Christian M

X2...I bought my Tracker cash in full, Its a proud feeling knowing your boat is all yours. My tracker may have a few years on her but you would never know by looking at it or fishing from it. I was going to spring for the 597 but all they had was the 581, I'm happy with everything and I also plan to keep my baby for many years to come

My very first boat, if you can even call it that, was a Sevlor 360 Fish Hunter, got it brand new it for $300 with an electric west marine pump, new battery, new Minn Kota trolling motor, and lots of rope, I fished from that raft til it couldn't hold air for more than 2 hours. lasted one season I Upgraded to a 14' Scanoe which was awesome to fish out of but a nightmare to load up. I got it for $220 on sale then discounted because they lost the title & were missing bolts for the middle bench seat, I did some tweaks to it & put a cheap FishFinder on it. Then bought a 1976 Glasstron Tri-Hull that was converted into an open deck electric bass boat. I bought it for $2000, which was a steal because everything had been redone, from the stringers, to the wiring on the boat & trailer, to the wood, carpet & paint. Plus it was sitting on an 06 loadrite trailer that was worth $1500 easily. The boat came with everything I needed, All I did was upgrade the bow mount motor & build a livewell for tournaments. Finally this Spring I sold the Scanoe & Trihull which I had for about 3 years. Got a steal on a 96 Tracker Pro Team w/a Merc 9.9 4 stroke that was hardly ever used, plus its got a built in gas tank that fills up just like a car from the outside. I paid $2700, EVERYTHING is in mint condition,The trailer has brand new wheels & tires w/new bearings, bearing buddies & protectors. I swapped out the stock Motorguide 36lb for my 55lb MinnKota PowerDrive. I also swapped the cranking motor out for an Optima redtop. I bought a 31M Bluetop & installed a 50amp breaker for My Trolling Motor. I kept the lead acid cranking battery on the boat because its new. I bought a new Minn Kota 210D onboard charger, and last but not least I bought a new Humminbird 581i HD/DI/GPS combo for the deck & mounted the transducer to the Trolling Motor. All thats left is a kicker bracket for my 55lb transom mount Minn Kota trolling motor, but it's all money well invested. I could turn around and sell it for way more than I paid, but thats not gonna happen for a long, long time. Sometimes I miss the trihull because it was so simple & solid...Then I look at my Tracker & think about how hard I worked to get it & how long I wanted one. Not to mention it runs & fishes like a dream.

This is a paper tournament due to the spawn, which means everyone should be paired at random or with someone they dont know. Thats how my last club did paper tourneys too. Its the only way to keep things honest and fair. Its beyond me why they are not doing this. I actually know this lake like the back of my hand. In the last two years I've logged over 100 days. However that was when I had a 14' trihull with 5 deep cycle batteries, & Two 55lb motors (bow & transom). That setup would keep me fishing all day with no problem. My Tracker is a whole different story, its almost 4 feet longer, much wider and heavier, with only 55lbs pulling it at the bow. I've been on the lake and had the wind go from completely dead to 20mph within a few casts, this could leave me stuck in the standing timber, or even worse, washed into the boulders. I would fire up my engine before that happened, but that would disqualify me and earn me $1000+ in fines, and what if my engine doesnt want to start! All in all, not worthit by a long shot

Spinnerbaits can be tricky, it can get confusing with all the choices out there. Also there are lakes where they just don't produce. My advice for early in the season would be to go with small, single bladed spinners. Indiana blades are hard to beat year round. Remember, the fish are just spawning, so the bait & forage is still small, you want to imitate those little baitfish. Also take the water color/clarity into consideration when choosing your spinnerbait. However, the bass might not be ready to strike a spinnerbait just yet. I've been using a lot of soft plastics and finesse techniques so far, and with success. I've checked out stinger hooks & I wanna give them a shot. This little trick can be used on lots of lures like jigs and chatterbaits, I even put a trailer hook on hollow body frogs sometimes, & this keeps everything weedless.

Thank you very much. I did freehand it at work today. I have a BS in Graphic Design, I would love to post up some of my art but I don't want to seem like I'm soliciting myself on this site. I figured a sketch would help to realize all the different ways this technique can be used.

