Spreadin' the Love

It's such a joy to witness a father passing on a love for the outdoors, particularly when the child has an exceptional day. 

 

Fished Sunday with Steve and his son Nathaniel, age 9.  I arrived at daybreak and got a few hours in before they showed up. Water temp was 68 F to start.  Around 8 am I found this hawg in 6" of water on the bank with my black buzzbait. I saw the fish move as soon as my lure hit the water, ~6 lbs on the grips. Great way to start the day. I landed several small bass trolling a blue x-rap as well as a few decent crappie. 

 

 

 

Nathaniel was eager to out-do me and he scored big with 2 bass pushing 5 lbs, both caught on a jitterbug.  Here's one ... 

 

 

After noon, Steve and I both landed 5 or so each to finish out the day. I got a few on a balsa Rapala SSR 6 (silver/black, floating, shallow runner) including this guy, Steve's were on a buzzbait. 

 

Other highlights included more small bass, blow-up missed strikes from large river bass, as well as a very aggressive pickerel that slammed my swimbait like a freight train. It went airborne twice and ultimately shook the hook. 

We pulled out the canoes around 3 pm. All in all, a great day on the water. Beautiful weather and big bass. I'm pretty confident that Nathaniel will be asking for a return trip, and I'll be buying a few jitterbugs! 

Mohawk 16 RX Test Run

 

I got my son up at 6 am to get out on a local flow for a 1/2 day in the recently modified Mohawk tandem.

The canoe performed well and is a very stable platform for the two of us. It's also not so heavy that I can't handle it myself. Bought used and slightly modified, it's also under 1/3 the cost of a new fishing kayak.  With superb stability and a few additional features, the Mohawk will also likely become my winter trawler.

We launched around 7:30 or so with clear skies and clear water. Things started a little slow. I was throwing a weightless super fluke in albino color and couldn't buy a bite in the first 30 min. We hit a little honey hole and I switched over to a Zoom clear/flake fat albert grub with a gammy jig head. I proceeded to land 4 crappie in 10 minutes and my son picked up a nice gill on an earth worm.



We made our way downstream and I landed several bass on the fluke, grub, and black buzzbait. I also caught 3 bullhead catfish on the Zoom grub, all within 100 yards or so on the same bank.

Got a few more crappie on the way back as well as a few more bass. My son brought in this small bass near the end of the day. I still have to cast for him to get it in the right place, but he does fairly well after that. I'm just stoked that he likes to go!





I think I missed 5 pickerel, one was absolutely huge, just missing my buzzbait about 10' from the canoe. I had another ~3 lber hooked with the buzzer and he came off near the boat. Landing a pickerel today just wasn't in the cards.

Lastly, nothing like a cool dip when the sun is high. He jumped in twice to cool off.


 4 nice crappie and 3 bullheads came home with us and the crappie have already been consumed

Mohawk 16 RX

I picked up a lightly used royalex Mohawk 16' tandem this spring in hopes of making it a good tandem fishing platform for my son and me.  This is how I bought it ...

Although this canoe appeared to be setup for whitewater, it has very little rocker and had cane seat back kits installed.  The cane on the backs is in great shape, but on the seats themselves the cane was brittle and cracking, in need of repair.  There are relatively minor scratches on the bottom, with light wear on the keel front and rear.  A previous owner had also glued in closed cell foam in front of each stock seat, I presume for comfortable kneeling. 

Well, the foam was separating from the bottom and harboring various pests, including roaches.  I've removed the front as it was in worse shape, but now I'm left with this sticky residue.  More on that later. 

My objectives:

1. Install a center seat, preferably with an integrated yoke so I can still comfortably carry it on my shoulders for short distances.
2. Remove the cane seat back kits and sell them, recouping some of my investment
3. Fix the stock seats
4. Add a rod rack and possibly some rod holders for trolling
5. Figure out a convenient anchor arrangement
6. Take my son fishing in it!

Today, I finished up the seat install/refurb with positive results.  My brother made a center seat frame out of reclaimed oak, but it was a little heavy.  I trimmed it down and cut in the carrying yoke.  After sanding and test fitting, I hit it with a coat of poly.  I intended to strap all the seats with nylon webbing.  I bought 50 yards of 1" webbing from an online store for $30 shipped, enough to do 4 seats.  Basically, you staple one side, pull tight, staple other end, trim, and melt the frays with a lighter.  I used a basic bostitch T50 stapler with 5/16" staples.  I also cut out the old cane, sanded, poly'd, and strapped up the stockers.  They all turned out well.

The front cross-member of the center seat is in the stock yoke location, dead center.  With me just aft of center, this arrangement gives me enough room to reach my son, yet he's still far enough forward to avoid snagging me when he casts.  Also, the stock width was 35" at the gunwales (pronounced "gunnels").  I pinched it together slightly to 33.5" to allow better clearance for paddling with a kayak paddle.

This configuration should also be fairly well balanced, I suppose trimmed is a better term, so paddling is efficient and we're not weather cocking in windy conditions, something I despise when trying to fish in a canoe.  The third seat will also allow taking my daughter when she's old enough to tag along. 

Next up will be installing a rod rack and holders.  I have a few ideas on how best to do that with limited weight.  Looking forward to getting out in this boat, particularly this winter to troll for crappie.