Nalod

I think another good point is that if NYS had an open season right now, how much money would Dan and others like him have spent in New York instead of other states? I know a bunch of fishermen that would prefer to be fishing our waters... --Joe

I think the saying should be -- Don't ever forget your Pearl White 9" Again, great fishing. You are putting up some really nice numbers and great looking sizes. --Joe

Three guys from LOU were in attendance...Larry, Chad, and myself. Personally, I enjoyed the seminar. Greg did a great presentation on short trolling, Marc discussed all of the ways to rig tubes and what each rig is intended to do, and Johnny was interesting in his discussion of breaking apart a map and planning a fishing trip. They were not able to use the pool this year, but had a video of every lure to show how they worked in the water. I enjoy the pool-side demo, but this was good also... --Joe

Great fishing, and congrats on your best day ever. You are really crushing the fish this spring --Joe

Change of plan...I ended up coming across a 1/4 lb spool of Ande's pink line, so I picked it up and am going to give it a try. Thanks again to everyone for all of your input. I am getting pretty excited that the walleye season is only a month away! --Joe

Larry, July 21 or Aug 4 would be perfect. I would definitely be fishing it! --Joe

I really need to keep a closer eye to the member birthday calendar...I keep missing everyones! Dan: It looks like you had a great birthday. My birthday is in the summer, so I get to fish on it most of the years...but I am thinking it is pretty rare for you to get out on yours. What an awesome looking fish! --Joe

Hope you had a great Birthday, Larry. The weather was perfect to be out on the lake...did you get to take advantage of it? --Joe

Thanks to everyone for their input. It looks like I was waaaay off with my original line choice. I have a large spool of 12lb big game mono laying around here, so i may just try that this year and see how the first couple trips go...thanks again! --Joe

I am setting up a couple rods for walleye trolling next year. I plan to spend some time running boards on Erie and on Chautauqua. What line should I be looking at? I was going to run 14-20lb flouro, but am wondering if Erie has the same problem that Ontario has with Sea Fleas. What type of line and weight are you all running? Thanks, --Joe

So it was their new 360 Imaging that they were talking about. It looks like pretty awesome technology, but is going to be out of my price range (Cabelas has it on presale at $2k...ouch). Humminbird's page: http://www.humminbird.com/360Imaging/ Marketing Commerical: http://www.makevisual.com/humminbird/Hu ... t_05_1.mov --Joe

It is currently 12:16PM in Central Time....so in about 1 hr 45 min until they announce. --Joe

Neo: It looks like the live stream is going to be at: http://upload.outdoorsfirst.com/liveaim.asp --Joe

I just heard that there will be a new product announcement today by Humminbird. They are making the announcement during the BASSmaster's media conference (2PM CST). Rumors have been that they are debuting their 360 degree imaging that can be added to newer units... --Joe

Thanks Gregg, Will Tony be presenting this year also? Also, will the room be available this year after the event to do the lure swap like we did last year? I know a lot of guys really enjoyed being part of the event and the swap last year. --Joe

Hey Chad. Great question on the gas costs...I am going to guess around $250 for the both trips. Well worth it to get me out of my funk though! --Joe

I have tried to use planar boards in the past, but have had limited success with them. I have tried using church's walleye boards and have tried it using large boards/mast system. Smaller lures and lures that just do not disperse a lot of water have been what I have tried to work with (small newmanns, XJ-13 Xraps, sledges, etc). We normally do not get slow on our trolling, so I want to say that at our slowest, we were still going 4 mph. The mast system can take a lot more abuse. We had an outcast legend running once. I was amazed that it was able to run, but the boards were digging hard into the water. Bakers and wileys were also able to run off of these boards. As far as I am concerned, you should be able to run almost any lure (almost -- as in plows are not going to happen). I would like to spend some time this year giving it a better try. I know there is a guy on Chautauqua that is fishing a set of homemade boards...he has to be having success since I see him out there all the time. --Joe

