MARCH

[Micanopy]

I long line troll, but I also short line troll. It is a little something that I lucked into last Summer. I caught a fish and after unhooking him I pitched the jig over the side of the boat. By the time I finished containerizing the fish, another grabbed that jig. It was swimming right next to the hull. With all the talk of spooking fish I couldn’t imagine one would dare pick off a bait right beside the boat. Well as Summer progressed I learned that some days the baits right next to the boat outproduced those on the way back rods.

So I am dragging ten lines and of course that part is easy, what is not easy is spacing the rods so that when landing a fish nothing tangles. Because the boat remains in constant motion forward, the fish approach the boat at an angle from behind. The back half on each side really needs to be open with no lines there to get a clean shot. Especially when it is a large fish. So I have a 16’ rod up front each side, then an 11’ rod beside that and a little behind, then I have a 6’ rod behind and beside that. That gives six rods in the front of the boat, and four out the back.

If the six foot rod is long lining the fish will foul as they come aboard. However, if I can get those baits down a few feet then there is no problem. The fish being landed goes right over top. So two rods have trolling sinkers in front of the jigs to get the depth needed. This works OK, but I had tried using larger sized jig heads and skipping the trolling sinkers, and they really didn’t do anything much. So I gradually transitioned right back to the trolling sinker setup. Split Shot are not heavy enough.

Well now I have this new jig mold and it pours a nice 3/8th size head. The bullet shape should swim nicely enough. My only issue is that this cavity in the mold will not fit my preferred hook. So I am using the Victory 1/0 hook to make these.



The baits are Slabonator’s 3” Booty Thumpers. These baits are large and the plastic he uses make them tough. I nipped about a half inch off the nose of the bait and screwed it onto the Screw Lock. I added blades to most of these, but a few I skipped. This blade is larger than I use on the 1/16th ounce sizes, and I bought 100 of them already attached to barrel swivels, shipped, for $20. That makes life nice.

Anyways, these will be my close quarters baits. We are definitely into Spring around here it is time to move back to using large baits again. So I will experiment and see if the larger jig heads work better than the smaller heads dragged behind trolling sinkers. One out each side, straight down with a slight tilt towards the rear.

The back four rods are two long lines dragging jigs about where the same distance as the boat is wide, and then two spaced just inside those with the trolling sinkers, now gonna be large jig heads. These two down lures ride in the swirls the boat produces. I usually do not get many fish on these rods but when I do they tend to be the big fish of the day. Because I will nab a big one every so often I cannot swap these out. I feel compelled to keep them right there.

Being as these four rods are close to the boat it is much easier to guesstimate the depth. If I want shallow I peel out a little line until the jig disappears and done. Deeper is just letting out some more line. Just off the bottom is drop down until I feel bottom and reel up a few turns. Because they are close the fish come aboard green and feisty as all I really do is kind of lift the rod to hoist them aboard.

The bullet head shape is appealing to me and I will be watching them swim alongside the boat for clues as to their performance. The heavier head should prevent the bait from swimming in a cocked attitude. Be a more horizontal presentation.

I have the green baits with Yum Yum Yellow tails, and the white with yellow tails. Slabonator is having his Spring Sale this month so I plan to order a few more colors in this larger sized Booty Thumper. Gonna try to get a purple with yellow tail and a pink with yellow tail. The plastic they use is very nice and leaves the bait with some structure and firmness. This also helps to keep the fish from shredding the thing. In the picture you can see what the larger head size looks like with the 2” Booty Thumper. Not too shabby but definitely not as sheik as the 3” variety.

I also plan to try his curly tailed grubs. I have several varieties and some the tails come off first fish. I am thinking he uses the same plastic mix for all of his stuff, so maybe his curly tails are more durable. Again I am planning to stick with my four color combinations.

