eric1978

That's a very pretty smallmouth in your picture and a nice looking stream as well. I can't help you with any advice on fly fishing techniques for smallies, but my one suggestion would be to invest in a spinning or baitcasting reel and rod if you don't already have one. Many (most) of the baits that are going to catch bigger smallmouth are going to be too big to cast with a fly rod, although I have heard some guys getting some bigger fish on streamers.

Hoglaw, you may want to do a little research on riversmallies.com...here's the link to the website.... http://riversmallies.invisionzone.com Most of the anglers who frequent that website do their fishing in the east, and I'm sure many of them have experiences with the Smoky Mountain area. You won't find any info on trout there obviously, but some of those guys know their smallmouth.

Yep, the thought of eating crow just about gets me gagging, but the fact is they don't eat anything more disgusting than what catfish eat.

You're a riot Buck's Hot Dad. Will you mail me some of whatever it is you're smokin'?

The way Skip was talking he made it sound pretty sweet. Great for stability and storage and taking out a couple of idiots that can't canoe. My only concern would be having to portage the thing any kind of distance. How heavy is it?

Wrench I did try the palm down method when I first started, but it just didn't work for me. If I had to make a correction of the wheel more than 90 degrees, I had to regrip the wheel and I was all confused again. With your hand palm down on top of the wheel, you can make a correction of almost 180 degrees without changing your grip. I guess everyone has to find their own method, but one thing's for sure...you do it enough times and you just get it, kinda like the first time you ride a bike without dad holding you up. I cut my teeth backing trailers in a shipping yard at FedEx years ago. I moved thousands of them, and yep, the suicide knob (why do they call them that?) was awesome. The first time you back a 53 footer is pretty intimidating, but you soon realize they are gravy compared to the 28 footers. And the dollies? Fuhgeddaboudit. They were tough. Had a hydraulic fifth wheel on the yard dog, too, that made life real easy.

You forgot to mention your duck boat.

Don't know it, but that sure looks like a fishy stretch of river on the bluff side. Bet there's been a bunch of smallies caught in that hole!

I pull a trailer every day for work and backing it eventually becomes so second nature you don't even have to think about it. A few easy tips: 1) If possible, get your vehicle and trailer lined up so you can back up straight. Try to get to where you can see your entry point equally in the driver's side and passenger side mirror. As you're backing, look in your driver's side mirror and keep the side of your truck and boat in one straight line pointing in the direction of your entry. If it's tighter quarters and you can't straighten out before backing, always try to back up turning with your driver's side toward the water instead of the passenger side facing the water. 2) This point can't be stressed enough for beginners or those who are "backing challenged:" Take a deep breath, relax and clear your mind. Don't think about the other boaters watching and waiting for you to finish. As soon as you break your concentration, you get all mixed up. 3) Look at the butt of the left side of your boat in your driver's side mirror as you back up and keep your right hand at 12:00 on the wheel. 4) Keep the instructions in your head simple. If you want your boat to go left, turn the wheel right. If you want the boat to go right, turn the wheel left. Keep saying: Right goes left, left goes right. Right goes left, left goes right. 5) If you screw up, don't start all over, just pull up a couple feet until your truck and trailer are aligned again. 6) Back slowly. No one is there but you. The shorter the trailer, the tougher backing is. Use very small wheel movements when backing a short trailer.

My thoughts are with you, Eric. Hang tough Brother.

You should shave a G off that down payment and get yourself a Vagabond as a gift for putting yourself through such a traumatic experience. At least that would be my rationale, but I'm the rationalizing king and master. You may want to mention to your adjuster that you had some gear broken in the accident as well. If you have receipts for your rods and reels, they may just pay for them...never hurts to ask. Remember, American Family works for you; you write their paychecks.

irony-an outcome of events contrary to what was, or might have been, expected. That's all the help I can give. I've got a meeting with an old lady and a fishbone I'm late for.

I agree with you Chief, but what do they do with the 60 lbs of pills they collected? If the treatment plants can't get rid of it, where does it go? Unless you shoot it into space it's gonna wind up back in the ground sometime. I guess they could bury them in plastic barrels, but even they will fail eventually...maybe not while we're alive. And to Wayne's point...who on earth is flushing Viagra down the toilet? Even if your woman left you, you'd probably hold on to them for a while, no? Also, I seriously doubt the FDA is going to allow the resale of previously privately owned drugs, although I'm sure there are plenty of people who would buy them.

I didn't want to be the one who said it.

Sit on dock. Hook minnow. Drown minnow. Open beer. Wait.

Looks like tomorrow will be a really rainy one. Good day to hunker down and enjoy your little fried feast (hope they're rainbows, sounds like they're too small to keep if they're browns).

If you're looking for a chance to hike, canoe and catch both smallmouth and trout, I'd consider the Smoky Mountains. The wilderness there makes for incredible hiking, and I know they have both species of fish. Particular streams and where and how big the fish are, I have no idea, but I'd be willing to bet that if you headed out to around Smoky Mountain National Park, it would be really tough to have a bad time, whatever you wind up doing. I backpacked there, and it's absolutely gorgeous. It's temperate rainforest meets deep Ozarks meets the Rocky Mountains. So diverse, so beautiful. I didn't bring a rod to do any fishing because I'm an idiot.

There are a lot more factories in the east and I wonder how much of what's found in the water is coming straight out of them. I know they're under a lot of disposal regulations, but we all see those documentaries and news reports on the illicit practices that go on all the time until a company is caught. Manufacturing byproducts are surely making their way out of those buildings into places they're not supposed to go and leaching into the aquifers. We all know where that water goes next. I guess I'm just skeptical about how much contamination is actually passed through humans and into the toilets. I'm not saying I'd want to take a bath in a vat of human waste, but if it wasn't for the diseases in it, I'd venture to say it would be more organic and less toxic than the stuff factories are producing. I suppose this could be a major problem, however, if it's true that water treatment plants are incapable of filtering out pharmaceuticals through some process. You can bury solid trash in a landfill, but it's really tough to sequester contaminated liquids, which I guess we humans have been struggling with since the industrial revolution. We are our own worst enemy.

Ha! You kill me man! You got some whoppers under your belt bm! Love the old school 80s photos. Keep 'em comin'!

Paola Cat had a load of 'em for sale a couple weeks ago. Not sure if he sold them or if he had that color. Look back in the buy/sell/trade forum to find him. If not, I'd check ebay.

You're right bm, sorry 'bout that. I'm bored to death, too.

When you go east on Big Bend at Sulphur Springs, you go down a hill, then start going up another and you're on the left, right?

"]"Then in the Arctic half-light of the canyon, all existence fades to a being with my soul and memories and the sounds of the Big Blackfoot River and a four-count rhythm and the hope that a fish will rise. Eventually, all things merge into one, and a river runs through it. The river was cut by the world's great flood and runs over rocks from the basement of time. On some of those rocks are timeless raindrops. Under the rocks are the words, and some of the words are theirs. I am haunted by waters." Norman Maclean One of my favorite movies of all time. Watch it about once a month on rainy Sundays like this one.

Blue Springs Creek is actually more like 50 miles downstream of Maramec Spring. I guess they stock trout at Blue Spring OTF? Never been there...

I have no idea, but that's an awesome bluff, Wayne. I'd guess somewhere farther south, maybe in AR near the Buffalo.