Hey Everyone, I have been having a bad case of the winter blues lately. I think it is because of the warmer weather and not having the opportunity to get out to do some ice fishing. To try to alleviate the blues, I decided to take a couple trips to some musky shows. On February 11, I drove out to Butler, PA. The weather was not the greatest (and the plowing was even worse). I really enjoyed seeing all of the lure builders that I am normally throwing. If you have not been to this show and fish Chautauqua, you probably would know most of the booths here. Things that I purchased: - Newmann crankbait (disappointed that he did not have any jerkbaits this year. He has been extremely busy with his painting, that he has not had a chance to get to building new jerkbaits) - Wiley crankbait - Legend 6" crank (this thing is awesome. It is 6", but has the same profile/shape as their normals lures) - A bunch of Lunge Lumber Lures (I would rank these as my favorite lures at the show.) - A Musky Train 60" Ruler (My mother went with me for the trip. She ended up carrying the ruler around. So many people asked her where she bought it that she ended up going back to Musky Train's booth to ask for commission. ) - I also bought a couple Lunge Lumber Lures for Mike (Ronix52). I know he is anxious to get his hands on them! This past weekend, I drove to Michigan for their show. I started the trip by going directly to Cabelas and spending a few hours looking around. I did not buy much there, but did manage to get a phantom bait. I spent all day Saturday at the show. It was smaller than last year and the attendance was not as good as they were hoping for. The booths were completely different from the Butler show. I honestly think the only booth at both shows were Musky Train (Hey, why was the ruler $1 cheaper here?). They had their share of what I could call Basement Baitmakers (basically the local builders), but they also had a large assortment of national manufacturers. Things I purchased from this show: - Two new Traxstech rod holders that I can use to mount my salty rod holders - A hellhound glidebait - a couple river2sea glides - a t-shirt from the Michigan Muskies Inc I also got to see Mike's (Ronix52) new custom rod. This thing is amazing! Jeremy from Tuscarora Tackle (he builds some insane looking snakeskin lures also) built it for him. I dropped Mike's new fishing rod a few times while looking at it, but the couple dents won't hurt While driving home on Sunday, I got to stop in at Jann's Netcraft retail location. This store is awesome! It might have been my favorite part of the trip. They have some tackle at the store, but are known for tackle/rod/net building. I was able to pick up a few things that I have been wanting to dable in. Hopefully these things will keep me busy until our season opens! If you are looking to attend a show next year, I would recommend the Butler show over Michigan. It is almost the same size and is a lot closer to home. What shows has anyone else been attending? Buy anything you would like to share? Any experiences? --Joe

Hey Zach, Glad to hear that you had so many phone-in orders and such a great order through Big Wood Baits! It is always great to see a local guy show a lot of success that was just started as a hobby and has turned into a business! I was hoping to see you this weekend at the Michigan Show just to be able to catch up and see how you are doing, but knowing the orders are coming in and that you may actually get to spend some time with the family is good enough for me! Talk to you soon. --Joe

Next weekend...Feb 17-19. http://www.michiganmuskieshow.com/ --Joe

Ray J: I was at the show also. It would have been nice to have met you and actually be able to put a face to your name. Zach: I hope everything is okay. I was going to post a picture of your booth and make a joke about it, but I think I will pass now. Maybe see you at the Michigan show? --Joe

Hey Bob, I have my trolling setup with Saltist 40 lc. Personally, I love them! The line recovery is awesome, the line counter is very easy to read, and the reel is just great all around. Chad has the Tekota (I believe 500 line counter models) on his boat for trolling. I feel that they are just as nice. Either reel will be a great setup! --Joe

Zach, Very awesome auction! The scary part is that there is still over 6 days left to the auction, and it is already out of my price range! It is amazing on how much talent we have near us in the bait building industry. --Joe

Hey Guys, As a winter project, I decided to try to learn how to do maintenance on reels. I have been doing my research, and tried some work on one of them this afternoon. While I know there are other things I could have done (replace paper washers, get rid of some plastic parts, remove all grease in bearings and re-grease, etc), I think my first attempt went well. Does anyone else do their own maintenance? I would love to be able to bounce ideas and questions off of others. Also, does anyone have any good tests to make sure that the maintenance went well (especially things that will tell me if I used too much or too little grease/oil). I tested the reel by casting in my back yard and pulling real hard on the drag to see if it would slip. --Joe