skeeter

4fishys, My neighbor and good friend got a 2010 150HP Optimax back in the Fall on his new pontoon boat rigged for fishing. He had it out seven / eight times before weather got too cold for him and that is one great running and performing outboard. He got the "lifting strakes" on the tritoon and the thing get's up on plane and scoots for a 24 footer. "Out of the hole" acceleration is unbeleivable for a 'toon that size and it's not due to the prop as he had them prop it for cruising. Several dealer's service dept's. managers said the new Opti's are using less fuel than comparable four strokes and you don't have the oil change hassle on them. Hope yours works out for you and you enjoy. How in the world did a guy from Chicagoland hook up with Cook's down in little old Troy MO ? I'll bet that's a story in itself. Wrench and Bill, thanks for posting the info about the '05 Opti's. Good to know.

Here we go again ! Light freezing rain, sleet and a little snow this morning in Baxter area. Started down to the boat and couldn't even walk on the iced-over boards going out the ramp to the dock. Supposed to continue off and on through tomorrow (Friday) then more snow Sunday night and Monday. Darn that Groundhog !

Strongly disagree. In those seas that were running at the time the change of course the Japanese vessel made was a deliberate "hard to starboard" turn of the rudder. If they were trying to avoid the "bat boat" you don't turn into it at that proximity even if attempting a specific turn like the "Williamson" or "Scharnow" turn to avoid the "bat boat" with the stern of the whaling vessel. If the people of the Sea Shepherd group don't take action, who will ? I don't see the elitist tree huggers at Greenpeace doing squat here except a lot of lip service. The Japanese whaling interests are breaking International Law and thumbing their noses at all of us so have at 'em.

FYI, A local lawn and garden equipment dealer has tested the gas from Stations along Hwy. 13 from Branson West South to Kimberling City and all of them test negative for Ethanol content in their 91 to 93 Octane gasoline. Also, the Baxter Marina has no Ethanol in their gas, either 89 or 91 octane. Thankfully, gasoline sold at Marinas does not have to contain Ethanol by law.

Phil, You posted this in the correct area but strongly suggest you go back and view the video again. It plainly shows, and reports from on the scene agree, that the "bat boat" was sitting motionless to the starboard side of the whaling vessel's course. The Captain or helmsman of the Japanese whaling vessel clearly and abruptly turned his vessel sharply to starboard to collide with and sink the "bat boat" and the action of reversing the "bat boat's" engines is all that saved the boat and the crew from being completely overrun and sucked into the propellors of the whaling vessel probably killing all aboard her. Notice also that despite the "bat boat" being cut in half the high pressure fire hoses on the Japanese whaling vessel kept spraying the boat and the crew who had scrambled to the aft section of the boat in fear of their lives. If there is any question of the claim of "piracy" here it would rest with whomever ordered or made the turn to impact the motionless "bat boat". Was International law broken here and was this a deliberate, life threatening attack by the Japanese ?.....obviously. As someone else posted, the problem here seems to be lack of costly enforcement of International Law and until these whaling laws are strongly enforced I applaud the tactics of the Sea Shepherd in bringing world wide attention to this ongoing Japanese abuse. Remember, it was the Japanese "factory ships" that all but wiped out the Western Atlantic codfish from the Grand Banks area of the Atlantic Ocean. This was a resource that had been harvested at a sustainable level for 400 years and only went into severe, seemingly irreversible decline when the Japanese Corporations arrived. You can ask hundreds of families along the East Coast of Canada what happened to their livelihood when the factory ships from Japan arrived and started decimating the cod population beyond all hope of recovery.

