wolc123

My favorite is Kring point, just north of Alex bay, on the St Lawrence. That point forms Goose bay, which has some good LM bass fishing. There is good SM bass fishing on the main river. My family has a cottage on the back of Goose bay, and sometimes we stay there. Our kids really like camping at Kring point better though, so we always try and do that once a year. The bathrooms have been modernized and are clear and 1st class now. Each has it's own shower, and they are all individually lockable and "any gender". The beach is great and the roads are all paved for good biking and skate boarding. There is a nice playground and a good store/ice cream shop just outside the gate. Our kids love riding thier bikes over there each morning to fetch ice and mid day for ice cream.

This is one of those days when if you look close enough, you can see the corn grow. Warm temperature, plenty of sunshine, and 4 inches of rain on Thursday, makes for some fast growth. My back 2 acres (1st pic) is looking real good, I would cal it arm-pit high. It should make well over 200 bushels. Front two acres, planted just two weeks later (second pic), not so hot. I will be lucky to get 50 bushels from that. As long as some lasts until the Holiday ML season, that's good enough for me. The recent rain gave me a chance to finish the rear rim change on the old 8n. That was a tough job. Those 70 year old bolts did not want to break loose, and it was tough getting the beads loose on the rusted out rim. As a side benefit, the kids got a bigger fire pit now, from the old rusted out rim. They got to wait for me to finish tearing the old barn down before they can use the new 12 foot concrete one. That little one setting on the edge of that is the cut off compressor tank one that they had been using and complaining about because it is too small.

I got one of these platforms up over at my folks place today, in a cherry tree. This one replaces a very uncomfortable hang on stand. It is just into the woods, on the edge of a clover plot. This is the spot where I arrowed my largest ever button buck a few years ago, from a cheap pop-up blind. It still needs some work, a 3 ft barnwood wall/gun rest wall around 3 sides, and a few extra braces added. I will make another trip back there, with my generator, circular saw, barnwood, hammer and nails, before fall. The bb was standing right about at the front of the truck, when I arrowed him from the blind. Mature bucks are a little too elusive for that, hense the elevated blind. Also, I dont like spiders and a beow recluse got me bad in that pop up blind.

Boats are cool, so is Genny:

We landed 10 smallmouth total, out on the upper Niagara river, before the rain this morning. The problem was, 6 of them were 11 - 11-7/8 inches long, so they got to go back. The 4 14 - 16 inch ones were not so fortunate. We lost at least as many as we landed. They are fighting a ton more now, in the 70 degree water, than they were out there on opening day, when it was 63. I had to set up a fish cleaning station, under the porch of the pole barn, to stay out of the torrential downpours that struck after we got home. At least I wont have to water the plants this evening.

All people are lazy by nature, and dec officers at no exception. That is why they hang out at butcher shops during deer season, and public fishing piers in the summer. The "father helping pink zebco girl" is a probably a high-percentage violation. I imagine they are taught that one, on day one at the academy: "If you are struggling with your quota some month, look for a pink zebco".

That's as good of a description as i have heard of a big lake Erie walleye taken trolling with heavy tackle. It has got to be tough, for a guy used to lake Ontario salmon, too get excited about that. They are a lot more fun, when you catch them "by accident" on light tackle while targeting bass. I also pefer eating bass, over big lake Erie walleyes, especially after they have been in the freezer for a while. Even vacuum sealing doesn't seem to help with the big Erie walleyes. I find thier flesh usually tastes like algae smells. The warmer the water, the worse it gets. If you get them early enough in the season, when the water temp is still below 70 and eat them fresh, they aren't too bad.

I got the the rest of my sweetcorn cultivated, and the 2 acres of RR corn that I planted 2 weeks after the first batch, cultivated and sprayed this morning. I just beat the rain, which is in the forecast for the rest of the week. The spray had about 2 hours to dry before the rain hit. Those later plantings dont look near as good as my earlier plantings. It looks like maybe crows got at some seed, and deer definitely chewed down a lot more. I am going to have to hit the coons real hard with the traps in order to have any chance of some corn making it until the Holiday ML season. I may be depending more on some turnip/radish plots for that. I will probably cultivate both batches of sweetcorn one more time. Before I can do that, I need to fix the tire on my old Ford 8n. That is a good "rainy day" job. That old tractor has about double the overhead crop clearance as the newer John Deere, that I used for the initial cultivation and spray.

That reminds me, I forgot about my two "fancy big game and exotic stuff" hunts. On a Quebec moose hunt, when I was in my 20's, the licence I purchased was good for moose, bear and "other species". I didn't see any moose or bear, but did kill my first porcupine (legally), with a Remington model 760 30/06 that I borrowed from my cousin. On a DIY, OTC tag Colorado elk/mule deer hunt, with a few friends, when I was my 30's, we didn't see any elk. We did manage to kill 3 mule deer bucks. I killed the smallest (a 1.5 year spike) with my Ruger M77 30/06. That was my first and last of those. I say "last", because it tasted like sage brush, and I wouldn't killed another, unless I was paid to do it. I would recommend getting those "fancy" big game hunts done before you hit 50, if you can swing it. Had I not done the two that I did when I was younger, I wouldn't appreciate NY's Adirondacks as much as I do. For that reason alone, I dont regret those trips. In my opinion, the Adirondacks are way more scenic than the Rockies or Northern Canada, and whitetail is just as good tasting as elk (maybe not quite as good as moose), but way better than mule deer.

My daughter would love that, purple is her favorite color. She dont like my old blue Evinrude.

