9-7-15 Labor Day The wife is still at it!

Ever had one of those days where you would have been money ahead to have stayed in bed or at least stay at home? That was me Friday when I took the wife. We had time after time that I spent what seemed like hours untangling lines from yellows that weren't noticed or baits not running true. Finally, when we hung and lost 4 cranks at one time while I was busy untangling multiple lines, I had a meltdown. I'm nowhere near as bad as when I was young but it does come back to me occasionally. Load it on the trailer and go to the house was my solution before I said or did something that would have equaled me letting my alligator mouth overload my humminbird butt.

After removing about a million miles of line and backing off all my trolling reels and replacing it with fresh, we were good to go for Monday morning, Labor Day. Holidays on KY Lake are like being at Disney World the week after Christmas. Been there, done that, got a T shirt. My better judgement said no but the wife was off and ready to make amends for Friday's fiasco.

We launched and headed to a spot I wanted to try while it was dark enough to have to run lights. We were pulling baits before the sun thought about coming up over the trees on the LBL side.
http://i101.photobucket.com/albums/m...psk4pzorsj.jpg

We hadn't gone far when we hooked a double on gaspergoos. After some laughs and fancy net work we looked back and this one was skipping along the top on one of Vicki's rods.
http://i101.photobucket.com/albums/m...ps8krr0ad5.jpg

She wasn't even woke up good and wasn't happy to get her picture taken with no make-up on and sleepy eyes. She got over it.

I couldn't keep up with her when it came to putting crappie in the boat. I did hook what might have been the biggest crappie I have seen this year and got it to the net where it was promptly knocked off to go and swim again. We had a heart-to-heart lesson on netting techniques AGAIN but for some reason I just laughed it off. Might have been karma from Friday?

I did manage to catch a few like this one that swallowed the crank out of sight then bled all over me and the boat.
http://i101.photobucket.com/albums/m...psmxslrhw2.jpg

The lake lice stayed in until just after 9 AM. we left it for them soon after but not before I caught this pig. No idea what went thru its mind just before it took on this c55.

http://i101.photobucket.com/albums/m...psjmyi1y5p.jpg

We ended up with 10 keepers with 4 really good fish and one giant that got away. I know where she lives!

Any lingering effect from Friday got washed away this morning. Another good day pulling cranks with my wonderful wife of 40 years.

Sometimes great days don't need great numbers. Happy for yall :)

nice pics

Very nice. Glad things turned around for you.

Great Doug and Vickie some good looking fish!

nice report doug

I know you've probably gave this information before Doug but how many hours are ya getting out of your batteries trollin?

You do such a good job Describing the stories you tell! really detailed like reading a book! I love reading your stuff!

Quote:

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Originally Posted by dkb23

I know you've probably gave this information before Doug but how many hours are ya getting out of your batteries trollin?

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I'm going to qualify my answer on this by saying my boat is an 1860 Horizon that is probably much lighter than most of the tin boats members here run. It was a basic open floorplan that was a tiller boat until I got a great deal on my 75 Yamaha. I do without a lot of storage and bells/whistles of the more top-of-the-line rigs. It has always worked well for me but isn't going to win any best-engineered awards.

I'm running a Terrova 80 I-pilot on 2 WalMart series 29 deep-cycle batteries that are on their 3rd season. I keep them plugged up to a 2 bank MinnKota onboard charger 100% of the time the boat is in the garage. I have ran them up to 7 hours of pretty much continuous running recently with no noticeable drop off in performance. My typical trip is 4-5 hours since I'm only 10 minutes from the ramp and if they aren't biting, I'm heading home. My Terrova is usually running on cruise control for 100% of the time we have rods out. My normal speed for cranks is 1.7-2.0 and 0.8-1.2 for longlining jigs.

I've been very pleased with the battery performance. If I had to go today to replace these batteries, I would probably look at golfcart models that are the same footprint but much "taller". If my budget got in the way for those, I would be heading back to Wally World for more of the same ones I have or series 31s if they are available.

I like your set up Doug. Don't ever think you got a low class set up. The ingenuity is sometimes better than having a high class boat. Gives u something to be proud of too! [emoji106]. BTW. The lights are cool![emoji12]. Thanks for the info bud.

Nice catch and some nice pictures also

I'm glad some are getting to wet a line I haven't been able to get on the water since spring

I have been running 4 walmart batterys total of 400 amp hours and am only good for about 8 hours. I am using a 18 foot tracker all fish with a 80 terrova. I am running 5.5 speed on the terrova at 1.7. I am going to 3 trojan J185H-ac the 128 pound ones will give more than 600 amp hours and then buy a 112 ulterra and a minkota 4 bank 15 amp charger the programable one. I drive an hour getting back and forth to the lake and want to be able to spend 12 hours at the lake. I will have to build boxes this winter for the batteries. Just enjoying my addiction. I think next I may start painting my own lures and get my grandsons involved.

Don