In my opinion and experience, if you plan on keeping your electronic units for several years and expect to get them repaired when they need service, then I would avoid Lowrance like the plague. Lowrance has this nasty habit of declaring slightly older units, regardless of cost, obsolete and will refuse to repair them. I had this experience, as have others, with two relatively expensive GPS units that were 5 and 8 years old respectively. Seems to me if you spend over $1K apiece for a high end GPS unit the manufacturer should provide service and parts for it for at least 10 years!!! Lowrance was sold to a new owner in the past two years and I was told by a large marine dealer that they laid off over 40% of their techs and customer service people. That lay off probably accounted for the 1 hour and 45 minute wait I had on the phone only to be told my LCX-15MT was "obsolete" and I could not buy a replacement GPS antenna for it. Last Spring there were many owners of the new HD Lowrance units returning them, under warranty, due to water leaks only to find the new, replacement unit leaked too. When Lowrance finally corrected the manufacturing problem they refused to divulge the beginning serial numbers of the units that had the "fix" installed so no one knew if they had a good or a bad unit and I can only surmise they did that so merchants with defective units in stock would sell them rather than returning to the factory ! I now own two Humminbird SI units and am very happy with their performance and the support for both. Caveat Emptor !

What the ???? I must be living in a cave ! Storm lures was sold to Rapala and they discontinued the suspending Wart ? When did this happen ? Thank goodness I still have some suspending Phantom Green crayfish in the boxes.

Wish there were more clubs/derbys like yours.

Well good luck with Lowrance. If you want a model number like you mention I'd try EBay first but be sure the thing is working when you buy it. Before investing any cash I would recommend going to the Lowrance site and researching the model you want. See if they have declared it "Obsolete" like they are so fond of doing. If it is deemed obsolete, Lowrance will refuse to take it in for service and repair. I had an LCX15MT on which the GPS antenna died. Couldn't buy a replacement from Lowrance but a friendly member of this board tipped me off that Bass Pro outlet in Springfield was selling Map Create 7 kits including the unavailable antenna for $30. Otherwise that $1000+ plus unit would have been junk, thanks to Lowrance. Caveat Emptor !

Thanks for all the replies. Good to hear they use a release boat and do so carefully. I recalled several posts about that "water slide" thingy and several members were not too happy about it's use. With all the incredible tournament pressure on this fishery, a lot of bass TLC is needed at the weigh-ins and releases.

Is this the tournament operation that releases their weigh-in fish by shooting them down a water slide into the local cove ? I recall some previous posts a couple of years ago about a group that released ( ? ) their fish like this behind Ahoy's in Kimberling but cannot find it. Anyone ? Thanks.

Yowsuh, Yowsuh.

Ha ! I was thinking of trying the same thing with the high's predicted in the low Seventies the next three days. Good Luck !

http://www.eclassifiedsnetwork.com/content...p;MemberID=1191 While this sounds like a good idea it will have a negative side also. This will assist thieves in locating the dock from the land side after they check out what kind of boats are left on the lifts on a given dock. So be sure and remove everything of value from boats left on lifts.

Champ I guess you know by now that the manufacturer of your GPS unit had the DST change-over dates "pre-programmed" into the units when you purchased them ? We have a couple of so-called "Atomic" clocks in the house that were built (inexpensively) the same way to roll over the DST time to CST on the pre-programmed date in effect before the Government change in 2007 instead of receiving the accurate time signal from the Universal Time Code broadcast from WWVB in Boulder, CO. Two other clocks we have had the radio receivers in them and accurately rolled over when WWVB sent the signal. You just never know what you have, it seems, until the time actually does change. Sorry to hear it cost you the weigh-in. I'm betting this caused a lot of confusion for a lot of people.

Yep, Friday morning in the Baxter area about 8 o'clock. No clue seen on the boat or the angler as to sponsor or anything to I.D. who it was. Can only assume the second boat was for the cameraman to hop into when they wanted shots of the guy fishing alone in the Nitro. Very large camera held on the shoulder like you see for TV news and stuff. They were sure in a hurry, coming, going and fishing.

Don't know about results but there was a white Nitro Z-9 fishing in front of the house this morning with one angler in the bow and a camerman in the stern seat with a very large, professional-looking camera taping every cast. They were closely followed by another guy in another white Nitro and they zoomed down the bluff with the trollers on high making rapid fire casts with no success. Both boats took off to another spot together. No names or sponsors on either boat so have no idea who it was.

