03.18.2010 Fishing Report

[poker fisherman]

After spending the last two months building my own canoe, yesterday's weather was the perfect time to get it on the water for the first time. Goggle-eye were biting like crazy and I saw a lot more fish that I did just two weeks ago while wading. Everything I caught came off an Eakin's jig with a Yum, craw-papi on the rear - peanut butter & jelly colors.

The canoe is so stinking light the smallmouth pulled me all over the pool I was setup in.

For those interested...I took lots of photos of the boatbuilding process, and you can check them out if you CLICK HERE.

[ollie]

Nice haul of eyes. What part of Elk? At least you beat the party crowd down to the creek! Also that is a pretty sweet looking canoe.

[poker fisherman]

Ollie, I was on Indian Creek. Probably won't hit a cold water stream until wintertime C&R. All the trout streams are getting pounded by corn chunkers.

[poker fisherman]

That would be absolutely awesome. I have waded from McNatt quite a bit, and just started a Stream Team a few weeks ago from McNatt downstream to the first county road bridge. Plan on doing some trash pickups and water quality monitoring. Only 4-5 miles from the house.

[Justin Spencer]

Beautiful boat! Is it pretty stable?

[poker fisherman]

Beautiful boat! Is it pretty stable?

Yeah it is fairly stable. Only 22" wide at its widest on the bottom of the hull. Feels a little topsy when getting in and out, but did really well out on the water. I only went through one little chute with it, and had no problems. The best part is that it only weighs 50-60 pounds. I'm hooked on the boatbuilding now. Buddies are trying to talk me into a drift boat - which I'm sure your plenty familiar with up on the North Fork

[Zack Hoyt]

Great pics and gorgeous boat. I would love to see it in person. I have a wooden drift boat I take down the Elk and surrounding rivers. just got done re-varnishing it and getting ready to put the seats back in.

[poker fisherman]

Great pics and gorgeous boat. I would love to see it in person. I have a wooden drift boat I take down the Elk and surrounding rivers. just got done re-varnishing it and getting ready to put the seats back in.

The boat looks better from a distance! First attempt at anything like this. It turned out pretty good, but the learning curve when working with epoxy is pretty steep. I might try out a pirogue style boat, now that I have learned a little more about the process. Building a floatable boat was very easy. Fairing and getting everything smooth was the difficult part for me.

[Zack Hoyt]

Epoxy is a bear to work with. My boat has an epoxy/fiberglass bottom and sides. The interior is not painted. I actually just put the final coat of varnish on it today. It was time to apply another coat. In the boat building world......price does equal quality.

I am planning on getting a few of those BPS canoe seats for my boat as well. I have a rope weaved seat, but no backrests. Makes it hard on the lower back setting in it all day.