lew

I spend ALOT of time fishing late at night and wear a headlamp that throws a pretty strong beam of light into the water, and have wondered if some over zealous CO has ever tried to flaunt his authority and tried to charge someone with using them to attract fish ?? My bud was fishing late at night a couple years ago and was way off the channel in the thick reeds and the CO's were working a late shift and saw his headlamp and came right in after him. They weren't concerned about his lamp and were only checking licenses, but it shows they do sometimes work after dark. I know back in the day when we used to fish for smelts in Lake Ontario after dark, we'd hang a Coleman lantern off the pier and it'd attract the smelts like bees to honey.

I saw that fire on the Toronto news last night Jeff, hopefully none of the injuries were too serious. Fighting fires in these cold temps makes the job even tougher than usual.

Very simple to launch that boat when your alone. Simply tie one end of a 50' rope to the bow eye on your boat, and the other end to your winch tower. Undo all other straps and slowly back your trailer in the water until the boat floats free, then pull the trailer forward until it clears the boat. Put your emergency brake on and go back and undo the rope from your trailer and pull the boat over to the dock and secure it. Park your truck and go fishing. When your done, simply back your trailer in the water till the wheel fenders are just sticking outta the water, and drive the boat up on the trailer until the bow reaches the rubber roller on the tower, and your done. Hook up your strap and crank the boat all the way up until it's tight, put on your saftey strap and pull the boat up the ramp and outta the way of others that will be waiting. With a bit of practice, you'll be launching and retrieving your boat alone in under a minute.

Sorry Mark, we were both posting at the same time. I'll take a drive up Kennedy and see what they've got in stock. Be good to see you retire this year too Mark, best thing there is to improve the fishing trips

Thanks for the heads-up Glen, but this is the one I'm actually lookin for, in the 7 7/8" model, but I've got all winter to search for it. Might find it at the Odyssee in April. http://www.salmofishing.com/lures/skinner.html

Thanks for the update Mark and it's nice to hear they looked after you like that. I thought it was a class act when they responded to you directly thru this board too. I like the looks of those larger Salmos for muskies and have thought about giving them a try, but haven't seen them in any of the local shops, did you get them around here ?? I had a similar experience with Drifter Tackle a couple years back when a musky broke a 10" Jointed Believer in half. I contacted the company and sent a picture of the lure, and not only did they replace the damaged bait within a couple days, they also threw in a 10" Stalker to go along with it.......another class act. Some companies still value their customers !!

Thanks guys, I've decided to go with the proper charger & alleviate all doubt.

Hi guys, I recentely got a Garmin 265WT GPS for my van and have been using it with the power cord plugged into the cigarette lighter, which also keeps the battery fully charged. I've decided now that I'd rather run it off the internal battery and recharge it in the house whenever it needs re-charging. I stopped into Best Buy today to purchase a charger ($28) but the salesman said I could use my cell phone charger to do it........ It has the same male end as the Nuvi charger. (The GPS has a BlueTooth connection) The GPS battery was about 2/3 charged when I tried the phone charger and sure enuff, it brought it up to 100%, but I'm still leary of doing that. Do you think the cell phone charger will be OK for the GPS, or should I spend the additional $28 and purchase the proper charger ??.........I'm leaning towards the proper charger but no sense spending $28 if it's not needed. BTW, when I plugged the phone charger into the GPS, a picture came on the screen showing a device plugged into a computer via a cable. Any thoughts ??

Outstanding pictures Bernie, and like others have said, it's great to look back on these old memories. Hopefully you'll share more of them with us. Being as you come from a long line of cedarstrip boat builders I thought you may be interested in this one, although I've posted it before and you may have already seen it. This is my Dad trolling in his 15' cedarstrip back about 1955 and it's interesting to note that the steering wheel is on the left side of the boat rather than the right side as they are today, and also is situated in the rear seat rather than the front, but I recall many of the old cedarstrips from that era were configured the same way. The old gear shift is quite different from today also with the 2 levers rather than a single....one for shifting from fwd-rev-neutral and the other is the throttle. It also gives a good view of the old cable/pulley systen for the steering hook-up. That 25 HP Johnson was actually green but somehow came out brown when the picture was colorized. Things have sure come along ways in 50 odd years. And BTW, that fishing pole Dad's using is the very pole I learned to fish with

