Dabluz

I like Excalibur Rotating treble hooks. I always replace the hooks that I don't think are adequate. However, some lures do come with excellent hooks. I would even say that the quality of the hooks on good lures has improved over the years.

I did some stretch tests with a couple of fluorocarbon lines and a good handful of monos.....all of the same lb test. Ok, the tests were very simple.....I just used 3 foot lengths of line and added weights to the end of the lines and measured the difference. Stretch lengths were similar. Ok....Berkley XL had a bit more stretch.

Please give us a report after your outing.

I also would go along the lines of tickets to the theatre or a musical. The Cirque du Soleil is very popular.

That's more for pike and big walleyes than for musky. However, it will work for smaller muskies but not for the serious musky fisherman. I would go for at least a heavy wieght rod of about 7 feet long. Capable of casting big lures like "Suicks" and real big spinnerbaits. A medium action rod with lots of backbone but can absorb shocks and not rip the lure from the fish's mouth. I would also recommend the Curado 300 if there is going to be any casting done.

Gas line anti-freeze should not be used in any vehicle. If you need the stuff it's because you buy it from a place that doesn't have good facilities to store gas. If you want to use gas in small engines during cold weather, never gas up from the pump directly to the motor. Fill your gas can and then leave the gas can outdoors. Any water in the gas will freeze and drop to the bottom of the gas can. Then, pour the gas into the engine while using a funnel with a filter. A felt filter. The gas going into the small engine will be clean and free of water or ice. Water in the fuel is a big problem here in northern Quebec during the winter. When it's -40 and you want to start your snowmobile, the fuel has to be in perfect condition. Using alcohol to melt the ice crystals will work for a little while but when the mixture of gas and water goes through the carb, it gets very very cold and the carb clogs up. This means you have to pour boiling water on the carb to melt the ice. In any event, after a short while, the alcohol in the gas will evaporate away and leave you with ice and/or water.

1000 dollars....whoa....that's a bundle for me. I know that I don't need a scope nor the rack to hold extra bolts so I guess I will save a bit right there. Are the crossbows with cams cheaper?

Are you planning to sell one of your crossbows? I also plan to take up hunting with a crossbow. The initial question is just right up my alley. I can only hunt moose in my area and the bowhunting season is far nicer than the rifle season. Since we have to be 2 hunters for moose....which is a pain since my buddies no longer go hunting, I will probably go south to go deer hunting. I'm not a serious hunter, I just like to go hunting and camping alone. Shooting anything will just be the cherry on the icing. Is using a scope on a crossbow a good idea? I would think that a good sight would be just as good and make the crossbow lighter. I have no idea as to what a good crossbow and accessories will cost.

You only add distilled water if the cells need to be topped up. Topped up means that the plates must be submerged. If one cell is lower than the others, this could mean that it may be damaged. If you do have a deep discharge battery with covers that can be removed, your best move is to buy a hydrometer to check the specific gravity of each cell. The specific gravity of each cell must be the same. If you add water to a cell, the specific gravity of that cell will decrease so you will have to put the battery on a charge of about 6 amps. Don't let the battery heat up (100F) and stop charging when all the cells give a read out of about 1.240 to 1.300 (depending on the concentration of the acid mix when the battery was first charged). It is not necessary to leave the battery on a trickle charge. Just a hydrometer test every now and then and a bit of a charge maybe 2 or 3 times during the winter. Yes, a cool storage does decrease the activity inside the battery. However, at -35....the battery may freeze if the specific gravity is under 1.240. Keep the battery clean and dry. Dirt and moisture on the top of the battery will cause current to flow between the posts and slowly discharge the battery. As for the motor, you can store it anywhere however it is a good idea to keep it in a closed dry space....not outside hanging from the transom of the boat. It's a good idea to remove the blades and check to see if any fishing line has been accidentally wound on the shaft. Add a bit of oil to the shaft to ensure against corrosion.

Yes....It's the same with me except when I'm sitting....everything is happening at a much closer range. On top of that, I can do this for 12 straight hours, I do not have to kneel, stoop or crouch down to grab or net my fish or another rod and I'm not worried that a sudden movement on the part of my partner or any sudden lurch will pitch me into the lake or make me step on something fragile. My tackle boxes are just beside me and the sonar screen is easy to see. Standing up is for hot doggers. It's people who have fallen into the water that forces us to follow all those security regulations. I've never heard of anyone falling in the water from a sitting position.

