tjm

RR fishing good on these days. I caught several fish an hour without much skill or effort. People I spoke to all seemed happy with their catches. All mine were on dry-ish flies, midge , beetle, ant etc. but all the usual baits and lures appeared to work for those that used them. For the most part the fish ran bigger than they were a month ago. Surprisingly there was not a crowd on any of the days I was there. I got no pictures, but, you've all seen stocker trout in bright red colors before, full of eggs they were.

roflmbo >>well those quotes didn't carry through with the other stuff included, so it may not make sense but I laughed at my attempted funny and the way others read it

maybe on a carp forum

I am semi opposed to catch and release because of all the released rod and reel fish that I've seen dead. We talk about fish handling and care but there are dozens of anglers that have no idea what that means, many think they are doing good when they are in reality wasting a fish that is slowly dying. If I had MoCarp's zeal and energy I would campaign for regulations that made every one eat every carp they catch. And only allow certified anglers to release bass under 20".

Big LES are rare in my experience. Hundreds of 3" ers have tried to eat my flies over the years, but only a couple of pan sized ones. Awesome deer hair display.

top right corner of page, your name has a drop down menu, on that is ignored users. I think it's silly, because it just keeps you from seeing what he/she wrote, it doesn't keep he/she from writing nor others from reading. And if it is quoted you will still see it in the quote. If it isn't quoted replies to the comment you can't see may not make sense, I have even seen such replies make the blocker take offense, thinking the reply was aimed at him/her. It is real easy to just not click on any user's post if you don't want to see it. Or to act the part of an adult and not get offended by other's views, this is after all the internet and freedom of opinion is widely accepted, sorta like "freedom of speech" .

You have had rain? I have only had to mow the lawn twice all year.

I think the national attitude towards public access is it should all be hike in, on public lands and and pay-per view on private lands.

from Wikipedia "The longear sunfish reaches a maximum recorded length of about 24 cm (9.5 in), with a maximum recorded weight of 790g (1.7 lb). Most do not live beyond six years. " http://wrec.igfa.org/WRecDetail.aspx?uid=19304&cn=Sunfish, longear Huge fish, my biggest longear was about 7.5" and I wasn't sure what it was at the time because of the size, I thought hybrid.

very nice

I saw on another forum that elvers were worth an average of $2369 per pound this year to Maine commercial fishers. South Carolina is, I believe the only other state that has a commercial elver fishery. The Asians consider them an aphrodisiac. http://www.maine.gov/dmr/science-research/species/eel-elver/factsheet.html

40 odd years ago when I was catching them in RI and butchering them for my mother in law; I was curious enough to spend time in the library studying them - the info was that European eels and American eels both breed/spawn in the Sargasso Sea and very near to each other but do not mingle. Then the babies went back to the continents and up all the streams, often to the head waters. So, any stream than drains to the Gulf or the Atlantic likely had elvers and eels at some point. iirc the adults die after spawning.

I've caught them on worms and on flies in the Narragansett Bay drainage and in the Bay itself on squid and sand worms. Their slime is not only slick it preserved the color of my new dungarees where it touched them through countless ships launderings. Faded pants with a streak of new looking blue snaking around the calf. I skinned them and rolling in ashes makes them easier to handle. Lemon Joy is your clean up friend. My uncle told me they came up the Elk River and he could remember them in Little Sugar Creek before they built Pensacola Dam. We would probably still have them if there had been a fish ladder constructed. An older guy down by Elkins told me they used to come up the White as well. Both those guys are dead now and so it's hearsay, I reckon.

One weight heavier isn't likely to over load the rod at usual fishing distance, I might go up two weights to cover the flaws in my casting style. And while I fully agree that top quality lines are worth the money, and full length lines will reach out farther, I tend to recommend a less extravagant line for learning use, the Cortland Fair Play line casts pretty well for me and can be bought for <$14. Cheap buy in means I can buy 3-4 different weights and test the rod for what works best in my hand. In my fly fishing actually hooking a fish at over 40' is very unusual, my casts rarely exceed 50', so is 90' of line necessary? On a double taper it is essentially two lines, wear one out and turn the thing around to get a few more years out of it. On a weight forward all that built in running line could just as well be backing in most usage. I recall my first year of fly rod fishing, I wrapped around logs and threw the fly up into sycamore trees and hit rocks with the line and stepped on the slack by me and.., long story short that good line (@~$70 now) was trashed in 9 months, the next line lasted three years, as my ability to avoid catastrophe increased the lines lasted longer and longer. And while the top line will make your rod perform better in expert hands, it didn't make that much difference in my casting until I developed basic skills; further, the rod will still be a basic rod. So, my advice (and it is worth every penny it costs!) I'd buy a couple of the cheap weight forward floating lines and try them, I expect the line you got is level line and WF in same weight rating will be heavier at casting distance. Six months or 500 fishing hours from now you should have a much greater appreciation of fly line mechanics and enough ability to determine if you want upgrade just the line or you want to go for better everything. Al made a good point about lines and leaders when using the bobbers.

