MrGiggles

You're looking at things in a very narrow perspective. Nobody is arguing that professional fishing is physically demanding. Maybe more so than an office job, but nothing like what you mentioned. Distance from your family, sponsor relations, living in hotels, pressure to always perform, the lack of long term success, those mental demands are going to take a toll on you. Ask yourself this, if it was that easy, wouldn't everyone be doing it?

I always felt like the odd man out, but prefer working in the late morning/early afternoon in the summer. It's always dead still and far more humid in the morning even if the temperature is a little lower, once the sun burns that humidity off a little and the breeze picks up some I find it to be a little bit more bearable.

You know it's bad when you get excited to see that it's only gonna be in the 90s this weekend.

I snuck away to Crabtree yesterday afternoon. Man, the lake was busy. Felt like a holiday weekend. I expected the lake to be higher with all the rain in the Springfield area, but it hasn't risen much, if at all. The fishing was terrible. Ended the afternoon with one short walleye and a drum.

AKA, the lowest hanging fruit. 😁

I haven't been fishing a whole lot this summer. I did go out with a buddy Sunday morning and had 7 walleye (3 keepers), two channel cat and two crappie between us. Great morning until the wind came up. Mostly BB in 20ft or so.

My powerhead will blow again before I every need to worry about spark plugs.

Sounds more like NGK should be footing the bill if they are listing their plugs as compatible. What plugs did you take out of them?

You can use the Minnkota transducer with that graph without a problem, I believe you will need two adapter cables. See the webpage below. If you do decide to run both Garmin transducers, you can use a band mount for the 2d/di/si transducer and a shaft mount on the livescope transducer. An Ultrex is pretty easy in this regard, as it cannot turn more than 360* like the electric steer motors, nor does it slide up and down in the mount. Just make sure the cables are out of the way of the mount so they don't get pinched in there. https://support.garmin.com/en-US/?faq=0NLGtqrmuW3xg2L2gdURi9

It's unbelievable how much our hay fields perked up from the little bit of rain we got. I'd swear the sudan grass put on another foot in the last 10 days. In a normal year we'd have already cut it once if not twice, it's looking like we may get at least one decent cut now. Beans and millet are looking better but the lack of moisture gave the weeds a pretty good head start. We have one field with a bad wet spot right by the truck stop in Collins, cattails and all. I've never been able to get in there with a tractor and mow it, this year it was hard as a rock, slicked it off with a 2wd tractor no problem.

Those storms that rolled through last night dumped about an inch of rain on us, one round just after 9PM and another later. Seems like everything greened up already this morning.

From what I've seen it's cheaper to buy the combo and sell the extra transducer.

I don't think I've ever seen someone that physically matches their online persona quite so well.

Ditto. Verizon will be the best but it will not be perfect. I have TMobile now, which is by far the best where I live, but pretty crappy South of Stockton or towards Pomme.

There's a video out there of that. As I recall it's a 250 or something like that. Was pretty entertaining.

I wouldn't go any larger than the data plate, and I doubt you would find any shop that would install a motor larger than recommended. Tohatsu has a new 60hp triple that is pretty attractive at only 215lbs. The Mercs are over 120lbs heavier. 60-75hp is just fine for that size boat.

Sounds like it may be the same spot, this was in one of the last coves before the split on the little sac, same side as state park marina. Pretty good patch of it there.

I was out on Sunday morning and had a rough time, one 14" walleye and a white bass. The water was real scummy on the main lake. Never seen it like that, clear a few inches down and you could see clouds of muck just below the surface. Back in the coves it was much clearer, 10ft of visibility. Found some weeds for the first time ever on Stockton.

Figured it was about time for the channels to swarm. Drum are next.

215lbs or so. The Merc is around 360. I have considered lithium for a long time, they're getting cheap enough now to be worthwhile. It's got one. I had always been really pleased with them, but it didn't seem to do a whole lot on this motor.

I guess it's been long enough to post an update, even though there really isn't much of one. Aside from a couple of dead coil packs, I haven't had any more issues with the Merc. Doesn't seem to leak or burn any oil. The weight kinda sucks. I've thought about trading it on one of the Tohatsu 60hp triples, as I've heard they are pretty lightweight for a 4 stroke but haven't pursued it any further. There seems to be a big weight penalty going from a 60 to a 75, more than 100lbs in most cases. Going from the 75hp Suzuki, I gained 3-4mph on the top end. The boat porpoises terribly, which has been an issue with every motor that's been on it, although it's worse now. The point at which you get trimmed up, the motor starts to sing a little, and the steering lightens up, is also when it starts to bounce, there isn't much overlap there. I have raised the motor up on the transom nearly as high as it will go, which made little difference. I'm not sure that much could be done about it.

Been almost 2 months, no trouble. Leveled it, tinted the front windows, and put some new rubber on. Was able to sell both of my old vehicles pretty easily, the used market is still hot. Also had to put a seat cover in, whatever fabric those seats are made of stains really easily. The display seems to read about 1mpg over actual, my average has been just over 18. The Chevy was always 13-14.

Definitely not a pike but the coloration is weird for a Musky. Wonder if the hatcheries are playing with a new strain, I googled "spotted musky" and it looks just like a strain native to the great lakes.

Just going back through my records (posts on here. ) I didn't have a boat until June of 2017 so no data prior to that. 2018, caught fish on beds 5/7 and 5/8, the next week they were gone. Water temps were low 60s. 2019, no bed fish but we were flooded out badly towards the end of May. 2020, hardly fished, lakes were a zoo, peak Rona lockdown. Caught fish on beds at Pomme on 4/22. Stockton was a dink fest. 2021, also dink fest. Fished more for walleye than crappie that spring, noted water temps at 66* at the dam on 5/2. 2022, flooded out but caught fish on beds under marooned docks and in the bushes on Pomme on 5/9. 2023, haven't been to Stockton in the last couple weeks but caught fish on Pomme last week that were spawning or just about to. As you can see I have always had a lot better luck fishing the spawn on Pomme.

I think the last spring that I remember the water levels being somewhat normal like this year was 2018. I'm sure that has something to do with it.