Topics

1

The Hawg Forum / What makes you and your boat tournament ready

« on: April 04, 2022, 12:42:29 PM »

Thought I would try and spark a conversation...

I wanted to provide some help to someone I just met. They are looking to get in to tournament fishing and just purchased their first boat. We all remember when we took that leap of faith and jumped into our first tournament on our first boat.  I remember vividly having my ugly stick and flip sider tacklebox ready to go!   

Just thought it might be a good thread to talk about it as the season is kicking off very quickly.

• What you need on your boat?
• What you need as a angler?
• What should you do?
• What shouldn't you do?
• Ramp etiquette.
• Something you wish you knew day one, you now know.

I'll have to think about this and post a little later. 

-Mitz

2

The Hawg Forum / Are Spark Plugs made of Gold?

« on: April 01, 2022, 03:54:02 PM »

I have a 115HP 04 Merc Optimax 3 cylinder so thankfully while my motor is a DOG I only have 3 plugs just spent $18 each...    One SKU up and they were $8 one SKU down and they are $7...

O well...  I really do want to repower my boat with a 150HP but just doesn't seem worth it... I'll just continue to push water for 1/2 the lake...

Mitz

3

The Hawg Forum / Totally unnecessary purchase

« on: March 29, 2022, 01:40:11 PM »

I picked up hydraulic Wire Lug crimpers. $40 on Amazon

What a Game changer! Needed to swap out a few battery cables for the boat and when you have 4 batteries it can get expensive. I use to buy premade, to just not worry about it but they are always too long or too short.

Picked up a length of good battery cable and some new lugs cut them to length. The hydraulic crimpers are WAY better than anything else I've used to crimp, smash or vise on lug ends!

Ended up nice and neat and should be in place for a while!

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B07RSJZJRV/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_search_asin_title?ie=UTF8&psc=1

-Mitz 

4

The Hawg Forum / Lowrance Ghost 360

« on: January 14, 2022, 03:51:55 PM »

For the upgrade cost of a 3-1 transducer nose cone, HDS or Elite FS unit and a software update looks like Lowrance added 360 imaging for FREE! LOL (just $4000 upfront) 

Doing some research it doesn't look like a show stopper but it will be fun to play with. As long as you don't need to steer the boat using the TM. 

-Mitz

5

Fishing Tackle & Equipment Reviews / New Scale

« on: December 30, 2021, 04:53:41 PM »

Great Price. $30.00

SNAIL TRAIL Fish Scale with Lip Gripper, Fishing Scale Weighing 50lb, Tournament Scale Recording 8 Fish Handheld Electric Scale.
by Snail Trail

Learn more: http://amzn.to/3sKgPE3

Very impressed by the price and quality. Now just need for the spring to come and put it to use!
It doesn't automatically figure out the Culling but it does tell you what rank each fish is. So you can figure it out pretty quickly.
One other thing I noticed just playing around is: to delete a fish you just hit select the # and press Del. With there was a confirm or double tap required.
Not a deal breaker but something.

-Mitz

6

The Hawg Forum / Department of Environmental Management hopes to purchase Alton Pond boat ramp

« on: December 01, 2021, 02:38:38 PM »

Not sure what this will mean down the road but it was related to fishing and not cold weather.  So I figured I'd pass it along.

http://turnto10.com/news/local/alton-pond-boat-ramp-for-sale-department-of-environmental-management-hopes-to-purchase-it

-Mitz

7

Lure Making / Breakfast and Baits

« on: February 06, 2021, 10:33:05 AM »

Cup of coffee and a handful of bladed jigs.   This was the 2nd batch now all the Plano boxes are full!
-Mitz

8

Boating Forum / Cleaning up my 04 Tracker Avalanche

« on: February 06, 2021, 08:22:55 AM »

To be honest I'm somewhat ashamed. I had no idea how bad it was! LOL 
By the end of last year when I was getting the boat ready for it's winter nap I did a walk around. The poor boat looked like it just came back from a week long bender at the Roxbery. I lost most of the decals on my 04 115hp Mercury. The decals were replaced by dirt. Seats have tears and patched with flex seal tape. Side rails faded from sun and pitted. This was just the start of my list.

Since I had shoulder surgery this winter I needed a project and my plan was to pay a little respect to the old girl. She needed a facelift of Joan Rivers proportion!
I'll be posting more as soon as I get the boat into the garage.
-Mitz

9

The Hawg Forum / Battery Stuff

« on: May 10, 2020, 05:31:20 PM »

So I know everyone has an option when it comes to batteries but we can all agree it is expensive to replace them! I have 4, a 36V trolling motor and a cranking battery. I'm using all Optima batteries, one yellow top and 3  bluetop D34M. The back drop to the story is I was working on the boat over the winter and noticed one of the charger lights was acting funny. It would show bad battery and then flash and go back to bad battery.
SO looking at the label I noticed it was from 06! Figured heck that was a good life and ordered a new one. Then a week later something else was odd one of the batteries what flashing charging but would not complete. Well this one was from 09 again not a bad life so I spent another $250 and now my boat has 4 batteries less than 3 yrs old.