Pink head- white body- yellow tail
Yellow head- green body- yellow tail
Pink head- pink body- yellow tail
Yellow head- purple body- yellow tail

Their sale is this month and is 15% off the list price, which is fair to begin with. They really do produce a fine product. The colors are bright and there is no slop left on the bait heads. The tails stay affixed to the bodies and that ain’t all bad. The shipping is good as well.





I did my first cook where I was in charge and I was smoozing the owners of the campsite. They have hundreds of bicycle trail riders show up, campout, ride mountain bikes down trails, and they feed them breakfast, lunch and dinner. I did their first night’s dinner. Chicken, mashed potatoes, baked beans, roll, and banana pudding and chocolate eclair. I also had mac & cheese for the kids and vegetarian beans for them what don’t like meat. I had two young men assisting me and the owner said he was gonna tell the boss what a good job we did. I heard him tell his wife that he should have called us sooner. I strode over and told him we cook a fine breakfast, and can provide packed lunches that the bikers could eat on the trail.

Sure enough, yesterday morning the company delivered 600 bagged lunches to them. I am told the sandwiches were to die for. We also got a second dinner out of them last night. It was pulled pork, mashed potatoes, and beans. With desserts as well. LOL. Them folks sure do like our cooking. LOL

I cooked at that live stock auction facility again yesterday. It was the annual 4H hog sale. We made baked beans, pulled pork sliders, but we also deep fried pork tenders. These were very good and I liked them better than the sliders. We had all sorts of people walking up to mention their enjoyment and I got two of the ladies to commit to calling us for their weddings. One was a big old cop and she could arrest any of us anytime she wanted. There would be no complaints, I assure you. She was quite the looker. Nice lady.

The way the sale worked is people show up and bid on a hog one of the kids raised. Actually, these hogs are like dogs and are pampered like you would not believe. There is even an award for which kid keeps the cleanest stall. After the sale of the hogs, they all get transported away and slaughtered and the frozen meat gets distributed to the buyer at some point.

I asked one young lady if they give her a chance to say goodbye and she said they do. All the kids do that together with their hog and she had done so a few times and said it was tough at first. I admired the kids and wished I had done something like that when I was a lad. Several businesses were buying more than one hog and I heard they gift most of the meat to their workers as a benefit. It walso is great advertising as the parents in the audience see them helping out the kids.



Today the wife and I go for another walk in the wilderness. A privately owned park with a 2.5 mile trail. From the website it looks like it is well maintained. I of course will be spraying our ankles, shoes, pants, hats and shirts with bug repellent. Not for skeeters mind you. This is that time of year we get these little bitty ticks. I once got bit by one and maintained a red spot for the rest of the year. Hate them things as they are so hard to spot. You guys bear this in mind as you go afield this Spring no matter where you are. Ticks are nasty little devils.



The puppy has made it through his challenges and is recovering nicely. A few days ago he tore off after some squirrels and that made me so happy. He still sleeps a lot but is back to tending to his regular rounds. He had pancreatitis and developed diabetes in the process. I say in the process but truth is he was a little fat. I avoided giving him snacks as schnauzers are known for this sort of thing, but he over ate and that was my fault. He has dropped a few pounds and now gets insulin injections twice a day. He is a good sport about it but doesn’t care for any of it. He also has a new type of food which he thankfully likes and eats it all. So I went from planning on putting him down to having my pup come back home and all it cost me was $2,000+. I put that on my credit card and hope to pay it off over the next few months.




That is him lying at my feet. I wanted to thank all of you for your well wishes and heartfelt prayers. Thank you very much. His name is Zzippi and he is 10 years old now. Curly haired schnauzer in case he doesn’t look like one to you. If you ever met him you would know right away he is all schnauzer. Needs a buzz cut for Spring.

[DockShootinJack]

I sit here with a little Bulldog happily snoring with his head on my leg thinking that is a small price to pay for such loyalty. Glad to see he is getting back to normal.

[Jamesdean]

Glad to hear he is getting better. We have three Chihuahua's, All rescues. Ages from about 16 yrs old to 2yrs old. Nothing like the love of fur babies...