I always enjoy watching FishfulThinking and Bob Izumi. But, I have been reading just about all there is in fishing magazines, books, catalogs since I was about 12 years old. Add to that the fact that I have been fishing for close to 60 years....year round, worked as a conservation officer and biologist in a ZEC here in Quebec and spent a lot of time with fishing associations and federations. But most of all....I've never had the budget to buy lots of equipment or often go to places where the fishing is easy. The only time I have ever fished at an outfitter was last spring. A buddy needed some people to make a fishing film. I got my first boat (12 foot aluminum) 2 years ago. I still do not have a gas engine. I've had a canoe for about 30 years now. So, you can see that fishing has not been easy....at least high quality fishing. This meant that I had to learn how to catch fish that had already been fished and in places close to civilization. I've never used a downrigger or a side planer.....you need a boat for those things...lol. However, I do a lot of finesse fishing. 2 to 4 lb test mono is the norm.

Well....first of all, bass boats do have chairs so they must be used quite often. On top of that....pro bass fishermen....are they really all that good? I bet there are lots of fishermen on this site who could do just as good if they had the same equipment, time and money. Why do the pros seem to fish from a standing position so often? I don't know. I don't find it very comfortable, certainly not very stable and I find using a foot pedal for the bowmount motor more difficult when standing. However, I did notice that bass boats do not have seats that make fishing very easy except for the seats on pedestals. I know for sure that I get a lot closer to fish when I use my Sportspal canoe with the old foam seats that sit on the bottom of the canoe. To play a joke on a buddy while he was eating his lunch, I made a bunch of fast casts around the canoe with a Rapala and reeled in as fast as I could on a brook trout lake. Then, I dangled the Rapala about 12 inches off the surface of the water beside my buddy. It took about 15 seconds and a big brookie leaped out of the water to catch the Rapala. Startled the hell out of my buddy. Sure you can cast further when standing....maybe about 10 feet more but you scare fish that are 30 to 50 feet away when standing and you can cut down that distance by 75% if you keep a low profile. Ok....I fish for brook trout, landlocked salmon, walleye, whitefish and pike in an area where the lakes have little vegetation when compared to the warm water lakes further south. The water is often tea coloured but clear.

Why do you want to stand up? Standing up allows the fish to see you from further away and forces you to cast further. Standing up also increases the length of your shadow.

Hot Sauce is too thin for spinning reels. They do not have any fast moving parts anyway. Lithium grease is perfect for the gears if the grease is consistent enough. Ordinary sewing machine oil is perfect for the line guide and the handle. Most spinning reels never need to be greased anyway. I have a Shimano Symetre 2000 that I bought over 10 years ago and it is so smooth that if I place the handle at horizontal and unlock the anti-reverse, the reel will slowly spin (either way) until the handle is down in the vertical position. I use this reel everytime I go fishing and I go fishing at least 3 times per week all year round. I use this reel for ice fishing too.

I rarely see any outdoor vending machines these days. The last few that I saw were often abused or turned on their sides etc. We didn't even think of doing stuff like that when we were kids. About the baddest things we did was steal apples but I'm sure that if the apple tree had a sign on it asking us not to steal from it....we would not done that either. I remember getting into fights but in those days, when a guy is down on the ground, the fight was over. Sure there were those who broke into homes when no one was home and some that stole cars because someone would leave the keys in the ignition but the next day, the car would be spotted near town and towed back to the owner. Here in Quebec, the kids are particularly excessive. I am quite sure it's due to the fact that the "separation" question is so prevalent everywhere I look.....especially with the artistic crowd who get a lot of attention and news coverage. Kids are rebellious by nature and this issue continues to add wood to the fire.

