fishinwrench

Yup

G-E, what year is your Honda?

Post over on the Mo.Catfish board and have those guys direct you to the parachute cord slinky weights.

There is some wood along the bank, more as you get further downstream from Bagnell. There are alot of transition areas where the bank goes from rock to gravel, or gravel to sand/mud and those spots routinely hold bass. Also anywhere a creek or ditch meets the river are notorious hotspots. Typically if you can find wood cover that is on a transition area you should find a group of fish on it. Google Earth it before you go and you'll have a general idea of where to go after you launch.

The MDC ramp is good, but don't expect a "courtesy dock ". The only navigational hazards would be the BOTTOM DEPTH which you'll have to be constantly mindful of until ypu learn your way around.

The spawn is not over. Water color is variable depending on what cove ir creek arm you're in. Topwater bite is a day to day crapshoot, but it doesn't hurt to always have a rod rigged for it. Pitching lizards (and stuff) around shallow docks and wood cover is among the best ways to stick a pig right now. Hope you have a good trip!

Don't know if you have a voltmeter on the dash but if you do did you notice any voltage spikes (Over 14.5) or irregular tachometer readings? Sounds like a voltage regulator failure, probably caused from a bad battery or loose/dirty connection. Peek under the flywheel and see if the stator windings and voltage regulator (and associated wiring) look like they've been hot.

Nice bass! Good lookin' crawflys too.

Here's the color pattern A Wiggle Wart painted in that pattern (including the bill) is a smallmouth killer !

Not bad at all ! Think you could do some Wiggle Warts in the original Heddon "bullfrog" pattern?

The bite was outrageous yesterday apparently. I was stuck working but some guys I know loaded up on some really nice crappie ahead of this front. Probably sucks today with all the thunder and lightning.

Dave, it sounds like a wire has come unsoldered from the speed switch (rheostat ) or the switch has gotten corroded. You could probably tear into it and repair it yourself, they are pretty simple in design. Parts are pretty reasonable online if you need any. www.trollingmotorparts.com

Here's one I'm anxious to drag through a bed

Good point. On the plus side..... it'll likely still be there next time you go.

2007 seemed to be a really bad year for batterys of all makes, no idea why or how but I'll never forget how plagued everyone was around here with battery return/pro-rate refunds, it totally burnt me out on dealing batterys. The straw that broke the camels back was when I recieved a "lead acid battery tax" statement from the state saying that I owed over 600.00 when I only realized a profit of less than 500.00 from selling batterys that year. I buy them as I need them now, somebody else can have that headache.

Litterbug !

If you've got four 6ga. going up then it's not cheaply wired.... somebody just didn't configure the wiring/ switches quite right (or it may just be a missing or loose jumper wire at the switch. If you actually use the 12v option it would be worthwhile to get that straightened out so that your pulling parallel off both batts when on 12. Most TM upgrades I do are from 13/24 to straight 24, and in that case I terminate the 12/24/chg. switch and run 24v up both sets of cables and either upgrade the plug or hard-wire it straight to the pedal. Keeps the whole circuit nice and cool.

Right. Whats on top, the crappie, the whites, or the mudhens?

Bird watcher, if that's true then your boat is wired cheap, your 12v should pull parallel. Do you have only 3 leads running from the stern to the bow, or 4 ? Switchable 12/24 has never made sense to me, there's no benefit to running 12v when you can run 24v at a lower setting. Never understood the concept or reasoning for that.

I agree, but I guess if you had to "fill" a freezer, "legally",.... you couldn't do it with crappie.

Firstly, always replace 24v TM batterys in pairs. Secondly, "fully charged" only means that the cell has taken all of the charge that it is capable of..... that doesn't mean that the cell is "good", it just means that it will not accept any more amps. A bad battery will show 100% charged on an automatic charger, because it actually is "fully charged"..... it has reached it's full capacity.

Charley, if you find yourself in the Lake Ozark neighborhood gimme a shout, there are plenty of easily wadable streams in the area that hold some decent smallies. A med-lt. Spinning rod and some smaller sized plastics will practically guarantee success.

Hunnewells boats are probably registered. You can switch motors on a registered boat without making any changes to the registration of the boat.

Yeah, the strip pits and ponds where the top layer of soil has been removed from the area are sometimes gin clear.

The top soil around there is really slimey cornbelt dirt and underneath that is clay. , during dry spells the top soil cracks open and water cant penetrate the clay. The runoff is heavily stained because not much of it has a chance to sink in and be filtered through rocky substrate.... it just sinks in to the layer of clay and ozzes back out of the ground muddier than it went in. Ozark lake water gets "silty" and off colored during heavy runoff but clears back up when the silt particles sink. Mark Twains "color" isn't silt it is just mud-stain that just doesn't go away. When you scoop up a glass full of it and hold it up to the light you don't see little particles suspended in it, you just see chocolate water. The same way that coffee or tea holds its color even after sitting still in a pitcher for weeks.