skeeter

Hydro-tech said flashing the Yamaha SHO 225 ECU allowed the butterfly on the throttle body to come fully open instead of just partially. Made a huge, immediately noticeable difference in performance and hole shot.

Corn Ethanol and Gasoline have different Specific Gravities. Gasoline containing Ethanol will eventually, if allowed to sit immobile for a period of time, separate, and the lighter gasoline will float to the top while the heavier Ethanol will sink to the bottom.....exactly where your fuel pick-up is located in a boat/car fuel tank. Motion will restore, somewhat, the mixture of the two liquids. Ethanol has an affinity for water and will absorb water from the atmosphere and the more humid the percentage of the atmosphere is, the more humidity available for the process. One of the reasons engine builders were finding rusted surfaces in engines they were tearing down. However, there is a move going on to force all gasoline to contain 15% Ethanol and that is NOT a good thing !

It wasn't just the loud exhaust from the straight-exhaust V-8's they were running, it was having the inside of your home lit-up so you could easily read a book at 3 AM. Of course we still have the night-time bright light thing going on including the clown at Baxter who always runs all the way back to the launch ramp with the huge LED lights blazing and blinding other night anglers.

From the MDC website "fishing regulations": Number of poles and hooks If you use more than three poles (or two poles on the Mississippi River) at any one time, the additional poles must be labeled with your full name and address or Conservation Number. Regardless of the method or number of poles, you may not use more than a total of 33 hooks at any one time; except on the Mississippi River the maximum is 50 hooks at one time. If fishing on the Mississippi River and on other Missouri waters at the same time, no more than 50 hooks may be used and not more than 33 on waters other than the Mississippi. Hooks on trotlines must be staged at least 2 feet apart. Hooks on any type of line, as well as the line itself, must be attended every 24 hours or removed. SIX trotlines put out along "The Wall", not one of them marked, comprise far greater than the allowed "33 hooks".

If you are one of those night-time anglers usually fishing "The Wall" on the same side of the Indians as Baxter Marina.....BEWARE ! Some unnamed soul has put out and then left behind several Trot-Lines along the steep shoreline and Bluff face there and they are creating a mess with the usual bait-grabbing hang ups trot-lines create. They are unmarked with no required name or address of the person installing them and run parallel to the shore.

Never could figure out all the hoopla about Presley. Wife and I ( 1 pre-boomer, 1 extremely early boomer) both considered him a "Greaser". You'd have to be of our age brackets, probably, to understand the meaning of the term. Glad you enjoyed it....and him. Meanwhile, the bite in the far backs of coves with run-off water running into them was ON !!!

You nailed it when you said the Lake was almost "James River Green" ! Had the Econo Lift crew convert our lift back from the Tri-toon BARGE to accommodate the new/used Skeeter and the shallow water above white air tank on the submerged econo-lift was Pea Green and the lake bottom at the slip site, which is always visible, has disappeared entirely. Assuming this is temporary due to a Phytoplankton bloom from the extended heat wave ?

Interesting question. Yes, I've noticed definite current dozens of times on The Rock and there is an "Eddy Current" where the two Indians empty into the White along the face of "The Wall" at Baxter. It definitely flows backwards just like you'd find on a River or Stream there and it's not wind, but current.

After my '98 225 2 stroke Yammy was ruined by Mud-Dauber Wasps, I learned to keep a vented engine cover on the motor cowling at all times.....the hard way ! Finally found a good, used 4-stroke 225 SHO VMax on the new/used Skeeter we just bought and wondering if any of you guys/gals have bought vented covers for yours and where you found them ? There's a source in Australia called OCA for vented splash covers but no one seems to re-produce the colorful OEM graphics from Yamaha on their covers . Dratted Wasps !

We pass by this site often. Our area's residents call it "Mud Mountain". Only thing is there isn't much "mountain" left after they took at least 40/50 vertical feet off the top of "Dreamcatcher mountain" and dumped it down the sides of the slopes to make more flat area to build their project on. The latest there is a steep road they cut into the sides of the valley to the South in order to access the Lake. They better get huge income to pay for the earth moving and rock drilling they have done there to create their uglification of the Ozarks.

"Only" 13.33 inches recorded at Baxter for May's total and the "tipping spoon" in my Vantage VUE weather station was disabled by a spider web for two rain events so that total is too low. 0.62 inches so far today.

6.67 inches here at Baxter since just Sunday, May 1st. Recorded on our Vantage Vue Weather station's rain gauge and confirmed by a mechanical or static rain gauge. ( yeah, I'm a weather-geek ! lol ) Lake level this morning at 0900 923.74 and forecast to go over 925 but that may be too conservative and need updating. Here we go again ! Better weather, by far, in the forecast so break out the shorts and sunscreen.