I do my fair share of Surf fishing up here in Jersey. Definitely go with at least a 10' rod, remember, you need something that will cast beyond the break into deeper water. As far as lures, topwater pencil poppers, large swimbaits, heavy bucktail jigs, sandeels, and ESPECIALLY diamond jigs with a surgical tube trailer all will due, emphasis on topwater tsunami poppers and #47 diamond jigs. If you're not into the idea of working a lure, then you'll need a few things other things, you may want to consider a longer pole, when I'm fishing using bait I break out the 14' pole at least, my buddy is a bit taller than me and he uses a 17' pole. The longer the rod, the further the cast. You'll need weights, anywhere from 1oz-6oz, I prefer the ones that are shaped like a teardrop, the pyramid weights work well too. You'll need some heavy braided line (at least 50lb), along with barrel swivels and leader line. again tsumani makes some good strong ball bearing swivels, if you want to spend the extra $$. The leader will depend on whats in the water. I'd be safe and get some steel along with some flouro, the steel will come in handy with the toothy monsters. You'll need a sand spike if you're gonna fish with bait. You'll also need some rigs. I would wait to buy the rigs and bait at a local bait & tackle store. Usually the High-Low rig & the FishFinder rig will due. The store owner will tell you what the fish are hitting. It's usually going to be live clam, or bunker. If you get clam, make sure you get a clam knife, and learn how to properly bait the hook. Do yourself a favor and get some vinyl gloves so that you don't cut your finger badly casting that 50lb test (it can and will happen) and a pair of heavy neoprene chest waders so you can get in the water. After all this maybe a lantern, definitely a good headlamp as most of the fish on the beach eat when the sun is down or coming up. If you need anymore advice PM me and ill be happy to share what I know. Good Luck and have fun!!

X2, Always have a breaker installed at the battery(s). I made the mistake of running my bow mount 12V w/o a breaker & I fried my control board. Luckily I was able to contact Minn Kota & they sold me a new control board for $70.00 & installed it myself. If not I would have been looking at at least $500 to replace the motor.

I'm sure that with all the tinkering and experimenting that most of us do with our tackle, this has been done before, but here goes anyway. I fish a lot of shallow lakes (3'-10'), and in some of these lakes, the spinnerbait is key, one of the most productive lures you can possibly use. I use a trailer hook with some sort of trailer worm (usually a twist tail worm/grub) on my spinnerbaits religiously. I cant count the number of Hawgs I've skin hooked with a good sharp trailer hook with teeth marks on the trailer worm. However, If you fish shallow lakes, you know how difficult it can be trying to fish through heavy cover (patches of pads, hydrillas, etc...). A lot of the time, If I can manage to get the blades and the head of the bait through the cover, my trailer hook comes back with grass on it, ruining my presentation. Its frustrating because most of the time, that heavy growth is where the monsters lurk. Especially on lakes that don't have many docks or much structure for them to hide under & hold in. Over the winter I was playing around with some spinnerbaits, and I came up with a small tweak that has been working like gangbusters for me so far. I'll explain and include a rough sketch. 1. Start off by putting a twist tail worm on the main hook of your spinnerbait, I like to cut off the tophalf of a Powerbait. 2. Put the trailer hook on and secure it with a piece of plastic or rubber tubing. Your trailer hook should move freely, so don't use the trailer hooks that come with a molded keeper over the eye. (If all you have is this type of trailer hook, you can just pull the plastic cover off of the eye, then use that piece of plastic as a keeper on the main hook). Now you have your twist tail on the main hook, and your trailer hook moving freely with a hook keeper in front of it. 3. Take a screw lock and pass it through the eye of the trailer hook. 4. Take a twist tail grub and secure it to the screw lock, then push the point of the trailer hook into the grub but not all the way through. Now you have a spinner bait with a weedless trailer hook, also you have 2 trailers that give the spinnerbait a whole new look and action. Another thing I've found by doing this is that the extra trailer creates more drag, so you can slow the bait down to a crawl and not worry about the trailer hook snagging. Experiment with the types and colors of your trailers. I have a sunfish pattern spinnerbait with 2 painted blades, a chartreuse grub on the main hook, and a dark green grub on the trailer. I can't stop catching all types of fish on it. I have a sketch that I will include also. I hope this info was helpful & tight lines!

Thanks for the advice, I really needed the voice of experience on this one, I'm decided, time to move on. As for my last club that has 25 tournaments, I agree, its an insane amount of time, money, and travel for an 8 month season. However, the club president, director, and a couple of other members have sponsors and are fully committed to a life of tournament fishing. The rest of the members are either retired, and/or have very deep pockets, and not much of a life outside of fishing. I cant take anything away from those guys, as a club they're organized, well managed, and focused. Three of the guys that placed above me last year can fish circles around me any day of the week, I should have taken fourth, but I missed tournaments due to my mothers illness, causing me to miss out on points. Thats not the case in this new club, they came to me asking to join!

