Quote Originally Posted by Specklocker View Post
I switched to the power drive and it was the best thing for me. Fish how YOU fish if it's working for ya and you're catching fish. Electronics and remote trolling is a proven combination. It allows you to put 20 rods out even when you are by yourself. :>}
Years back before I moved to Florida, I lived in PA. During the early 80s the fishing on lake Ontario was really becoming popular.
I rigged my 24' Grady White with 4 downriggers and bought a bunch of downrigger rods and good reels. Also a foot locker size
tackle box to house all the hafta have lures of every color and description. At the time the X15 Lowrance graph recorder and loran c
was the ultimate in electronics. My 2 sons and I would trailer the boat in both spring and fall for a few weeks each, and comute on
weekends to fish. Id spend the day trolling as slow as one of the 150 hp engines would idle down while staring at the graph and temp
gauge. One of my sons would have to stay awake and keep his eyes on all the rod tips. Hours would pass with the only excitement
sometimes being a false release of one of the rods. We did catch some nice fish but the boredom wasent offset by that brief bit of
excitement. We just couldn't make the transition to that style of fishing and after a few seasons gave up on it. Yet I introduced a friend
to fishing there and he loved it. He bought a nice boat and even a small cottage to stay in. Ultimatly we both moved to Florida, him on
the west coast and me to the keys. He got to be bringing his boat to Islamorada for a week or so in the early summer to fish for mahi.
Just him and his wife mostly but he kept after me to join him for a day. Well one day I went and took with me a medium spinner with
a 1/2 oz jig tied on it. When I approached his boat he said what are you going to do with that? I replied well hopefully catch a mahi.
He said when you go on my boat you fish my way, and my way is to troll. A couple hours later we were trolling along with 4 rods out
when I noticed a frigate bird off to one side. I motioned Harrys attention to it and he changed coarse in that direction. Wasent long till
I saw a blue streak in the water and I said were gonna get hit. Almost at the same moment a rod went off and we were hooked up.
I said to him don't stop, keep moving we might get another. But he did stop and told his wife to grab the rod. It was about a 15 # bull
and when it was ready to gaff I was there. But trailing along trying to grab the lure were quite a few other schoolie size fish. I said Harry
if we had some spinners and bait chunks we could have a ball here right now. He said nothing, and when the fish went into the box he
drove away. A little later we hooked up again and it was a repeat of the first fish with me gaffing and lots of others following the fish to
the boat. Before noon we headed for the dock with 2 nice fish, but that was my last trip with my old friend Harry.