The Question Is

Will the Trophy make it out on the water this year?  I'd put your money on won't.  I have the itch to go fishing, but I think my shore spots still have a descent shot to produce.  The weather is supposed to warm up starting tomorrow, so we will find out soon.

Power Pole Micro Anchor Has Me Interested

This won Best In Show at ICAST.  How much are they gonna cost?


Answer: $595 Retail and I'm not sure if that is with the spike included.  That's a bit steep for my blood at the moment.

Trophy Boat Cover Trouble

So today I went out and pulled the canvas cover off the boat to find the other cover ripped significantly in two places.

Click to Enlarge

Not sure if we will be able to fix it or have to go to someone else.  The canvas cover needs repaired as well.

Not Getting the Boat Ready Today

The Trophy has been sitting in the driveway for a couple of weeks.  Today will not be the day I break it out.  Actually it doesn't look good for the whole week.  Maybe next week.

I don't plan on fishing either with the wind blowing 25 miles per hour and it being in the mid forties.

Trophy On the Water

( Picture not from today)

I got the Trophy (Cyberfish's boat) out on the water today at Rock Lake. The engine started right up and I took it for a quick spin just to check everything out. The thing is I'm going to try hanging a different 25hp Johnson on the boat. This other 25 is almost 10 years newer and has rope start back up to the electric start. With the motor on the boat now, if the electric start fails for some reason you're pretty much hosed and I don't like that idea.

I also have work to do on the electric trolling motor, which wasn't even on the boat today.

Trailer lights worked!!!

Hopefully I will have the motor situations squared away by the end of this weekend.

No fishing today. I watched American Idol results instead. I hoped and figured it would be Scotty and Lauren. Haley never should have gone as far as she did with some of the other talent this season. James was robbed!!!

Victory Is Achieved!!!

The Trophy is no longer stuck in the back yard. It was a painstaking process to get it out but we did it and didn't sink the truck luckily. Now I've just got to get the big motor and trolling motor situations ironed out by bass opener.

In other news, I went to the Chiropracter yet again today and he recommended that I take a break from casting for a few days. I can still fish, just no chuck and wind.

The Weather Has Been Awesome

But I haven't been fishing, except for a few casts after we took the dock out on Monday.

Yesterday I took the Trophy out to Rock Lake and ran Stabil into the motor before running it completely out of gas. When I got home I vacuumed out the carpet, pulled the batteries, and trolling motor. Later today I plan to wipe out the white interior. I don't think I'm going to do anything about the scum on the outside of the boat because the stuff I have for that is a little too harsh of a chemical for my taste.

I may do a little shore fishing tommorrow, but I'm not sure.

Trophy Is Out

Pulled the Trophy out of the water yesterday. The water on Platte is super high and so we were able to pull the boat out at our friend Jenny's access. That is the same spot that I fish from shore occasionally.

I still plan to do a little bit of fishing before ice up, if we can get some nice weather. I very well might hit up Rock Lake, Erskine Lake, or Peavy Lake instead of Platte/Sullivan.

Going Ike in a Coleman Crawdad

Here is my Crawdad:

(Click to enlarge)

Coleman Crawdad's are great little boats for small lakes and bad accesses. I can't believe Ike put a casting deck on one. They are pretty stable, but I would think making it top heavy like that would make it much less so. Maybe Ike's is bigger than a 10fter.

Boat in the water, motor started right up. I got up to 19.8MPH on the GPS which is about right.

Fishing Report: After I got the boat broke in I did some fishing for a few hours at Rock Lake. I caught a pike and two 14" bass. I did try for panfish a little bit without even getting a hit, but my main quarry was dogfish and I didn't get any of those. I fished the whole Rock Platte River Outlet(RPRO) which is a text book shallow dark bottomed bay on the NW side of the lake. I found water temps as warm as 47 but there was zero activity in the bay, I didn't see a single fish. At about 7PM I pulled out and headed to the GOMH.

GOMH Report: No Grumpy Old Men, I was the only one there. The water was flowing steadily into Sullivan. I didn't get any action until it was getting fairly dark. I was in the bullhead sweet spot and the bobber went down and it was no small bullhead. Unfortunatly this bullhead decided to go into the shoreline weeds a couple of times. Eventually it did swim out but then my hook came out. About 15 minutes later my bobber jumped then went under slowly and I landed a nice 10" silver bullhead. Unfortunatly that was the extent of the action. I stayed a while after dark and tried with a lighted bobber and glow Demon, nothing. Both fish bit on a glow Cubby and Crappie Minnow.

Camera Problems: I would have gotten picks of the boat in the water (the pick I used is from 2006) and of the fish I caught but the digital camera is being tempremental. It wouldn't work for me today at the lake.