Good question! But it's a bonafide fact, and no measure of CFS on either end is gonna show it. So there's that !

I think you misunderstood what I was saying. A "0" gage reading will indicate that any LOSING SECTION will be bone dry. Water flowing down a river basin isn't always all above the riverbed. Varying amounts of that flow goes underground....from place to place....and may re-enter the riverbed downstream. I don't care about the amount of water underground, I only care about the water that's above the riverbed keeping the fish wet. I don't wanna argue about it, because you probably know more about this than I do. I'm just making the case that the gauge height method works wonderfully for ME......So there's no reason why it couldn't work for others. It's quick, it doesn't require any memory or calculating. Of course, as I also made clear (or attempted to) I'm not ever opposed to hopping out and wading through some skinny spots. Matter of fact I hardly ever FISH from the canoe. I mostly use the canoe to float through spots where I either can't wade, of don't care to thoroughly fish. Whereas you seem to be concerned about the ability to float an entire section without ever having to get out. In my world, the fish are way easier to find and catch during times, and on streams, where they have less deep(er) water to occupy. I'm there to fish.....not go for a leasurly boat ride. 🙂 Now, as to guage placement and accuracy...... Usually I'd be the one to say that Geologists/Biologists do half-assed jobs. But in this case I'm gonna bet that river level monitors are NOT just slapped in un-strategically. I'm sure there's a setting method that is reasonably consistent. More consistent, possibly AND PROBABLY, than the measure/calculation of CFS. Let me ask you THIS......On a stream with no USGS guage installed, can YOU measure and monitor CFS ? Huh?? 😉 Because I can measure and monitor guage height very VERY EASILY, at any place I choose to do so, with NO PHONE SERVICE OR INTERNET ACCESS. 😁 And I'm just a stupid boat mechanic! In a 1 hour period with no internet access....can you tell me if the river you're on is starting to rise, or fall, by measuring the CFS ? Or do you just glance over at that rock that you were standing next to a few minutes ago?

River2sea S-waver 120 (swing it cross-current.....then just hold it in the flow for a few seconds) Try to concentrate on areas near a current seam. Strike King flutter spoon (Sexy spoon) 4" (worked the same way). Whopper Plopper 130 in Monkey Butt.... Don't give yourself a heart attack though!!!!! Timing is a big thing with Stripers. When they aren't on the feed......they just aren't on the feed. Go back in a few hours and try again. An hour before dark is usually the best time, unless it's a dark cloudy day.

I don't believe that. I think that cheating in that fashion is pretty darn rare. As far as the LAW is concerned.....if they could make those charges stick then they could fill the courtrooms after every weekend golf tournament and horseshoe pitching contest.

No diode in the LiFePo4 ? What is it exactly that ensures that a meltdown can't happen on THAT one ?

Many streams are perfectly floatable and fishable at much less than 100cfs. I didn't think the question was... "At what flow rate will I not have to worry about touching a rock?" 400 cfs on NFOW is way different than 400 cfs on Tavern cr. But both are pleasantly fishable/floatable at 2' guage heights. Nobody wants to fish Tavern cr. or the little Niangua at 400 cfs......But the NFOW? SURE! Whatever works for you is fine 👍, I was just sharing my personal "ignorant boat mechanic" method. On a river with multiple guage sites the CFS increases as you travel downstream, as does the guage height. And since they never place guages on a loosing section of a river......I feel that you can accurately feel out what conditions you are going to be faced with at any given time. As long as you realize that "0" at a guage site is going to be bone dry along any loosing section. Water moving underground is still moving...... but you darn sure can't fish it. Right? And if you're not familiar with the river there's no guarantee that the water will reappear in the same ditch. I'm not even sure how CFS is accurately monitored...... But I know exactly how guage height is monitored, we all learned that in the 3rd grade of elementary school. So no calculous or algebra tests ever needed to be passed......Which is good, cuz I failed them all. 😉