Yep, your first guess is correct. Workin' on keeping me and my old boat dry

This morning's NWS extended forecast from the Springfield office is calling for Sunny/dry weather today through next Thursday so that's good news. However, the radar is currently showing another big slug of rain moving NE from Texass all the way up through Kansas so maybe they think it will miss SW MO for once ? October was already the wettest on record before yesterday's and last night's downpours. Bad news is the Month of November is usually the wettest Month of the year by average which surprised me when I learned it. I would have thought April or May..... Don't at all understand the COE strategy for keeping Beaver so high for so long ??? They don't share much info even though we pay their wages so who knows. At least the migrating Snow Geese like it. Saw at least 1500 birds rafted up together and resting Wednesday morning on TR and then one Bass boat went by ( he did try and avoid them ) and they all got up and flew off. Very impressive sight !

That 927msl forecast was made based on last week's deluge. Unfortunately, more rain is on the way http://forecast.weather.gov/MapClick.php?s...2&map.y=242 Some docks already inaccessible from land so check before you come.

Ken Burns' "The Civil War" was, by far, his best documentary thanks mainly to the late Shelby Foote. It was like you were there, alive, in the first person. This one on the Nat'l Parks was so boring and disappointing it was impossible to watch. The same old, same old black and white photos over and over and over glorifying Yosemite and Muir. Muir's history was interesting but after a while you've said it all ! As much as I like, enjoy and respect Ken Burns this was just too sleep inducing to bear. I thoroughly enjoy the National Parks and we are very lucky to have had forebearers with the foresight to create them but Mr. Burns, surely you can make things more interesting for the viewer ?

"A LITTLE BREEZY" ???? LOL ! I saw boats going past the house bouncing clear out of the water trying to run across the three and four foot high rolling whitecaps. Saw a couple of lower units with propellors spinning free of the water. Thanks for the tournament results and fishing report but couldn't help but laugh out loud at your weather description.

Agree with everything fishin wrench posted. I'm assuming you are running a stainless prop ? Having owned and driven high performance bass boats since the early 70's ( well, they weren't really high performance back then ) I would concentrate on your prop at this point. I haven't used a custom prop shop in several years so don't know who is doing what but I would suggest taking your rig to a recommended shop that is on or very close to the water. Tell them your problem, be prepared to spend a few bucks and turn them loose on the prop and ask them to test it on the water after modifying the prop. You may get away with just buying a different prop or they may need to install a different prop and then put some "cup" into it. A good custom prop bender will get your boat maxed out and running the way you want it to. I'm guessing with your report of no rooster tail that you need a prop giving you more "lift" at the stern of the boat when you are trimmed out especially since you are running a four stroke as they are heavier than a two stroke of the same HP. Happy and safe boating.....

Wow ! That's a tough question to answer. These birds can range so far and so fast it's really tough to predict their whereabouts at any given time. I would suggest scanning the skies over water's-edge ridges and bluffs that have the day's prevailing winds blowing into or onto them. Those winds provide the Eagles with an updraft that allows them to soar along the shore where the wind hits the land coming across the water and then turns upward. Those locations also enable them to visually scan the water for shad being blown into the banks by the current the wind creates. Another place I have seen them frequently is on long points of land that extend out into the lake. That's going to be a little hard to find this year with the Lake being slightly above normal pool but they do like to congregate on those exposed pieces of dry ground and is one of the few times I have seen them actually on the ground instead of perching in a lakeside tree. We have noticed when they first arrive from the North they like to gather in small flocks and put on a fantastic show of aerobatics locking talons with one another and tumbling through the sky doing several somersaults. It's an amazing sight if you see it.

The "Long Pincered Crawfish" that are native to only the White River http://www.mdc.mo.gov/conmag/2005/05/ have what I consider a unique coloration. See the excellent pictures in the article from MDC and these match exactly the crawdads I get in my TR trap. Agree with Babler about the digestive juices in the Bass changing that coloration.