I'm not familiar with that model, but most pickups sitting on a level surface slant up from front to rear while empty, the bed rail will appear to run uphill from cab to tailgate and when loaded that rail will appear more nearly level. I should caution you that 1/2 ton rating in the past ('50s,60s '70s) actually rated the bed load nearer 750#, but people I grew up with had a "load it til it breaks, then make it stronger" philosophy. My own philosophy after many years of fixing broken trucks is "buy the single axle 1T or the heavy duty 3/4T if you intend to haul loads on any frequent basis. Light duty pickups have evolved into cars that are only good for occasional loading and towing. My experience with more fuel efficient rated units indicates that a 25mpg empty unit will get 19 mpg at half load and 14-16 at full load and it will break down much more frequently. The manufacturers realized that 1/2T s could replace full size sedans and have less EPA hassles so they dropped all full sized sedans, the last being the Crown Vic platform in 2007, Chevy having dropped the Caprice in '96 or so. Doing the math of 5mpg against repairs and lost time convinced me that I want a truck to get 15mpg max, if I intend it to be a truck. imo, any pickup with a rear seat and/or four doors is meant to be a car. Big question is how do you know in advance how much the load will weigh? You may be over thinking this.

I have hauled 2700# a few miles in a C10 1/2T bed, the steering was a little bit light and I kept the speed down. I have seen hundreds of loads of firewood weighing ~15-1700# hauled on 1/2 tons of every brand, but these were all full sized pickups with L6 or V8 engines. Since I'm still driving the '85, I can't say what newer models can do. My '87 ranger I4 had ~7-800# bed capacity normally, mostly due to power train, but I hauled a load of scrap that scaled 1400#+ one time . In general I think the engineers design so that a fair portion of the bed load is transferred to the front axle. It does help to position the load as far forward in the bed as possible. If the load slants the rear down past the level it's likely too much.

some good info in these articles if you haven't read them; http://www.ozarkanglers.com/lake-taneycomo/fly-fishing-taneycomo/

Just a thought, Travis, but in those small sizes won't a 90 head pretty much close the gape up? I have seen the small 60 style used with bead heads. I bought some 1/100 oz #14 some place a long time ago and used very few of them so far. BPS has these 1/128 oz #10 that you could tie on. https://www.basspro.com/shop/en/white-river-fly-shop-super-jighead

J Stockard lists these down to #20 and half a dozen other styles down to #16 http://www.jsflyfishing.com/firehole-sticks-516-60-degree-heavy-jig-barbless-hook and these to #18 http://www.jsflyfishing.com/lightning-strike-jf2-barbless-60-degree-jig-fly-hook Presumably if Stockard has these other suppliers could get or do have the same sizes in the same styles. The easiest way to add weight to a fly is use a bead for the head, or add lead wire under the body. I have used tiny split shot quite a bit, about 3" up the tippet.

I don't think the guy writing the opinion piece expects it to result in banning all bass boats, I thought when I read it that his intention was to draw attention to the speed and numbers problem as a whole. There are 100mph pontoon boats according to the 'net and 100mph with no brakes is just stupid, imo, but beyond the stupidity it endangers any one not traveling 100mph because they can't get out of the way. If the article creates discussion in a dozen or so places as it has here and 20 people (or a 1000) start to see things the way Al expressed them, I think the writer and the editor will be satisfied. Of course it makes a difference whether you are the swimmer or the wade fisherman or the cat with the high-speed boat. On the other hand in an overpopulated world, what is the loss of a few lives. There will be no solution if no problem is perceived, and at the rate things happen, the problems are often not acknowledged until the damage is done. Speed on water will never be enforced, power could be.

Didn't find it on the Roku search, so guess I won't see it soon.

100 mph makes one wonder how good the brakes work, eh?

Out of curiosity, how many of you will vote to ban pump gasoline when the attackers start to use napalm? Gas is not a right protected under the Constitution and is ridiculously easy to use.

You have point about the sober driver having only stupidity as an excuse, so, should the drunk that crashes get a pass because he has a better excuse?

So, it's good thing or a bad thing to pull checks for what ever? Are intoxicated captains a good thing or a bad thing?