I agree with you 100% Lowe Rider and am not arguing with you at all, inact I've said the same thing many times, that we're often totally overwhelmed with saftey rules in the workplace, infact often to the point where it would be nearly impossible to do our jobs succesfully if we followed all the rules to the letter. I spent 32 years as a fireman here in Toronto and we had saftey rules & regs coming out our ying yang, many of them good, but others totally inappropriate for that type of work. You get to the scene of the emergency, get in and then out...hopefully...the best way you can and often have to break every rule in the book to do what's necessary. I was on the 1st arriving truck at a house fire one night and was met by a hysterical woman on the sidewalk who informed us her husband was still upstairs. I made a quick judgement call, ran upstairs alone without an airmask on, grabbed the guy and dragged him outside, and was then chastized by the boss for not putting on a mask. I had alot of experience on the job and knew what I was doing, yet because I broke "a safety rule" I was in the wrong according to those in charge. Trouble was, the guy who chastized me arrived 1/2 and hour after the fact and wasn't even there to know 1st hand the reason for what was done. What I did is nothing unusual, infact it happens every day of the year, yet it's considered wrong because it goes against the writen "rule" When I went on the job more than 40 years ago, there were far less rules, yet we still got the job done, and now I think workers are aften over burdened by un-necessary rules. I remember a time when garbage men were required to wear hard hats because thy may fall and hit their head on the sidewalk. Once they explained that the mayor could also fall in his office and hit his head on the floor, the rule was recinded. My son was an iron worker for 20 years and worked the high steel all over the world, including 2 years in Shanghai and Bejing China where he was foreman on a job erecting 2 high office towers. No matter where or when they worked, and no matter how high the job, they nearly always clipped on their saftey harnesses to whatever they could, but from talking to my son many many times about his job over the years, it's understandable that often, because of circumstances, they just had to leave the harness off to get from one spot to another. I knew alot of his co-workers and they all said the same thing. Harnesses are obviously a very important part of their gear, but often the job required them to be left off. Unfortunately, on December 13th, 2004, my son was working on the high steel and had to remove his harness to move from one spot to another, and unfortunately, that was the time something terrible, and to this day unknown happened and he fell to his death. Every iron worker I talked to said they'd done the exact same thing 1000's of times. I didn't mean to ramble on like this, but I guess my point is that saftey rules & regs are OK most of the time, but due to so many different circumstances in the the daily grind of those of us doing dangerous work, the rules have to be discarded or circumvented, and most times we can get away with it, but often it backfires and people die. Again Lowe Rider, I'm agreeing with your post 100%, saftey rules are both good and necessary, as long as they don't go over board with them.

Absolutely Wayne and I was just adding to your comment. Last I heard, that female officer was in grave condition, wonder if she'll make it or not ??

Actually, in most cases, when people are sleeping they DON'T smell the smoke and are dead before they ever know there's a problem in the house. It just moves over you and kills you before you wakeup. That's the reason why you so often read that the victims of a fire were found dead in their beds when firemen arrived. That's why it's so very important to have smoke dectectors outside every bedroom and on every level of your home. You got lucky douG and your problem was only minor, but good to hear you replaced your detectors and are now prepared incase something more serious happens.

Thanks guys and I'm happy to hear everbody enjoyed themselves, it was an excellent day, and thank you Steve for posting those pictures, I forgot to take any myself. The picture of Adam's 49 incher is on dough boy 99's camera, but I don't know if he wants it posted here or not.

Agreed, I've got WFN but don't think I've looked at it in a month. Their either squeeling and giggling like school girls, or the music is blasting so loud I can't hear what the heck anybodies talkin about. Think I'll just wait till next May when I can get back on the water and catch my own fish again

If you look in the resource section under computer problems, it seems like alot of us are having this same problem lately and it's getting to be a real pain in the butt. I tried to post a little report earlier this morning and it took me an hour for what would normally take a couple minutes. I don't even bother coming here in the mornings 1/2 the time anymore just because of the aggravation trying to do anything or even read a post

Well, another musky season has come to an end with our annual G2G on the Upper Niagara and we had the best turnout ever with 15 guys. Myself, squid, Rizzo & his bud, Wayne, Terry, Aile Goby, Fishmaster, Sonny, (Jen met us for supper) Percher, Biteme, Adam (Reefhawg) Corvette, jwl and walleyemen....I think that's everyone. We all met at the ramp before sunrise yesterday morning, cleared away some ice, and launched the boats. The weather was fantastic, with alot of sun and very respectable temps for mid-December. A bit of snow in the morning, but it only lasted a few minutes and the sun was out again. We fished the river for 8 hours and then all met back at the marina at 4:00 and got the boats loaded on the trailers As mentioned in another thread, there were a couple fish caught in jwl & Rizzo's boats, and then the big fish of the day went to my old fish'n bud Adam with a beautiful fat 49 incher right at the end of the day just as he was getting ready to head for the ramp........WTG pal, she was a real beaut !! There was a pic taken of Adams fish, maybe it'll be posted Once the boats were loaded, we headed into Fort Erie where we had a fantastic supper at a restaurant recommended by jwl, then packed it all up, said our goodbyes to each other and proclaimed the 2008 musky season officially over. Definetely one of the best OFC G2G's we've ever had, and for those of you who couldn't make it this year for whatever reason, we'll be doing it again next December on the last Saturday before the 15th, so book your spot now Thanks to everyone who came out this year and it was great to see another successful trip.

WTG Roger and congrats, that's a great lookin fish and as always, it was good seeing you again. It was an excellent day with a good bunch of guys, fantastic weather and a great supper to finish off the 08 season

I don't normally find the need to hit too many different lakes over the season A couple different K lakes Quinte 3 trips to the West Arm of Nippissing Babaganouche St. Lawrence River St. Clair And today we'll close the musky season on the Niagara

Not just yet Sinker, there's still one more softwater trip left tomorrow

I think it's called the Niagara Parks Marina if I remember correctly but jwl can give you the proper name and directions when he sees this. I've never driven from the Peace Bridge end so I'd just get you all messed up if I tried.

I tried a couple times earlier today to update but I kept getting the same message about the missing file, but I just tried again and everything is good now. As mentioned earlier, it musta been a glitch in AVG

Cause nobody ever caught a musky while sitting at home in front of a nice warm fire on a cold day, that's why we do these things, Wayne

Thanks Cliff, sunrise & moonset within a few minutes of each other tomorrow morning, just as were starting to fish. Could be good

Anyone know what time tonights full moon will set and hopefully it's after sunrise tomorrow ??

There's probably 50 baits in the box I'm bringing tomorrow Jack, but it's only gonna take one of them