Finally Fixed The Boat!

I finally got my boat up and running again and its been out of the water way too long. First off though I want to give a special thanks everyone who helped me out with getting me back on the water. Ethan (Etray) for hooking me up with a new discounted prop and finishing the job for me, Larry (MrT) especially for really going out of his way to help me work on my motor and

teach me all kinds of new things, and Bernard (ol fella) for hooking me up with Larry which all put me back on the water.

Was thinking about hitting the sac again for salmon, but man after 10 outings and only getting one fish its tiring. I needed to go out and do something else and catch some fish.

Loading up the boat this morning I noticed I might be packing a little too much stuff.

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Do I really need to bring 6 rods with me? I think yes!!! Are they in the way in my small tin can? Maybe, but I have uses for all of them and its way easier to just pick up another rod then it is to constantly be retieing.

Stuck close to home and ran solo today, wanted to do my own thing and do some experimenting. Launched from Wimpy's around 0530 and headed up to the meadow's. Wanted to spend most of the day searching for some green carp and see what happened after that. Saw a lot of fish jumping right off the bat, so I grabbed my spook and started looking for that first light top water bite. After a dozen cast or so with out one blow up, but still fish jumping around everywhere I was wondering what the hell was going on??? I should be getting hit. I was just getting ready to switch to a swimbait, until I saw what the fish were. I saw one fish come completely out of the water and it was a golden brown carp. Crap, got to get out of here. I hate fishing around these guys. Their jumping drives me insane and I have noticed that I usually never do very much good fishing for anything else when they are around. Idk if their sheer numbers just push everything else out, if they stir up the bottom and make the water cloudy, or maybe I'm just paranoid. Point is though they are bad luck for me so I got the hell out of there.

Ran over to Law Slough to try again. Tossed a spook, senko's, and a crankbait all over the place, but I just wasn't finding any bites. I tried for the better part of an hour until I decided to try and get some bluegills to try drifting for some stripers. In my hunt to find a school of some bluegills I noticed a bunch of bait balls of shad sticking close to the surface swimming around everywhere. Man I would love them for bait, but they are too small to get on a hook and line. I'll have to get or make some kind of big dip net for me to try and catch them with sometime, since I've learned that cast nets aren't legal to use. I couldn't find any bluegills to save my life, so I though I would just try focusing on these bait balls. Like I do at the port when I see em I threw a swimbait just past the school and rolled it real slow under them and my second cast I got slammed.

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On the board baby! No skunk for me today. After this I knew if I just stayed on the bait I'll be good. I followed the bait balls around and not much longer I stuck another fish.

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Give me some suger baby! Nice little shaker striper.

I tried following the bait after this, but the wind picked up on me and it made it impossible to see the small ripple the school's make on the surface. I made fan cast's everywhere and plugged away for another hour for nothing. Time to go back to what I was doing before I saw the shad, bluegills.

I tried working some boat docks and I finally found a school in a cove next to a dock. Nothing but a small piece of a powerworm on a mosquito hook is all you need to go to town on these guys.

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I ended up getting a decent amount of hand sized fish which were a little big for what I wanted for bait, but I figured I'd keep the big ones for lunch and the small ones for bait, couldn't go wrong there. After working the area for a bit I had myself a nice bucket full of fish.

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Ran to an area where I've caught stripers before to try my luck. Found the community of house boats

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Started my drift with a live bluegill on one rod and a jig on the other. First drift I had a short run on my bluegill and missed a good hit on the jig. Headed back up for a longer drift and I started nailing the shakers on my jig.

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Had one more short run on my bluegill, but nothing that really committed to it. I worked the area for a good while catching over a half dozen shakers on the jig. Nice to get this thing to finally work constantly for me, been trying to jig fish for a while now with next to no success ever with it. I decided to leave though in the search for bigger fish. Ran around did some more drifting, but never found anymore fish. Probably should of stayed and worked my way through to shakers to get that keeper, but oh well all a learning experience.

Off of the water today at 1230 to get out of the heat and be home in time for work later. Love having my boat back up and running again =). Outcast is where its at! Thanks again guys, I so appreciative of all the help and to be a part of this family. Love this place!

Till Next Time Guys
Mark