Big Mike in Fl

This

I didn’t know Florida strain was harder to catch... I never seemed to have a problem! That being said I’ve never fished for northern strain, so I have nothing else to compare it to. In all reality i don’t believe they’re harder to catch but rather they’re behaviors are different than northern strain, forage can be different, and the types of cover and structure are different. So someone who is used to fishing northern strain may struggle when trying to catch Florida strain for those reasons. But seriously, I’ve never had much of a problem...

Some years back I was fishing the Indian river lagoon system here (brackish water) when I happened to see two guys wade fishing I. A spot where my cousin and I used to wade fish as a kid, as I got closer low and behold it was my cousin, with a buddy of his. Well of course I invited them to climb aboard and we went off and fished, about an hour later an FWC officer cane tooling along and checked us all, both of them got tickets as they only had shore bound licenses. Fast forward to a couple weeks ago, same cousin who now lives out of state is in town visiting and we head out to fish, he of course made sure to get a license. So we’re at a ramp waiting in a thunderstorm to make up its mind where it’s going go, and a sheriffs wildlife deputy pulls up. We proceeded to BS with him for about ten minutes before he headed off to continue patrol. My cousin was ticked he didn’t check his license, I said you know he would have checked us if you didn’t buy one! Another time some years ago, I was out with my buddy on Garcia when we headed back to the ramp we could see the FWC officers doing spot checks at the ramp. At that very moment it occurred to me that my license might have expired. I convinced my buddy to cruise on by the ramp and head back out to the lake, sure enough I was expired. So I called the number on the back of the license and renewed it in the water. Got back to the ramp and got spot checked, officer asked me when I had renewed it and I told him that morning... trouble averted! I got in some one serious trouble with wildlife when I was younger, I try my best to behave myself these days. I enjoy the outdoors too much to risk it, and while the first time was a slap on the wrist, I know the second won’t be.

I gotta say, when the water temp is at 90* it can be awful hard putting together a successful day.

I believe at least second year in a row a Florida lake hasn’t made it in the top 10... seems used to be lake O, stick marsh, even the Kissimmee chain used to make it in the top 10s. Pretty sad.

I got a couple of their cyclone reels during a b1g1 deal, I spent $100. Wish I had just bought a single reel for the money, one completely broke apart, the other I still is but have had to mess with it a few times. Some people seemed to love them but I wasn’t impressed

Sitting on a dock in the Indian river lagoon, Bait fishing for whatever would bite as a young teen, a group of porpoise were chasing mullet, in skinny water around the docks that lined the shore. I saw a mullet jump, and the porpoise jump, catch the mullet, and jump clear over a dock! Won’t ever see that again. also had about a 2lb bass jump straight into the boat, wasn’t hooked or anything, just chasing bait and jumped right in. Coolest experience though was witnessing gators pool up some sort of fish, either shad, or gar. Hundreds of gators in an area of a football field, they would then come under the fish and hit them like bass hitting a top water. Something I’m pretty sure very few people have ever witnessed

I fished it once probably at least 10 years ago, the little lake is good for a morning trip around it. Caught some fish but nothing special. If I remember correctly some deeper she’ll beds in it. It certainly wasn’t exciting enough to continue to go, considering Garcia is right around the corner

I’ll look into Steele creek. Any suggestions since I’ll almost definitely be shore bound. And also best bets for baits this time of year?

Well, I bought the boat. Tried to upload the picture but it was too large. 1999 Stratos vindicator 283 with a Johnson fast strike 150. Original everything, motor only has 330 hrs and everything is in tip top shape. I’m pretty excited about it!

Awesome, thanks for the info

It does have the composite sticker on it, I know the hull is composite, but I know a lot of boats in the late 90s still had wood decks. I think I saw searching through other forums that they did go to all composite in 99. Just hoping maybe Someone can confirm?

I’ve actually been contemplating dropping the FC leader on my spinnerbait and swim jig set ups because of this. I guess that’s one answer. I do know that in some applications I’ve seen noticeable increase in strikes when using FC vs not. But in the case of moving baits in moderate to heavy cover I agree it may not be as necessary

Hey guys I’m looking at picking up one of these tomorrow, and was wondering if anyone could give me some info, is the boat completely composite, or is the deck wood? The current owner said it’s full composite, but I haven’t been able to verify that online.

