lew

If your outboard motor has an alternator it'll be charging your cranking battery whenever it's running so that helps replace the juice your using while running your accesories, whereas the deep cycle isn't being replenished until you plug it in at the end of the day. Your troll motor could also cause interferrence on your sonar unit too if they run off the same battery. Always a good idea to carry booster cables in your boat incase your cranking battery goes flat, then you can get a jump from the deep cycle to get you home.

Me too Roy, once I pass that spot I know I'm only 30 minutes away Won't be long now

Excellent line-up Dax, this is gonna be another great show !! See you on the 25th

EVERY kid that's ever lived has promised his folks he'll walk the dog 3 times a day if he's allowed to have one, but what's gonna happen in a couple months or a couple years from now once the novelty of the puppy has worn off and the little guy isn't allowed in the backyard to do his thing or even when he needs some excercise ?? What about when it's cold & raining outside or in the dead of winter and nobody wants to leave the warm house, what's he sposed to do then if he can't go in the yard ?? You can leave a cat in the house and he won't really care, but dogs need to get outside to do their business and they REALLY need to run and stretch their legs. If he's not allowed in the yard, I sure hope your gonna keep your word and be able to commit to taking him for walks EVERY day......for the next 10 or 15 years anyways. Something you want to think long and hard about.

Excellent fishin tale Mike and it made for a great Sunday morning read !!

I guess everyones been following the very sad story of the 2 little babies who are both fighting for their lives right now in Sick Kids Hospital in Toronto. One is only 2 months old and has a major brain disorder that will probably take her life in the near future and even if it doesn't, she'll have to undergo a kidney transplant in a couple years. She's gone home for now but will probably be back in Sick Kids soon. The other baby is only 1 month old and will also die shortly if she doesn't receive a heart transplant. She's at the top of the transplant list and is basically waiting for baby #1 to pass away in order to live herself. I've been following this sad tale closely from the start and have tears in my eyes everytime I watch the up-dates. Like a few other OFNers, I've lost a child, plus my daughter survived a terrible car crash a few years ago when she was T-boned by a truck. I'm not really going anywhere with this, but if you've got children, please enjoy every moment you have with them and cherish every second they are with you because you never know when something tragic will happen. Give your kids an extra little hug when you put them to bed tonight. Hopefully I'm not outta line here, I'm just kinda thinking out loud.

Unfortunately Ron, I won't be at the lake in time for the April meeting, but will be there fer sure in May and lookin forward to seeing everybody again. That new location will be nice & handy too.

Your baits look excellent BassAsin Colorado & Fluted blades are good but they hold the bait higher in the water column, whereas the Willowleaf will allow your bait to run at at deeper level and that's often what your looking for. I carry alot of bucktails with willowleafs in my boat and their excllent for when you want the bait to run deeper. The smaller profile of the blade doesn't hold the bait up high like the other styles of blades. Folks that stick with only one style of blade miss out on alot of fish.

Dirk, congratulations to you and your wife on the birth of your 1st child, she's beautiful. You've just started on the greatest journey of your lives !!

You'll like that new motor Mike, those Merc 4 strokes are excellent engines !!

Sorry for bringing the curse down on ya Brian, it wasn't my intention, but I've got a couple snow shovels sittin in the basement all clean & shiny if you need to borrow them

Nuthin worse than snow in April, specially when you've had a taste of spring Cold & windy down here today, but at least none of the white stuff is left.

Thanks for your responses everyone.

I spend alot of time fishing at night and often have many miles to run back to the dock in total darkness after midnight, so rather than holding a million candle power flashlight all the time like I do now to watch for other boaters who don't like to use lights I thought I'd permanentely mount a floodlight on the bow of my boat, with a dash mounted switch, to make things easier. I know it's legal to have bow lights for when your coming into the dock after dark, but someone told me it's against the law to use them while travelling out on the main lake because they can make it difficult for oncoming boats to see your red/green marker lights on your bow. Anybody know for sure if were allowed to use headlights while underway ?? I'm thinking something like this, but it may have to be elevated somehow to shine over top of the troll motor when it's stowed.

Your 100% correct boatman. I've posted this picture before but it illustrates exactly what your talking about. This is my dad in his 15' cedarstrip about 1955 and not only is the steering wheel on the port side, it was also located in the back seat of the boat which was quite common back then. The motor was a 25 HP Johnson Seahorse ....that was actually green but came out brown when the picture was colored....but you can see the controls were actually 2 different levers. One was for F-N-R and the other was the throttle. You can also see the pully on the bottom of the steering shaft and the steel clothes line wire that connected it to the motor. Gotta luv the good ole days

Good that you were able to attend Joe, and sadly, this is something that's happening far too often lately.

The dealers paying for the 1st tank for me Glen and then it's my $$$$ after that, but I'm old school and still work in feet, pounds & gallons, and it definetely sounds cheaper when you only need 33 gallons compared to 152 litres Thanks for those other links fellers, some useful stuff there.

Thanks Cliff, I figured I was pretty close.

It's funny cause I really enjoy eating fish, specially a shore lunch, but I just don't have the heart to kill anything, so I seldom have any. I don't mind going out and doing all the catching, and as long as someone else does the killing I can totally pig out on fresh caught & fried pickeral. hmmmm, now that were on the subject, how many days left before Tombstone Rock in June ??

My new boat holds 40 U.S. gallons & I'm thinking that is equal to roughly 32 gallons Canadian. Am I correct ??

Last trip across the border for me was 13 years ago and I won't be bothering with a passport. Still got waaaaaaaaaay too many corners of Canada to explore yet

So if you CAN keep fish in a livewell and NOT stress them, what's the point of your entire thread, cause I thought you were concerned about stressing them by keeping them for the picture taking ??

I find it interesting that you twice mentioned concern about stressing fish, yet as a fisherman your obviously not concerned about the stress your putting on a fish by jamming a bunch of hooks in his face and yanking him outta the water I'm sure that's more stressful than sitting in a livewell or having a quick picture taken.

Just because someones holding up 2 fish, why does that mean he slaughtered them ??

I've been fishing for about 55 years and in all that time I spent the most hours in a boat with my brother Ed, and have absolutely no idea how many fish we boated together, but it sure was alot over the decades, but one fish will always stick in my mind the most. Apart from all the normal times we spent fishing together every year, we always took off the day after Labor Day for a week long trip after everybody had gone back to work after the summer and every year we went to a different place. In September 06 we went to Lakair on the West Arm of Nippissing for the week and had an excellent time, and on our last day there we decided to head out for one last time before we headed home the next morning. We ran down the lake to a favorite spot of mine and within 10 minutes I got this musky and Ed netted it and took this picture. A big electrical storm was moving in, so about an hour after this fish was caught, we headed in to avoid the lightening. My brother died a few months later and this turned out to be the last of our camping trips and also the very last fish we ever caught together after 55 years as a team. Every time I look at this picture I think of Ed and all the great fishing trips we had together, and I spose if I could ever have one moment in time back, this would probably be it. Ed was also an OFNer and went by eddyk