Thanks Glenn! I needed to hear that from an objective point of view, and thanks everyone else for the input. Since I was young my Mother always told me to "follow my gut instinct" in those exact words. I feel much better about the decision now. There are a ton of clubs around the area that are much more organized, and there are a ton of open events that I dont have to miss work to compete in. I have a great tournament boat, so why not fish this season on my time and my own terms!

I was at a local reservior launching my boat when I saw a guy catching shiners off of the boat ramp, he asked me if I wanted any & we got to talking. He was catching the shiners on a #20 hook (smallest I've ever seen), 1lb mono, & bits of worms. He told me they were food for his pet bass, I told him I has always wanted to have a pet bass & he caught a baby for me. I put it in my livewell, bought a tank setup on the way home & learned from there. I had a baby channel catfish in the tank with him for a while, but they were constantly fighting and the catfish grew about twice as fast so I brought it back to the petstore. Bass are really cool fish to have as pets, mine (Gary Yamamoto) would jump up & eat crickets right out of my fingers, & he would go crazy everytime I went near the tank. I fed him about every 3 days, crickets & minnows for protein & waxworms to fatten him up. If u plan on keeping one just remember to keep the tank as simple as possible and get a tank that's at least 55gallons to start because they grow FAST. The rest is just making sure the waters clean & balanced.

That's EXACTLY what I was thinking. I figure if I work all 6 Saturdays that I would have missed, I'm looking at a couple grand. With that I can buy some nice stuff!

I actually have not heard this, Im gonna give it a shot, I dont fish tubes engough even though I have tons of them, Thanks for the tip!

The club is laid back, but I feel that there is a serious lack of organization. There are no meetings, no votes, no website, no club fund or bank account to pay for tournament permits etc..Basically all we get is group text messages. As far as money goes, its not gonna make or break me. At the same time, if Im not having fun, why miss out on a few hundred bucks at work, or time on the water with my family & friends. My partner is the only person I know in the club, and another issue is that the point system is by team, not by indivudual angler. That means If I catch a 3 fish limit for 15lbs and my partner goes skunked, he gets the points that I earned, and vice versa. I don't think it makes sense, I told my partner and the club president how I felt about the point system, but I guess they don't want to do the extra work. All that aside, Im not worried about points and stats. I just want to have fun fishing, and right now its more stressful than fun, so I think it may be time to step aside.

I kept one in an aquarium. I got it as a fry & kept it in a 55 gallon tank for about 7 months. When Hurricane Sandy hit I had to release it in a local pond because we lost power & the filter wasn't working. He grew from about the size of my pinky to over 10" in 6 months, I fed him a combo of live crickets, minnows, & wax worms . I have a friend who got one up to 8lbs in a 180gal tank. They're slobs so if u plan to keep one make sure you use a canister filter rated for at least double your tank size, also try to keep the tank simple and change the water at least 50% every week. The more decorations & stones you have, the more waste gets trapped making the Ph harder to balance and the tank harder to clean. My avatar is a pic of my bass in h is tank.

DOWNSIZING! Learning that I can catch huge bass on 6lb flouro w/a 3"-4" worm or shad dropshotting or shaky heading Its saved me plenty of times and finesse fishing has become a go to technique. Forcing myself to leave my comfort zone and learning to use lures & techniques I don't normally use. Learning that the cover/structure I can't see is just as important as the cover/structure I can.