I use 25lb flouro leader on some braid set ups that are in heavier cover, down here in Florida almost every fish is gonna run for the thickest hydrilla or pads around, in my particular case this was a spinner bait running through pads and over hydrilla clumps. I expected full contact and got it. As for top water, we basically use braid on everything, with flouro leaders of varying sizes depending on applications. I use XPS flouro and have never had problems with it, I believe this particular case was a fluke and not in relation to line, or hookset. My hookset was textbook. Whatever the case case while I gave this weekends examples, every time we lose them it’s different circumstances. For instance the top water fish he lost he had caught 5-6 before that, without an issue.

I fish in a small club in central Florida with a buddy of mine, and after every tournament we analyze the day, how we fished, what we could have done differently (as I’m sure most everyone who fished tourneys does) one consistent theme is that we realize that if we didn’t place, we probably lost fish that would have put us in the money. There seem to be a wide range of reasons, and I can’t quite pinpoint any one circumstance that frequently happens that is causing it, for instance this past weekend he lost a 4-5 on a top water that just cane unbuttoned, and 10 minutes before weigh in I lost a 5+ when my 25lb flouro leader snapped (I had caught previous fish on the line and there were no nicks in the line) I guess what I’m wondering is what you guys do to try and minimize losing fish? Obviously if I could track down one root cause I could correct it, but I can’t say it is one specific thing causing it. It sucks when you know you’re competitive but don’t quite get in the money because of one or two lost fish.

Did you have to change the whole wire harness or did you use the same harness as you had with the 24v? Did you change out the circuit breaker?

Hey guys, I’m going to be visiting my in laws who live in the Johnson city area the week of July 4th, and am hoping to get away at least one morning and do some fishing. They’re very close to Boone lake, and I had actually asked about fishing there once before. When I was up there a few years back I checked out watauga lake and did some shore fishing with very limited success, I caught one dink small mouth. I’m wondering where the best places might be to go, I know Boone lake is low and I can probably get to many places on foot since it’s so low, wondering what the best baits and tactics will be for this time frame? Down here in Florida it’s almost all soft plastics in the weeds these days, but I know this is a vastly different scenario up there. The other option is if someone up there is interested in swapping trips out, I could entertain a trip on the Kissimmee chain (lake Toho) or stickmarsh/Garcia in trade for a trip out to either of these lakes mentioned.

And don’t forget to get some gator tail and hush puppies at lone cabbage while you’re there!

This X2. I had had a great top water popper that I got in a bargain bin and caught a ton of fish on it, lost it. Could not find another one for years... finally found it marketed under a different brand, now I own 4 and they catch, but not like that first one.

This is what I figure, thanks!

So, I finally finally got into the Cut R worm game after reading enough about them to believe I’ll like them, I’m a fan of zoom ultravive speed worms so I figure this might be a Slight upgrade, anyway the stupid question is this; there is a thin piece of plastic that runs from the tip of the tail to about where the body starts, seems to be an extra, like a left over from the mold. Does this serve any actual purpose or is it just a left over? I feel like it isn’t important, and definitely none of the pictures I’ve seen of the worms have it, but before I take them off I wanted to make sure they don’t have a legitimate purpose

I’m skeptical of it all in reality, it’s marked to $44 right now with the sale they are advertising. For rod, reel, spooled with braid, and two hollow body frogs. I’m pretty confident it’s junk. I was just hoping someone had actually touched one and it was one of those surprise deals. I read it was a heavy power from a comment or something, I’ve got a good frog set up at the moment anyway, I was really just curious about it, and if one of those amazing value deals I might have grabbed it as a back up or for another application.

I’m. Fan of the penn battle II especially if it might see saltwater. They’re a tank of a reel, not the lightest but certainly hold up. I bought a pflueger summit XT For $50 at BPS and am actually super impressed with it, although I won’t be using it in salt water. I feel like there are some really good reels for cheaper than $100, like the Sedona suggested by others.