Sk8man

Yes

Rolmops made a great point. It is important to make sure the shaft is down deep enough for steering. One of the things I noticed when I recently bought a 9.8 Tohatsu is even with the same size shaft (20 inch in my case for my 18 1/2 ft Whaler is that this 4 stroke is much better steering than my previous 9.9 2 stroke. I believe it has more torque or something because I haven't used a steering connector even with the previous motor for a long time.....I just steer with my 135 outboard (25 inch shaft) and in strong wind I had to use my big motor with the 2 stroke but not with this new motor; it handles the wind just fine.

Trying Hughes tomorrow in my neighbors boat so I'm not giving up

I would agree Dave about temp not being everything but it is also hard to fish marks that are not there . I ran lines up high too but there was nothing whatsoever on the screen... bait or fish with the exception of one fish between 25 and 30 and I was running something right there without a hit. The salmon truly are often way out of temp and I'm not a fan of the whole "preferred temp" thing anyway but in the absence of any good data (marks) and nothing visible on the surface, gulls, scum lines, or temp breaks/thermal barriers (indicated by darker water meeting lighter) it is the next thing on the list to try .

Thanks and very true Jeff.....part of the addiction also another indicator oof how effective the Revolution spoons are too because that was the only one the big boy hit

Use a weight scale such as the cheap ones used to check your baggage weight (less than 10 dollars ) and set them at 3 1/2 to 4 lbs or so to start out with and then change it (if needed) accordingly when using heavier stuff like flashers and spinneys.

Thanks Mark and for mentioning about the current. The current was unreal and as Mark said going west and each time going with it the lines would go totally slack and then almost straight back going against it and GPS speed meant nothing

Yes Ed he was happy and that screamer gave him a pretty good idea despite not getting him in.

I was too beat to post last night once we came back from dinner. Rather disappointing results but we had fun. We got set up abut 5:30 AM and took temp readings down to 100 ft. It was 72 on the surface and 52 degrees at 25 ft. and at about 70 it went to 41 degrees so really messed up water temps and NE wind which changed back and forth with North and 3-4 ft waves so we decided to say screw the water temps lets look for fish and bait and try a diagonal north west from the channel and cover a large area of the water column with different setups looking for something to happen. We had 2 riggers with sliders, 2 wires wione with spinney and fly and one with Echip flasher and fly and a 300 copper with spoon and a top line on board with small dipsey and spoon and later a J-plug. We reached 178 and the 300 copper with a purple Revolution spoon started screaming line and I knew I had cranked down the drag a bit so I knew from the sound and the fact that it made three runs of over a hundred ft it was a good mature but he came unzipped after the third run. We continued trolling and at 203 ft. we had one on the wire rig with spinney and one of my home made green flies set at 250 and it turned out to be a small king about 3-4 lbs or so and we released him unharmed and he took off like a bullet. About 5 minuted later the downrigger set at 40 ft with a slider as well fired and fish on but about halfway in he got off....and no slider present....swivel opened up. We kept trolling out to 140 or so and nothing on screen so we went back in to the 170-200 range looking.....never saw another thing on the screen and no hits so we retraced our path backwards to the exact location of where we hooked up with the other fish and again nothing. The wind became due north with 5 footers so although temped to go real deep we didn't feel like getting beat up so we figured we'd instead try in shallower to see what happened and not fight the wind. bad call on my part....we trolled until 6 PM within the 60 ft to 160 and never saw bait during the whole day and only saw one fish at 30 ft and nothing in the way of action. Should have gone deep I think but there were a couple of boats in the AM that went out and came back in so I figured things weren't great out there either. Virtually no fleas on the wire or See Flee lines. No debris lines to fish. When we came back into the channel we saw a bunch of gulls in a circle suggesting there may have been some bait in there but we were done and didn't check it out. The flies were biting right through my buddys thick socks but as usual I wore long pants that covered the sock area so I didn't have any problems but they were all over the boat once the sun and heat were present. I forgot to mention. We also fished straight out from the channel before quitting in 90-150 range as I nearly always find lakers out there and thought we might try them but we spotted absolutely nothing there and usually they are hanging on the bottom at least.

A long time ago I was fishing at Long Point State Park and I thought I'd save time and launch very early in the AM so I just parked all night near the launch with my boat and trailer and slept in the truck. In the wee hours of the AM I awoke to the sound of people talking and various loud noises. I looked out the window and there were hundreds of people surrounding me and taking their kayacks off their car tops and bicycles etc. and I was blocked in and had to get the hell out off there and went to Owasco instead

I have noticed it as well in my new one and it is in the exact place where I like to be but most of the time I can pretty much take it out by just messing with the throttle just past it in either direction as it is confined pretty specifically that specific point (luckily). I guess I am a little tolerant of it from switching from my noisier 2 stroke and I had a problem there right at my "sweet spot" where it was either too fast of too slow and hard to get "just right".....kinda like baby bear in the chair situation inm the Three Bears story

Send them out to Tuna Tom and save yourself some headaches. Quick return time and fair prices.

Thanks guys.

Thanks guys much appreciated. He has never experienced a king and got me into great fishing for sea trout and redfish in SC last Fall so I'm hoping to nail something in the way of a king to initiate him . Supposed to be 5-10 out of N NE so hoping that is allit gets to from that direction

A buddy from South Carolina is visiting (very knowledgeable salt water guy) and I was wondering if anyone has a good handle of what is going on right now out of there. I'm also wondering about the condition of the public launch. any info would be appreciated.

Hey Jim, I looked back at my notes that I keep on each reel (line type, amt, date put on etc.) and I put 150 ft of 50 lb test Big Game on that reel underneath. I apparently didn't carefully read what I had written above either because I was thinking about the 30 lb wire when I wrote 30 lb mono as well so disregard that. Rob's info is probably closer to the mark. It is purely "filler" too. You aren't going to get spooled with that 1,000ft although sometimes whenthey start running you might think so.

Jim I'd take the braid off. You'll need space for the wire. Iuse just about 50 ft of 30 lb mono and then attach the wire. Tuna Tom's suggested the mono on there to help take pressure off the spool of the reel rather than just the wire. Some guys just put the wire straight on too. .but I figured with all the reels they repair Tuna may know something I'd didn't. You'll need the space on the Magda anyway.

sandror you are technically correct but folks often refer to them as "eels" around here. I think Nick has seen a few of each to tell the difference but it is a good point of reference for folks not familiar with the Sea lampreys vs. American Eels they are indeed two distinctly different species. Lets hope the lampricide treatments are truly working Pap....

In my world that is a good sign Nick as it may mean the treatments are taking hold and maybe the smaller ones are on the decline. We had one even a little longer on lake O last time out but he ended somehow with a crushed head .....gee what a shame.....must have gotten our pliers too close to his head

The temps are messed up right now because of the wind but you don't ever want to rely totally on water temps....the big boys are often found out of their temp range.