I remember when I was a kid living in Ottawa, there were vending machines that sold dew worms. We didn't call them nightcrawlers in those days. This was in the late 50's. The worms came in a cardboard box similar to a cigar box. Actually, the box was 2 wooden ends with cardboard folded around both of these ends and stapled in place. The worms were top class. But, we rarely bought them because I picked worms and even sold some to make cash to buy fishing equipment. At 8 years old, I bought all of my stuff and paid my way when it came time to go fishing with my dad and his buddies. Ok....I didn't pay for the beer and gas and I sold worms to everybody in the group and even sold worms and marabou jigs to other fishermen when going to Northern Quebec. Out on the water in the upper part of the Ottawa River on opening weekend, there were at least 50 fishermen within sight of me. I always had a couple of yellow marabou jigs on my cap so that I was easy to spot. One year I guess I sold close to 150 jigs at 1 dollar each. Jigs were the new thing and they were super efficient. The following year, I sold as many jigs and dew worms at 15 cents each. There was a store in Kingston that sold jigs at 69 cents per 1/2 dozen. The real price was 69 cents each but they were on a cardboard card and on the card it was marked 69 cents. That same year, we picked up one of my uncle's in Montreal. We went to the Hudson's Bay depot and I bought a couple of hundred jigs at 10 cents each. These were very fancy jigs with marabou, fish hair, jeweled bands and behind the front hook, there was a doodad with a loop on the end that you pushed into a minnow's mouth and it came out his anus. Then you installed a double hook in the loop. Wow....I bought all there were. I still have 1 or 2. They would be way to expensive to make today. You could even remove the minnow doodad if you wanted to use just the jig. I made a lot of money on those walleye openers in Northern Quebec. Can you imagine about 50 fishermen who are catching few walleyes watching a bunch of fishermen catching and releasing over 50 walleye during the morning. They sure were hungry for my jigs and dew worms.

I'm planning to buy an SUV. Probably a used one but not too old. My big problem is finding one which will allow me to carry my canoe or even my 12 foot aluminum boat. From looking at all the SUVs I see everyday, none of them are really made to fit out with a simple canoe rack. Some don't even have a long enough roof to allow a canoe rack. What's the use in having an SUV if it cannot carry a canoe? I don't want to use foam blocks and 8 ropes to make sure the canoe stays put. On top of that, foam blocks are not sturdy enough for the 12 foot aluminum boat. What do SUV owners use these days?

Yes....works great. I also found that any wood does good. I don't like fish that has been smoked for long periods of time so I also like the warm method. I put the fish fillets (usually brook trout) in brine (salt, lemon, onions and water) for up to 4 hours. I let the fillets dry till they are tacky and put in the BBQ for 1 hour. I place a rack on top of a pan of water and sit the fillets on that. You will have to spray the wood chips if you see any flame. I drilled a hole on the cover of my old bbq so that I can spray the chips without opening the hood. Smoking fish is hard to mess up anyway. I've tried many methods and they all work.

Here is a link and you will find a half dozen direct links to how to maintain a baitcaster. http://pages.videotron.com/fishing/page6.html

I'm surprised at how many young guys that have never done any fishing. Somehow, they end up going fishing with me. I guess the fact that I have been involved with a bunch of associations, been on t.v. and newspapers and even in schools plus the fact that I was an auxiliairy conservation officer and taught gun safety and now in a bunch of discussion forums has been the reason I meet so many newbies. Anyway, most of those young guys in their mid twenties have become maniacs and good fishermen too. I always try to get them to bring their wives and show them that it's more important for the wife to have fun at first, if they want to be able to go fishing more often. The good thing about going fishing with a person with lots of experience is the fact that the learning curve is sharp. I've had some guys who I took shopping for fishing stuff because they didn't even have any to start with. So you can imagine when you start out with decent equipment and you get to go fishing where there are fish....the fishing disease takes hold real fast. When I take kids fishing, I give them a lot of stuff to keep. When I met my wife over 30 years ago, she had 9 brothers and sisters. None of them ever went fishing or camping in their lives. They all hated winter. Now, many have cottages and every weekend....all year round, they go to their cottages and all have VTTs and snowmobiles. Winter is welcome now. If you do an internet search for ice fishing on the Saguenay River (pêche blanche au Saguenay) you will see that it's a huge tourist industry. Yep.....I was the one who started it all, a little over 30 years ago. I was the first one to punch a hole through the ice and catch cod, halibut, ocean perch, ling cod, etc etc, in the deep salt water parts of the Saguenay river. Very few people have actually started by themselves.

There is a new synthetic material that is very similar to cork. I would say that it is almost exactly the same as cork and may even be better than cork in the fact that cork comes in various grades while this new material only comes in one grade. It's probably more expensive than cork for now but I guess the future will dictate if cork will still be as common as it is now.

