Flysmallie

I have been tying up some sort of like the two at the bottom of Dano's pic. The ones I'm tying are just a pine squirrel with a foam gurgler style back. Then I shave the hair off the tail, but leave a little tuft of fur on the end. I don't know if the trout like them, but the smallmouth seem to be very, very mad at them. I gotta be out of town until late Friday, but I'll try to post a pic when I get back.

Here is the link. But you won't find much. The boat shop is closed right now. Had to stop a couple of weeks ago to get ready for a float trip. That was all fine and planned on. Was ready to get back to work last week and ended up having to travel to Tulsa & Des Moines. Wednesday I leave for Raleigh, NC. If I could stay home I could get this done. Looks like the next six months are going to be travel heavy. I have accepted a promotion at work that will keep me on the road for awhile. Not what I want to do at all. I was actually going to turn it down, didn't want to travel. But once I looked at what it pays, I couldn't. I at least have to give it a try. My plans are to get back to work on this after I get back from NC. I need to get it done and float it before it gets cold. Already have contacted Matt at JEM Watercraft about designing a kayak with an enclosed rod storage area. Matt is a great guy with a good sense of humor. If anyone needs help getting into this, he is the guy to contact.

Looks like this year they had 38 boats. Click here for the entries.

It's against the law, period. Just the same as running a red light, speeding or murder. I'm not afraid to say that I have done both. But if I would have got caught I wouldn't have been crying about it not being a big deal. Used to be you could get by with a lot more than you can now. The reason is because it is so much worse now. My wife and one of my daughters were at the mall last night and today I hear that two guys were shot outside of Dillards last night at about the same time they were leaving. But I guess if they would have got caught in a stray bullets path, it wouldn't be any big deal, just today's kids being kids. I've had it with the way a lot of these punks act on the river, and I'm usually not afraid to ask them to move on. My wife and Daughters love to float but it's getting harder and harder to find a place that isn't R or even X rated to take them. You can offend me all you want, I'll probably just move on. But when my wife and kids are around you had better watch how you act. Maybe stupid, but when it comes to my girls, I'm not afraid of anything/anyone. It's got so bad that even when I float & camp with my buddies we take a handgun. It pretty much stays in a case, but it's the first thing that gets unpacked as soon as the tent is up. It still stays in the case, but the clip is in, one in the chamber and the hammer back. We had a bad experience one night on the Buffalo, and this was from a group of about 15 really drunk under age punks. We did not have a gun with us that night, but that was the last time. They finally wised up and decided that none of them wanted to be seriously injured that night. And as far as part cove, they can keep that cess pool. The way I see it, if we just let them do wahtever they want up there, they will eventually kill themselves. How many people have to drown on that lake before they shut that down???

One of my neighbors trapped squirrels one year. I think he said he hauled off at least 2 a day for about a month before he finally gave up. So many people with bird feeders and squirrel feeders in their backyards, I don't think you could ever get rid of them all.

You might as well try it Terry, everyone thinks you are a Bozo anyway.

You didn't offend me . I've fished a ton of tournaments on Pomme de Terre. I've had all the fish in my livewell die. Mostly at night in the summer months. I think what you guys are doing is great, whether you just measure them or even if you take them home and eat them. I don't care, just have fun. Nothing better than getting together with a group of friends and making a little friendly competition out of it. I do think that more than 4 tournaments per weekend is excessive. That's about the way it used to be. So you may just have to call me a hypocrit, because I bet there is a decent purse in a 70 boat tourney. May just have to go up there and see if I can bring some of that home. Hey I could start fishing bass tournaments again to pay for my bad fly fishing habit. Well I could if I didn't suck at it!!

I agree Geeze. I used to fish the tournaments out of Hwy 83 Marina about 10 to 15 years ago. It's nothing like it was then. I'm not sure the decline is totally the fault of the tournaments but they are doing a lot of damage. If you are going to have 70 boats in a tournament you need to find a bigger lake. Remember all the grass beds that used to be in the lake? Have they ever came back? I watched the last one I knew of disapear over the course of a year. When the grass was gone, so were the fish. Haven't fished up there in at least 3 years. I may have to spend some time up there this fall to see if it remembers me!!!

I saw a shark, I'm in. Catching a shark on a fly rod is something I must do before my time is up.

That's really cool Jeff. So when is the Jeff Scheetz Band playing at the pavilion on Taneycomo??

Well that proves my theory. Anytime anyone gets on a jet ski their IQ bottoms out. Click Here to see these retards going over the spillway.

I was already planning on glassing the bottom twice but I'm not sure about this graphite thing. While I'm not really worried about some scratches this boat will probably never see some of the places I fish. Those scratches are just fishing battle scars anyway, gives a boat character. The whole reason I'm building it anyways is for the experience. Not trying to build the best boat out there, just want something to putt around in. Might take it out to Fellows Lake this fall and see if I can hook a 40" muskie. CC, maybe you should design a retractable keel? Best of both worlds.