Last season I was fishing with a club that was very well managed & organized, had some great anglers, and a busy schedule (at least 2 tournamets per month all over the state). Toward the end of the summer my Mother was diagnosed with breat cancer, so naturally I turned all of my attention and time toward my family. Between my mother being sick, and work, there wasn't much time left for fishing. I made it to the tourneys that were close to home, and ended up in 5th with Lunker of the year. I qualified to fish the Bass Bowl, a regional tournament that includes the top 6 anglers from 20 clubs in the South Jersey area, but I couldnt afford to leave my Mother & work for 4 days at that time, so the next angler in line took my place and they won the event. That was a catalyst for them to become B.A.S.S affiliated. Their schedule this year was over 25 tourneys, with 4 out of state, and the rest spread out all over NJ. It was just not feasable financially or time wise for me to do another season with them. Thank the good Lord my Mother has made a full recovery, and in March I was able to sell my old trihull and finally buy a 96 Tracker Pro Team 17 in excellent condition, something I've been wanting for years. I wanted to replace the bow mount motor with a newer, more powerful one, replace the batteries & on board charger, add a newer fishfinder to the deck, and a kicker bracket for a transom mount trolling motor. So far I've done everything except get a kicker bracket. I was going to take the season off just to fun fish w/my family and work on my new boat, However, I had a fishing buddy hounding me all winter to join his local club. They had a much more relaxed schedule than the last club I fished with, one tournament per month, all within an hour of home, and you fish with a partner all season. I decided to join last minute as my mother was doing extremely well, and my partner offered to have us fish on his boat until mine was ready to go. We fished the first tournament together. I missed the second because my family and I decided to take a vacation in celebration of my Mothers good health. The third tournament is coming up next week and things aren't looking so great. A couple of weeks ago my partner let a racial slur slip out in front of me, I expressed my resentment toward his comment, kept my cool, but put some distance between us. Last week my partner called me saying that we wouldn't be fishing on the same boat for the next tournament. He said that apparently the club president decided to fish on a new members Nitro (who I brought into the club), while he fished with the club presidents partner, who doesn't have his boaters license. Leaving me as the only one fishing by myself for 8 hours on a 760 acre electric only reservior that gets REALLY windy (3' whitecaps & strong current) with one 55lb motor and 1 optima blue top pushing a 17' boat. I expressed to him that I wasn't really comfortable bringing my boat out on that lake just yet, and he had no answer, he kind of pushed the blame on the club president. I contacted the club president who only has a 12' V-Hull and doesn't want to take it out on this lake, and also was questioning whether my partner and I were even partners anymore?? He said I could either fish with the new member, or fish with him on his "little boat". In the end I agreed to fish solo, since it seemed like everyone had already decided this was how it was going to be. My partner called me shortly after and asked me if I was going to fish the next open buddy with anyone else because he wanted to invite a friend of his to fish on his boat. I'm seriously considering just taking the rest of the season off, there are only 5 tournaments left after this next one. I have to take off Saturdays to make it to these events, which costs me about $300 everytime. I've NEVER been the type to commit to something then back out, and I don't like people that do that either. However I'm really feeling like I'm being left high and dry by my partner. Sorry for the long post, but I wanted you guys to get an idea of why im at this point...What do you guys think??

Congratulations, you've got a sweet boat and truck, keep working hard and good things will continue to come!

I bought the Scatter Rap Shad, Jerkbait & Crankbait. I was casting the Scatter Rap Shad & Crankbait on a 7' Wright McGill S-Glass rod & 12lb Flouro. I also had a lot of trouble when either of them hit grass, they would come up out of the water & the line would get tangled in the hooks. They seemed to work much better when trolling in open water rather than casting, however, I only used them once in a shallow grassy lake. This weekend I'm hitting the reservoir which has a lot of rocks and fallen timber as well standing timber, I think they might do better there.

The new KVD shad bait is called the "Dream Shot", it does have salt in it, but very little, and it works really well for drop-shotting & shakey heading. For drop-shotting I would recommend a smaller hook, like a #1 or #2

If your talking about the new KVD drop shot/finesse shads (I forget the name...I think they're called perfect shots or something) then yes they do, I've used them drop shotting once so far this year and did really well with them, but the caffeine shads do not float, they have a really great shimmy as they sink and are really effective in spring. The best way to tell if a bait floats is to just taste them, if they taste like salt then they don't float, if you don't taste salt then they will float.

I would take a day on the water with ANY pro, just to be able to pick their brain and observe them. But If I HAD to pick one I'd have to say Ike, I love his "Never Give UP" attitude and we grew up fishing the same lakes and reservoirs, so I would love to spend a day on the water with him getting tips. Plus I'm sure he's got a few secret spots that I'd love to get the scoop on.

I own the Code and the Smoke. I love the both, I use my Code for flippin & pitching jigs in heavy cover, for the price its a solid reel. I did have one of the pieces break off on the drag star, which its made of a cheaper composite material, but I brought it back to the store and got a new one which has lasted me two seasons without any problems. The smoke is a great reel, I use it for pretty much anything & everything. Its definitely made with higher quality materials, eg. the drag star is made of metal, and its a much smoother reel in comparison. The ONLY complaint I have about the Smoke is that the paint chips much too easily for a $200 reel.

Our spawn is really picking up here in central NJ. Yesterday I caught 7 nice bass & lost 4. Everytime I caught a female I would release her as close to where I caught her as possible. I released every one as quickly as I could.

Nice rig, I love these style Trackers, its like having the best of both. Sweet ride