I started real early too. I was 2. My dad would stand me up in his pack sack and we would go creek fishing for brook trout. Went walleye fishing when I was 3 and mom never knew how dangerous that spot was. Fishermen can no longer fish from that spot....too many fell into the rapids and drowned. Went fishing almost every time my dad went. Then, when I was about 5, I started to go fishing by myself. My dad was a travelling salesman in those days. I either fished for chub near the house or took my bike to fish in a big creek about 2 miles away for turtles, chub and sheephead. At around 8 years old, we moved to Ottawa so I did a lot of fishing from shore for bass and catfish. We moved to Amherstview just outside of Kingston when I was 16. From age 8 till age 20, I did a lot of fishing and camping and hunting with my Dad and sometimes with him and his buddies. Anyway, from age 8, I did not need help, kept a low profile, bought my own stuff etc, took care of myself and didn't bother anybody so I was always invited to tag along. When in Kingston, I often went fishing by myself on Lake Ontario. I used to carry the 7 1/2 Evinrude, tank and fishing equipment to the lake and borrow a small aluminum boat or just fished from shore. I'm 62 now and still fish at least 3 times a week, year round. My son fishes quite a bit and my daughter likes to fish but her husband doesn't fish. My grand daughter who is 5 has been fishing with me since she was 2. Contrary to my Dad, I like to eat fish often. I guess he ate too many fish during the depression. He died about 15 years ago.

Cork. More sensitive, easy to clean, easy to sand down if needed, nice to look at, never slippery, solid...not mushy.

I've used 2 h.p. gas engines on the side mount of my 14 foot Sportspal often....with no problem. For close to 30 years, I used a 9 lb thrust Minn Kota (Minn Kota 15) and loved that old motor. Not much speed with just under 5 km/h at top speed however great for slow speed trolling with 2 people in the canoe and a wire basket for the brook trout hanging in the water. However for landlocked salmon or pike, I often trolled alone with nothing to slow down the trolling speed. The real slow speeds are for walleye, brook trout and lake trout. The big problem with the 9 lb thrust was the fact that in a windy situation....it was very slow when going into the wind. I should have kept the motor because it was working perfectly and it was great for the small lakes I often fish. Last spring, I sold the motor for 50 dollars and bought a 32 lb thrust for 60 dollars on sale. Wow....lots of speed. I will have to check the top speed with my GPS but I would say it was over 10 km/h. However.....no good for trolling unless I click the motor on and off all the time. However, the motor works great on my 12 foot aluminum boat....but still too fast for slow trolling. The 9 lb thrust Minn Kota was great for trolling for walleye on the 12 foot aluminum....even with 3 guys in the boat. Maximisers....I don't have much experience with them but I doubt that they are all that efficient. To move a canoe at a certain speed you need a certain amount of energy. If that energy comes in bursts, like I suspect how the maximiser works, you just end up going slower because you are just using less energy. You cannot go faster with less energy. It's plain physics. What I find wierd is why the companies who make electric motors do not offer more speeds.....especially the slower speeds. The energy consomption of a 30 lb thrust electric motor at maximum speed is about 30 amps. The energy consomption of my 9 lb thrust electric motor was about 9 amps. My Sportspal goes a bit more than twice as fast with the 32 lb thrust as it did with the 9 lb thrust.....but consumes 3 times as much energy at top speed. So you can see that speed is not directly influenced by energy consomption. I guess if I want to go 20 km/h I would need to consume 90 or 100 amps per hour. There are now infinitly variable speed electric motors on the market. Yes....they cost more but this way you can dial in the exact speed you want to troll and still have a maximum top speed. Do they go slow enough? I don't know. I use a very large battery with about 200 reserve minutes. This means that I will completely deplete the battery in about 4 hours at high speed (50 amps). This also meant that it would take about 20 hours to deplete the battery at high speed with my 9 lb thrust motor. Of course, a battery does not work in such a linear fasion. High speed slows down after a couple of hours at 50 amps. But at 3 amps (low speed on my 9 lb thrust Minn Kota), I guess I could do quite a bit of trolling during a week of fishing. However, doing such a thing would do some damage to the battery. Leaving a battery for such a long time without fully recharging it is not a good idea. However, it does not take 24 hours to recharge such a battery after trolling for 10 hours at 3 amps. Usually, the battery was fully recharged after an overnight charge rate of 10 amps. A 6 amp charge rate....I would recommend 24 hours.

For the bearings, I use Rem-Oil or Hot Sauce. Just one tiny drop. I want the main bearings to be like they were dry. For grease, I have a can of instrument grease that I got over 30 years ago when I was an instrument tech in the Air Force. Wow....this stuff does not even think about getting thicker....even at -30 F. Then there is just ordinary sewing machine oil for the places where the bearings are not subjected to high speeds. However, I will be buying an oil called "Rocket Fuel". It's a tad thicker than Hot Sauce. I have heard that Hot Sauce is sometimes too thin. I clean and lubricate my spool bearings a couple of times during the season.