So if you don't guide during the day does that mean you'll take us during the day for FREE?? Good job on the site. If you ever need somebody to just come and take pictures let me know. I'll bring the creamer.

I've seen some info on keels but I have always had a hangup about them. Floating a lot of small streams and on one of my favorite floats you have to walk a flat canoe a lot. It's a 4 mile section and when the fishing is good you can plan on wading at least 2 miles of it. The canoe is just there to carry the gear. I've always thought a keel would make this worse. But I've been lucky where I don't think I've ever needed one. Waht do you guys think about keels? Did get all the panels cut out. Got some sanding to do to make them all match. You could say that I'm lacking in the jig saw skills.

Beeson I think you are picking on me!! You have too much time on your hands. And by the way you have screwed up my progress for tonight. If you get bored come on by, I'll let you use the jig saw and there is plenty of beer.

Well now you have me feeling all guilty CC. All I have been buying is bottles. But I promise to do my patriotic duties and purchase the canned beer next run. Been out shopping this morning, mostly in Dad's garage, and I think I have enough supplies to make a big mess tonight. I do have a question that popped up while I was stealing every clamp that my Dad had in his garage. If you remove a c-clamp from a shelf and a bunch of stuff falls, do you think that clamp was in use?? Well I took it anyway!! Anybody out there know where to buy some fiberglass cloth. I would like a to find some 4 to 6 ounce cloth 60" wide by 10 yards. Also does is there anyone around that carries wood flour? I can order this online, but would like to get local if I could.

Hey John, check this out. Teardrop Camping Trailers It's a bunch of scans of old plans and magazine articles. It's very interesting.

Day 1 Well actually it was night. Started working at 10:50pm and just finished at 11:45pm. I did manage to get all the measurements added for the bottom and sides. Only thing that kept me from working longer was that I don't have a "curve maker". The plans suggest using pvc pipe or wood trim that will allow a natural curve along the measurement points. So off I go in the morning to Lowe's or maybe Dad's garage. I know he has something that will work in there. Gotta get more beer too. The plans said nothing about the amount of beer this was going to take.

Those are the seats. Thanks for the link, some great info there. Tonight there will be some progress (I hope). I would really like to get all the main panels cut out this weekend. Possible start the glass work as well. Have a big float planned for next weekend, not with this boat obviously, but I still have a lot to get ready. Time to make a huge batch of smallie flies.

I didn't even realize that we all went out to eat. Looks like me though.

Okay, initial and final stability I know about. But I am confused about the flare. You have to explain that, sounds very interesting. I thought the more it was flared the less final stability it would have. I did purchase the plans for the Pirogue 500. In the plans it said to mount the seats as close to the floor as possible. Won't that increase the stability? I am planning on using the seats from Uncle Johns, they look really nice.

Don't consider it unsolicited, I would appreciate any advice from anyone. That's part of the reason I wanted to post my building log on here. I have looked at building a canoe for a long time. Right not I'm just some guy goofing off in his garage, learning all that I can by making lots of mistakes. I'm not really worried how this one turns out as long as I can learn something from it. I would like to build a really nice kayak over the winter. CC - Thanks for all your input so far. I'll take all the info you have.

Okay so now I'm building a Cajun Pirogue. Here is a link to one. In another topic Crippled Caddis suggested that I look at this boat. The funny thing is, I have looked at this design. I have been telling everyone that this is what I was building. I like the looks and the stability of a pirogue in flat water is great. I guess what changed my mind was I thought the canoe would be able to carry more weight. It's no secret that I'm a big guy. Add another person and a cooler and you could be pushing 550 to 600 lbs. Well to hell with all that. I building the Pirogue. Much better looking boat in my opinion. I'm still going to probably end up with a 16 or 17 foot boat and as wide as possible. It will carry what it can carry and I'll just be happy to float in it. Back to the drawing board. CC thanks for getting me back on track.

JEM Watercraft

First of all I would like to thank Webfreeman for getting me into this mess. I have always wanted to build a wooden canoe, but couldn't justify the time and cost of a woodstrip canoe when I know the waters that I would be taking it on. Webfreeman found me an alternative. He posted about some canoe plans that he had found and that got me to thinking about this all over again. The weekend after his post, I was going to St. Louis and saw 4 plywood canoes in the backs of 2 pickups. That did it for me right then. The past couple of weeks I have spent time on the internet, in the library and several bookstores trying to get an idea of what I'm getting myself into. I have no woodworking skills, actually I would say that I'm in the negative on woodworking skills, but this actually looks simple. Time consuming, but simple. I also spent a lot of time trying to decide on the style of boat that I wanted. I've looked at canoes, pirogues and kayaks. I finally decided on the canoe pictured below. A kayak was out because I need to be able to take my kids with me. I like the idea of the pirogue but don't feel that it's what I need to float our local streams. Here is a picture of the Pirogue 500 that I have decided to build instaed of the canoe.