Not wanting to give up I did some research and found out that AGM batteries like Optimas can trickle charge down to nothing and cause chargers to not register properly.  One of them was reading less then 2 volts and my charger didn't know what to do with it.

The end of the story... Both the 06 and the 09 are working like new again because of 2 tricks.

1st battery that was under 2 volts. Hooked jumper cables to it + to + and - to - then, using a Noco Genius G3500 charger for 18+ hours it was fully charged and ready to go!! 
2nd battery was the 09 that showed charging but never got 100%. Using the same Noco Genius G3500 charger in maintenance mode the next day the battery was at 100%!! 
So while I'm not about to put them back in the boat I have some pretty kick butt spare batteries in my garage! LOL
Final thoughts for $500+ I gained some knowledge, 2 new batteries that will keep me fishing for another 7+ years and 2 deep cell batteries to use when the world goes to nuts and I forced to live off the grid. 
-Mitz

10

The Hawg Forum / 12+ volts but nobody is home

« on: July 10, 2019, 03:14:41 PM »

I have had an interesting year with my boat and last tournament was no exception!

Long story short over the weekend I had a night tournament. I launched my boat and started getting my stuff ready. The typical setup, power up electronics, pull out my rods and fire up the motor. Well that is when it all went south. I sat down to start the motor turned the key EVERY thing BLACK! No lights, No Electronics. nothing...

Tied off to the dock and started looking for a blown fuse, couldn't find anything in the dark. I ended running the livewell wires to the TM batteries and said screw it thats all I need to fish.
Got home and tested the battery. Reads fully charged on a volt meter as soon as I touch anything to it the volts drop to almost nothing. I had to laugh because I was like what the heck no warning and it just goes... Then I looked at the date sticker on the Optima battery and it was 7 years old. Guess that was a good life!
-Mitz

11

The Hawg Forum / Echo Lake first!

« on: June 07, 2019, 12:04:38 PM »

Fishing in a tournament last night I had a first for me on Echo Lake!
10+ years fishing there and never caught a trout before!


-Mitz

12

The Hawg Forum / What makes a good fisherman GREAT?

« on: May 14, 2019, 01:51:41 PM »

So I have been at this for a LONG time and to be honest I'm nowhere near as good as I should be. I continuously ask myself. WHY...
WHY are you not catching fish when everyone else is...WHY do I continue to beat myself up in these tournaments...WHY can't I find a fish on a spinner bait or a jig I know they should be on right now...WHY WHY WHY....
Well this weekend I had one of those days. In one of our SRIBA tournaments this weekend I had the WHY's and it cost me a good bag! I knew what to do from the start, I had the right baits tied on from the beginning and we were at the right place to make it happen. I spent more time picking rods, cutting and re-tying baits and dealing with a frustration level that just kept building than I did fishing. IT SUCKED!!!
THEN I had my moment... WTF are you doing! You caught fish they told you where they are WHY are you not listening. It was then I put down everything and tied on one single bait and began to fish. For the first time in the tournament since the first cast I was fishing again. Unfortunately it was the last hour of the tournament...
Like usual I finished with a few fish and in the middle of the pack. The difference this week is I think I actually walked away with something. I love fishing way to much to not enjoy every cast! If I'm a middle of the pack fisherman in tournaments I'm gonna be the best dam middle of the pack fisherman I can be... 
Tight lines to all and remember... Enjoy it because it is only fishing!!!
-Mitz

13

The Hawg Forum / 2019 Skunk is out of the boat!

« on: April 07, 2019, 05:40:02 PM »

Got out today to de-winterize the boat and take a few casts. Picked up my first bass of the year so the SKUNK is officially out of the boat. LOL
Wish I could have spent more time on the water but yard work was the theme of the weekend.  Felt great to take some casts! 
-Mitz

14

The Hawg Forum / How you know you are not on the right website!

« on: January 13, 2019, 01:58:38 PM »

I was just poking around the internet for some deals and came across this on OverStock.com. 
-Mitz

 

15

The Hawg Forum / So what do you think?

« on: July 02, 2018, 02:21:02 PM »

So this weekend I made a decision. It hit me like a ton of bricks when I caught my 2nd fish during a night... (and the fact it has been coming up more and more)

I fish in a Thursday night league and with Curt in SRIBA. The waters we fish in RI and for the most part CT tend to get hit pretty hard. Everyone knows the good lakes and those lakes take a beating. SO... Long story short Friday night my first fish was a typical 1.5lber but looked very healthy and solid. I thought to myself it was great to see a new young class of fish beefing up! Then a caught my 2nd and it was also a 1.5lber however it was a different story. I went to put in my cull tag and his jaw was split from front to back. You could see where someone stuck a cull tag in too far back from the fishes lip and it must have ripped. It sucked to know "we" did that...
SO I'm going to test out some of the non-penetrating cull tags and hopefully others will follow. Who knows maybe our club rules will change and non-penetrating cull tags will be in the rules.

I know others are already using these tags so please chime in. What brands work and what brands suck???
-Mitz