[Micanopy]

I went fishing yesterday. Wasn’t expecting any kind of banner day, just wanted to get after them. The air was warm and the water was 75 degrees, not much wind but some scattered rain was about. I arrived at the ramp at 630 only to discover that there were five other boats there. This was a surprise to me but I waitred my turn and everyone seemed to be patient.

I motored out and then started up the TM and positioned the rod holders and rods and cruised about. Caught a few smaller versions of a fish, then a keeper. The bite was slow and I was able to gauge my performance based on what I saw others doing. They were nabbing dinks, and not very many of them either.

I had my big baits on four of my rods, and four times a nice fish had hit them and then was gone just that quick. Rod would bow over and then nothing. I had this issue last Summer with the Bat Jig using the recommended hook. Only then the fish were at least on for most of the reel in procedure. This was an on and then off quickly experience. This means that the jig head and hook do not work together and are an issue. The heads and baits swam beautifully though.

I wasn’t sure if the heads weighed enough to work with my rod layout, but they did fine. The 3” Slabonator Booty Thumpers looked good and probably didn’t even need a blade. The tails waggle hard and the rod tip would wiggle from that action. I intend to make some new jig heads for these Thumpers today. Something different. I could change heads and keep the same hooks, or keep the heads and change the hooks. Hmmmmmmm

I kept a few of the bigger specimens for a dinner tonight. I plan to make blackened fish, blackened shrimp, over rice with a vegetable. This will please her and keep me riding high in the saddle.



I am not fishing today as it is raining. I will stay in the garage making some new offerings and getting everything ready for next trip out. Have a few things to do regarding the gear as well. My rod tips FINALLY arrived, so I plan to get that broken tipped rod fixed up. I also am ready to remove some line from a few reels and spool up some fresh.

I saw where a few jigs were spinning round and twisting up my lines. One rod was especially bad. I examined the jig and it was just a little off center. I swam it next to the boat and it seemed fine, but apparently when back there a ways things are different. I also noticed that these jigs were getting bites. Hmmmmmmm……spinning jig gets bit.

So I plan to add swivels ahead of my lures so as to eliminate at least some of this stuff. If I get a jig that is off just a tad, the swivel will help prevent a disaster. I have avoided this as I like to wind the jig all the way to the rod tip for storage. This keeps me sane when I go to deploy my rods from a jumbled pile of rods. Maybe a really small swivel will wind through the small guides and allow me to continue to wind in all the way and remain amongst the normals. I might add a flouro leader, too. I noticed a difference when using one style of quick exchange clip last year, so there probably is something there to be considered. I know line doesn’t matter, but I am different.

While I like the crinkle powder paint schemes, I have been using straight colors. These colors seem to do just fine, but now I want something different. I plan to experiment some today with painting heads in an unusual fashion. Something keen and unusual. If they turn out nicely I shall share.

I see all the jigs you guys tie and they are great, but I just can’t escape my addiction to plastics. They are just so versatile and provide lots of action. Last Fall I set out some hand ties to be trolled amongst the plastics and they seemed to be equal to one another. Maybe I should order up some new materials and try my hand tying skills again. Dumb old Bucktails been catching fish for a long time.

My friend went fishing yesterday. He and his buddy only caught 15, and almost all dinks. So I did just as well and that felt pretty good. The fish are just being spastic right now. Everything in nature is transitioning right now and I just need to be a little patient as they work through their issues. Last Summer I was launching, nabbing 25 keepers, and loading the boat back onto the trailer in about an hour. Did that a bunch of days. Other days it took two hours. I imagine those days were unusual, but I did have them dialed in nicely at that time. They wanted green bodies and Yum Yum yellow tails. The fish were very cooperative for me. I saw that others remained fishing after I had left for the day, so I figured that meant I was doing well.

I would like to discover something new all over again, and it better be soon, too. Fickle fish !!!!

