LarryC

Hickory Creek has brood minnows all winter. They usually get them a little before the stripers show up the first part of November. Cheapest is War Eagle Minnow Farm south of Huntsville but its a good drive out there. Either place you need to call to verify they are in stock.

Probably one of my lures. Heavy braid, good electronics, and a really good plug knocker help. I like baits that run about 5 feet below my ball so I can keep it in the strike zone. I'm dragging the bait about 50 feet behind my 12 pound ball most of the time. I'm also watching the ball on the graph. For me its mostly a summertime thing.

Its clearing rapidly now that the corp is dropping the lake in earnest. Visibility at Hickory was a foot, but still ugly. Point 12 and upstream on both arms is normal. Temperature is 48 degrees. I ran to the 412 bridge and turned around to come back to point 12. Marked some bait and fish there plus the birds were saying...here, here. Drug around a Flicker Shad and a Manns +20. In two hours I caught two sow white bass and a 25” striper. Beats Saturday. I ran up to the Church Camp on the War Eagle and caught a small kentuck along with a crappie on stick baits.

What do you suppose this means? NOTE: Due to heavy rain across the basin, a flood surcharge operation is currently being conducted utilizing the turbines and project spillway. The spillway release is 83,200 cfs. Found in on the COE lake level page. I think its guvermint speak for build an ark.

Looks like they are running one generator continuous. The other is down for maintenance I think. Shot on TV yesterday showed they also had the flood gates cracked. Is this the first time they have opened flood gates before the lake hits 1130?

I'm on my second Terrova. The first went with the boat when I sold it. I've had the second for nine years now. Not a bit noisy. I upgraded it once to wireless control. I may upgrade again to the I-Pilot link. I think its pretty neat to have the option to upgrade a nine year old motor. Its on a barge of a boat. 21' Star Craft deep V walleye boat. Handles the boat just fine. Both of my motors have worked great with no problems at all. With that said I would rather have a cable model if all I ever did was bass fish. The second issue is transducer mounting. The standard internal transducer won't support SI or DI. Went I went to a bow mount sonar with SI and DI I ran the transducer cable in a track on the motor shaft. Glued the cable down with West System epoxy after flame treating the shaft. Fabricated my own aluminum bracket to mount the TD on the motor. No problems after three years but it was some work.

They must have about 5 or more Helix models from small to large. There clearing out all the old models now. Last night Cabelas had the 899cxi at $599 on the website which forced me off the fence. That price is history today as they raised it back up. They had the 1199 marked way down today but it was still too pricey for me.

I see Cabelas has a sale on the Humminbird 899 now. I've had one on the trolling motor for a couple of years now and like it, so thought I would buy another one for the wheel. Only question is which map card to go with. I was reading about Lake Master and it looks like it will highlight a constant depth line. Maybe some of the others will also. That might be useful for walleye and stripers. I need suggestions as to which to buy.

I was out Wednesday for about 5 hours. Down rigging Monte Ne, Joe, and Blackburn. One short striper outside the mouth of Blackburn. Blackburn seemed to be the place to be seen for the bass guys. I tried it for a short time and came up with a couple. I broke two of my crank bait rods in the last several months. Fish had nothing to do with the deed. Replaced them with Cabelas house brand rods and gave them a short test. Medium priced at $100 but they seem to throw just fine.

I've been using Offshore boards for about 10 years and no problems. Took off the flags when I bought them. It is unbelievable to me the price they sell for. As an experiment I made a copy out of basswood. Used a piece of light gauge aluminum for the side arm. Works every bit as good as the Offshore.

That's exactly what happened to me a couple of years ago. Until the Lowrance went belly up it did just as good as the latest thing on the market. Got mad enough at Lowrance the replacement was a 898si. I think the 899 replaced it but with the same features. I do like it and have had zero problems.

A little blurb in the newspaper a few days ago said they would be doing maintenance work on the generators. They might make releases through the flood gates during the maintenance period. Of course we know the fish in the tail waters don't much like warm bath water. I just looked and nothing has come through the dam in a couple of days other than the minimum flow. Wonder when they will get done with the maintenance and start dropping it?

With a handle like that I had to look it up. Notropis is a genus of fish in the family Cyprinidae, the carps and minnows. They are known commonly as eastern shiners. They are native to North America. I bet that is a picture of one in your avatar. I'll stick with learning about walleye for the present.

Looks like its coming up an inch per hour right now. There running the generators at maximum capacity. With forecast of heavy rain this evening won't be long till they open up. I went to the dam in 08 and it was an impressive sight. Just to feel all that power of the water. I found out its hard to predict exactly when the gates will be open. One time I was 10 minutes late.

I started at Hickory Creek this evening. Downstream to the water intake it is extremely muddy plus loaded with trash/logs. From the water intake to the railroad cut at Horseshoe Bend it is still muddy but not as many logs. At the nursery pond the water was partially clear....actually not a bad color. I stopped there and was trying to find the new brush piles but they escaped the side scan. Caught a few spots in the brush. As much trash as I saw today, I'm sure some of it will make find its way clear to Rocky Branch. Be on the lookout for the logs.