First sparrow with Daisy pump action bb gun, first rabbit, ruffed grouse and with J. Steven's Springfield 16 gauge side by side, first grey squirrel with Winchester model 51 410 single shot. First whitetail (button buck), first legally antered whitetail buck, and last doe with 16 gauge Ithaca model 37 Ithaca featherlight deetslayer. First coyote, red fox, grey fox, crow, coon, possum, skunk, red squirrel, and first and last woodchuck with Ruger 10/22.

I couldn't find a small screw eye for the busted Zara puppy, so I tried the chugger. It caught a few bigger bass and one Pygmy special. That was only the second non-smallmouth I have caught from this lake this year including a 12" perch thru the ice on Presidents weekend. The first 14" bass on the chugger must have broken somebody's worm harness off. I left that with it when I released it. The 17 incher was the 7th and last to hit the chugger. The 18 incher tasted it a little, then engulfed my 1/8 oz jig when I "tossed it a softshell crab". I ended up with 26 smallies today, between sunrise and 8:30 am. All but the first (7) were on the jig. That bass was the fight of the year so far, taking 10 minutes to land on my 6 pound test ultra light.

The center hook pulled out of my Zara puppy just before sunset out on the middle of the lake just before sunset last night. I got 6 more smallies out there on it out there then. They were chasing minnows up all over and I kept rowing the boat to the places where I saw the splashing on the dead calm lake surface. A cast towards the last action usually brought up a strike. It is cool getting bass on top over 100 ft of water. I am going to try and thread another screw eye with treble hook into it. That is the hook that usually gets them. If that dont work I will try my only other "chugger" style topwater bait this morning.

Ready for the fireworks:

A guy down at the end of the lake put on a pretty good fireworks show last night. I wonder if he saved any for tonight: Oi

I hooked 13 this morning on the topwater bait. 2 of them about the same size as this 15" (biggest one that I landed) were kind enough to unhook themselves at the side of the boat. At least that many hit it but missed it. Most of those that I hooked pounded it as soon as it hit the water. Almost all that hit while I was "walking the dog", missed it. The last one was the coolest. A big bass buried the bait the second it hit the water. As I was reeling it in a shorty moved in and yanked it out of the big ones mouth. The big one escaped, but I landed the little 10 incher. I witnessed the whole thing in the crystal clear water.

I got no time for those. I did a lot of that when I was young but have not touched one since crossbows were legalized in 2014. My shoulders feel so much better now. I am 56 and have less shoulder pain now than I did in my 30's when I bow hunted. I can literally row a boat all day long (that's what I am doing right now in fact), without a lick of pain:

I am rationing my jigs and trying some other baits this morning. They like the Zara puppy:

Definitely a shooter. I am guessing 3.2 years old based on body size. I see 3 points on each side, plus he likely has brow tines, making him a nice symmetric 8. The problem with those spindly racked bucks around my area, is the ratio is so scewed from heavy antlerless pressure from farmers with nuisance permits. The remaining bucks always knock the crap out of each other fighting for the few does which make it to the rut. He would likely be down to just 5 or 6 points by the time I could get my crossbow on him. That is not a big deal for me, because it's mostly about the meat anyhow. It looks like he is packing plenty of that. I have yet to find a good recipe for antlers. As you are well aware, my favorite time to kill a buck, is when it is 6 months old, but 3.5 is second best. Hopefully, I can nail one of each this year.

I should have quit while I was ahead or at least re-tied or loosened my drag. What would have been number 70 got to keep my lucky jig. It jumped a couple times right after the hookset, then pulled rather easily to the boat. Apparently, it was saving its strength for a deep dive that parted my 6 pound test fluorocarbon line, right at the knot. My next 1/8 oz bucktail jig only lasted for two more bass, then I lost it on a snag. I only have 3 more. I hope they will last me through the next two days. The count is up to 7 bass on the current one, which I just caught after supper. I have plenty of 1/16 and 1/4 oz jigs, but they dont work quite as well.

I have not bought a new Chevy pickup yet in this millennium, but my last one from the previous is still going strong. I just used it to haul a load of pine branches to a dump at the end of an Adirondack logging road:

How are the white perch for eating ? I should have quit while I was ahead this morning. I went back out when it stopped raining. What would have been smallmouth number 70, on my lucky 1/8 oz bucktail jig, got to keep it. It only looked to be about 16 inches long. A couple jumps after the hookset, then it came in easy to the boat. I guess it was saving its strength for that powerful deep dive in close that broke me off at the knot. I should have re-tied or at least loosened my drag a bit. Up to today, all the bass I have caught have been rather docile, with the water temps in the 60's. Now that it has hit 70, they are on top of their game.

I caught 8 smallmouth before the rain this morning up at my in-laws Adirondack place. Last year, at this time, they were all suspended out over deep water. Now they are along the shoreline, because the water is cooler. This was the longest one today at about 16". The previous one was a bit shorter, but fatter and fought harder. I noted the tail of someone's senko sticking out of its gullet as I was unhooking it. I was able to extract that with my needle-noze pliers. That was the 65th bass that I have caught here on the same 1/8 oz bucktail jig. When the rain let's up, I will go back out and see if I can get a few more with it. It is still in pretty good shape, except for some brown powder-coat paint wore off the bottom of the head. I bent the barb down for about the last 20, which makes it easier to release them. They were getting lots of air on the fights this morning. They all fought way harder than those I caught earlier this year (lots of them on Memorial day weekend when I was trying for perch, and limit on opening day on the upper Niagara).

That was a cool show, thanks for posting. Not really a huge surprise to see Chevy win America's toughest truck, over a newer Dodge and an older Ford. I never owned a Dodge. My only Ford is an old tractor, that was likely designed by Henry himself, back in the 1930's. My wife's previous mini-van was a Ford. She traded that in on new Toyota, shortly after it's alternator started on fire.