[DrNip]

Love the color of the fish. Can’t believe your water temp is 75! Probably 1.5 months, give or take, away from seeing them temps here.

[SuperDave336]

Love those dark fish. The fish are sort of spooky here too. Like you said be patient and let them work through their issues.

[DockShootinJack]

Always great to spend a day on the water

[Micanopy]

I see the latest craze in BBQ grills has been the griddle tops. I really do not want to buy something large that needs storage in my garage. I do want to try some of the techniques that the griddle toppers employ though. I found…… a Lodge Pizza thingie.




Fits perfectly. Now I can griddle without having to buy a four foot roll around thingie for me to stumble upon. Had I the proper garage, well things would definitely be different and I would get one. I plan to experiment with breakfast, too. I want to do vegetables and fish for dinner.

It comes pre-seasoned and I warmed it up and applied some spray oil stuff to it last night, like Lodge suggested. No warps. There is a hot spot in the center but that actually might be an advantage long term. After a while last night I griddled me up some of the wife’s turkey cold cuts. I get the vacuum pack of thick sliced turkey near the cold chicken section of the grocer, vs. buying lunch meat. Anyways, it looked great and I then used that to make her a wrap for lunch today. She gets an hour and likes to take a short drive to a scenic parks and sit and read and stuff. So I fix her lunch and I really do try to offer variety and taste. Something other than here is your turkey sandwich…..again.

An additional bowl of orange wedges, blueberries, and sliced strawberries. Cheese snack thingie. Drink and I am golden.

Might take the wife out in the boat this weekend. Yesterday we got more rain in an hour than we have gotten all year long. It poured pretty good for a few hours then petered off. The trees sure must have been busily inhaling the stuff as it filtered past. Everyone is gonna have to break out their lawnmowers now baby. Spring sprung about three weeks ago round here.

Our first trip of the year left us badly sunburnt. This was because it was our first good dose of the year. We will be shielded if we go again. I like a few hours on the boat mid morning and then a relaxing afternoon. No pressure to catch fish but I did get a message the other day. The club is having a meeting coming up and they are in need of some fish to serve them what don’t fish. Old men that want a nice fish meal. We always fry the fish so I thought it might be nice if I did some up on my brand new Lodge Pizza thingie. All the club seems to do is deep fried. Surprise them and see how it goes. I have some in freezer if we strike out.

Delivered 280 smoked pork Boston butts yesterday to a fund raiser event. The cook team had put them on the day before and they cooked all night and until we pulled them around noon. We put them into boxes and met the girl’s tennis team at the vacant lot they had picked out. There we placed the boxes on tables and the girls and their mothers wrapped each one in aluminum foil, and then Saran wrap. Then as people drove in, the women directed the kids as to how many each car would get. They told me they sold at $30 each.

What do you think about these ?



It was tricky taking them off the smoker racks, and then later out of the boxes. We had to slide our hands all the way underneath in order to lift without having them fall apart. I thought we should have wrapped them right away and then delivered but the client wanted to save money. There really wasn’t all that much of a mess. Pig grease can go anywhere it wants and does so with enthusiasm, yet we had a couple of table tops that got nasty and that was all. It had been raining but it stopped just before we arrived on station. Easy job.

Today i go in early and load up and off to the fancy smancy palace place again. Rich family owns it and it is located on their farm. They own about a dozen grocery stores in the area and they are pretty popular. They also sold off some and folks can tell the difference as soon as they walk in. The new guys kept the name on the outside, but all trashy stuff on the inside. Stores just feel dirty. Cheap no name products everywhere. I’ll try to take some shots if there is anything interesting.

[BobC]

That griddle setup looks great, Micanopy! Really nice and compact!
Bob

[DockShootinJack]

Smash burgers on that griddle set up of yours. They are some of the finest eating you can put on a bun. I have one of the lodge pizza pans also. Fine piece of equipment it is. Does a right tasty pizza in the high heat of a grill.