jimvanm

I'll look into it. I'm very much interested in her accomplishing more than just passing the test.

Agreed, but my 12 year old daughter wants to get her card as well, and for her I was looking for a study guide that doesn't read like a legal document. The one I found online seems to fit the bill. We went through some of the sample tests together, and she guesses more right than I did, so I think we're on the right track here.

Thanks a ton for the response. I did a bit more digging and found this, which also includes sample questions: http://www.boatsmartexam.com/manual.cfm Thanks again!

Does anyone know of a good online resource for studying to get an Operator's Card? Google turns up a ton of sites where you can take your exam, but it's harder to find study guides that can be downloaded. TIA Jim

Octopi are known to be very intelligent. It has been estimated that they have similar intelligence to a cat. The shark is a fish. In a battle of wits there's no contest. I found it interesting that the octopus immediately covered up the gills of the shark. Kind of a sleeper hold wrestling move, that.

That's a good point. Catch and release has become the standard these days. Only keep what you'll eat. I think it used to be that people didn't worry as much whether the fish survived. Which brings me back to another thread, about fish getting more conditioned. If more fish are being put back, those fish might be more reluctant to bite, whereas in times past, it didn't matter if a fish learned that a lure was bad because it seldom survived to benefit from the experience gained.

Does MNR have stats on this? Are there big differences in fish populations since, say, 20 years ago?

What a monster. Wow.

That trophy is a beauty. I have to admit I am jealous! What a great way to introduce kids to the sport of fishing.

People like that are fascinating. In most cases they don't even know what they know, in the sense that they can't really articulate their technique beyond the obvious. Put the lure on, put it in the water, wiggle it just-so, and there's a fish. They just happen to have an almost magic feel for it, and to them it's so natural and obvious they can't see why anyone would spend much time thinking about it. I think one could spend a lifetime on this. What a hobby!

How do people choose a lure? Basically I have become conditioned towards orange lures. Why? Because all my favourite fish have been caught on orange lures. Now what actually might be happening is that I tend to fish more often with orange lures, so naturally more and more of the fish I catch would be on those, which reinforces the conditioning. When I go to look at lures, I am totally mystified by all the selection. I try and look at them from the fish's perspective. "mmmm, that one looks tasty". "hey, this one's nice and shiny!", "wow, that one has real-looking eyes!". But then I start to realize that I am not a fish, I can't know how a fish responds, and there's far too much about this that I just don't know. So I buy another orange lure. What I really need is a cup full of worms. It is a consistently proven fact that fish find those things irresistible. Do they come in orange?

A few weeks ago I was driving around the Toronto harbour area with the kids, and I thought it'd be interesting to drop a line into the turning basin and see what might be caught. After a few minutes another fellow showed up and started fishing. I figured that was a good sign. After a while I went up to him and asked him what sort of luck he'd had fishing in the basin. He admitted that this was the first time he'd fished it, and only tried because he saw me. Didn't get so much as a nibble, but then again I didn't stick around for too long. I guess that basin probably gets dredged for weeds, so there's probably not a lot of places for smaller fish to hide. Part of me figures there can't be many fish in there (if at all), and another part of me figures if there's a pond as big as that which is connected to a large lake by a wide channel, there has got to be some fish that have worked their way into it over the years. I'm wondering if anyone has caught (or has heard of anyone catching) any sort of fish in there?

Well, that fish had obviously lost a lot of weight and was probably just trying to build back the lost muscle mass ;-) That is a whole new method of fishing. We should call that catch-fillet-and-release.

NICE!! She's hooked now for sure!

I know it my head that it's an irrational fear. Even Great Whites are supposed to be pretty much uninterested in humans. Mostly they just take a test nibble and then spit us out. But of course a nibble from a mouth full of 6 inch teeth... The reason that I'd want to conquer it is because I know it's not rational. It wouldn't have to be sharks; anything that triggered the fear would be enough. I have also heard that having panic attacks underwater is pretty dangerous, so I'm not planning anything recklessly stupid anytime soon. I'll be happy to stick to fishing for a while :-)