Good question. If it's an MLF derby or a similar tournament that catches and releases at boat-side and is not a "fish transporter" it would have to be the Cormorants...especially during the spawn. I just saw hundreds, yes, hundreds of them this morning, flying away from out in front of the Baxter Marina and the size of the flock is GROWING ( possibly doubled or even tripled the number of birds ) from when they were first seen here about a week to 10 days ago ! Looked like they were possibly headed over to Flint Cove because they weren't trying to gain a lot of altitude. There were four distinct, separate flights of about 50-60 birds each. No Pelicans with them this time.

Very true and I had a report from a different site that those Cormorants have been heavy over on Taney. Those are some fish-eating machines that fly with their wings assisting them underwater and any time they overpopulate an area the fishery declines. Just ask the Smallie anglers up on lake Erie.

Yep, the LLC designation says it all......Tax write-off !

We've been seeing this large flock of Cormorants hanging around for over a week now and the surprising long stay-over of the migrating White Pelicans this year. Yesterday, before the heavens opened, we saw the Pelicans and the Cormorants fishing in the same area almost like they were cooperating with one another....that is until some Bass boaters decided to run right through the middle of them ! Anyone else recall the problems the Cormorants caused to the Fishery on Lake Erie ? I hope they are gone before our Bass get on the beds because those birds can and will pick-off any Male guarding a bed.

Strange how this rainfall has varied in a short distance " as the crow flies". 1.07 " in my Davis Vantage VUE weather station yesterday for total rainfall over here at Baxter. I saw a lot of heavy rain on the radar just to my SE but 2" is a lot of variance in that small distance. Yep, I'm showing 32 degrees this morning. Crazy April weather !

Springfield is actually closing Campbell down to traffic from Sunshine south to a small side street located South of BP. No parking at BP itself and you'll have to ride some kind of shuttle buses from off-site parking to their pay-to-attend event.

I'm still trying to find out how long a landowner has to wait for a MDC trapping team to arrive after making a complaint through channels.

Did anyone see or hear our usual huge flocks of Snowgeese travelling South since about November that you always hear before you see them way up high ? We always have had at least four or five mornings during the migration where there are hundreds of them in large flocks sitting out in the middle of the Lake before they decided to continue their journey. We missed them and our Neighbors have said the same thing about not seeing or hearing them.

Several years back we watched a Red Fox creep up from below our retaining wall and pounce on a big Grey Squirrel. There was a battle-royal between the two that went on for at least 30 seconds that looked like one of these special-effects movies where they speed the film up. It ended with the Fox shaking his head as the Squirrel ran off and up the nearest tree. Now if I could just import a few more Black Snakes to thin out these danged five-lined Ground Squirrels ( chipmunks ) that dig, dig, dig under and into everything !

Raptors usually perch on high ambush or lookout points to save the energy expended in soaring especially if winds are not favorable. We see this behavior with Hawks of all sizes on phone poles along roadsides and our resident and Winter-visitor Bald Eagles along the Lakeshore. What has become very common is seeing the numbers of dead raptor-birds on roadsides where they are so intent on diving on their prey they take no notice of oncoming cars/trucks. Have to agree with the ridiculous numbers of loose dogs and there is a pack of about a dozen that runs around the Joe Bald area on TR that has residents very concerned since Fido running in a pack is not the same animal exhibiting typical domestic Dog behavior ! Cats ? Where to start....whether they are feral or house cats turned loose they are natural born killers and are very good at it. Bunnies, songbirds...you name it and they will get it. People are posting a lot of Bobcat pictures on Facebook groups and it used to be you only rarely saw a Bobcat since they were nocturnal.....not any more ! Predator populations have exploded and the wild turkey population around the Tri-Lakes area has become few and far between. When we would fish Wolf Den in the Spring those bowl-shaped hills and ridges around the cove would be ringing with Gobblers sounding off. Haven't heard one there or anywhere else in years !

Our three Irish Setters were ALL "lap dogs". Our 198 lb. English Mastiff tried to be but only did a heavy lean on your legs when seated. darn, do I ever miss all of them !

I hope this biting incident is not connected to the recent attack that the Media reported happened in Reeds Spring where several people were bitten by dogs and the one Woman had to be airlifted to a Springfield Hospital due to the severity of her injuries. Southern Stone County Fire Protection District responds to dog attack on Thanksgiving (ky3.com) Earlier this week there were several reports on the TRL Facebook Group from over in the Shell Knob area about a pack of at least 30 dogs running loose and several people off Y highway around or near Cape Fair chimed in with reports of another large group of dogs running loose around that area. Sounds like it's time to start thinning them out !

How about 6.45 inches on my Vantage Vue weather station at Baxter ! That was in a little less than 24 hours beginning yesterday morning about sunrise. Good old fashioned Ozark Frog Strangler that surely cleared the leaves out of the gulleys. !