lake erie perch 9/7

[outdooralex]

I took my wife and my daughter out perch fishing Saturday evening to see if we could catch a few for a small dinner. Went out to Stoney Point eventhough the guy at Bottomline told us to go a little farther south. We were press for time so we didn't go as far as we probably should have. We got out there about 5:30 and fished till about 7:30. We managed to put 15 decent size perch in the boat. We were fishing in 24ft of water using crappie rigs with minnows. Along with the perch we caught a bunch of sheephead ( my daughter Sydney loves to catch them), two channel cats, rock bass, silver bass, and I even caught a smallmouth bass that bit a perch I already had on my crappie rig. I caught most of the junk fish on worms. It was a real fun couple of hours for the family :)
I want to also add anyone who fishes or boats on the Great Lakes please don't go out without at least a hand held ship to shore radio. On the way in last night I was flagged down by a boat with two guys a woman and an infant child. They were bobbing around the water for SEVEN hours after there boat broke down, unable to get help. I towed them just past Swan Creek boat club to there launch. I told them instead of accepting money put it towards a hand held ship to shore radio. I don't even want to thik how long they would have been there I we were not fishing. We were the only boat in that are at tht time, right before dark too. So please, all you guys please carry some type of ship to shore. These people got lucky.

[walleyeman830]

All right Alex, I'll bet the daughter had a great time out there and that's what it's all about, hunt and fish with your kids so you don't have to hunt FOR them.... I knew you were a nice guy, it's a good thing you were in the area. The issue we talked about friday is on hold until this wed. my buddy went on a little hunting trip to Africa..........I'll call him when he returns.

[Fried Fillets]

ODA, you did the right thing. Hopefully, the bad experience and your wise words were enough of a wake up call so they do not make the same mistake again. I believe any boater on the Great Lakes should not leave port without a ship-to-shore, cell phone, flares and a GPS, not one of these but all. This may seem excessive to some, but it is always nice to have different methods of communictaion and back-up. You never know what type of conditions you may encounter on the big water!

[catchem79]

You are right about carring a ship to shore but make sure you get a good one. I bought one of those Hummin Bird ones at Cabela's It seems to work fine I can listen to all the chatter from the big boats. BUT, Last Friday the 6th I was out on Stoney Point took one drift from north to south, went to start up to move back north and the motor wouldn't start. It cranked fine but wouldn't turn over. Checked kill switch, checked fuel, changed plugs, still wouldn't start. Ended up being egnition problem. This motor was bought new in June still under warrentee. They ended up replacing wiring harness from the key back. Well back to my point. I called and called on two differant cannels on this radio with no reply. I even changed the batteries in the radio just to be sure I had full power. A couple of times I herd someone else calling for his buddy but he either couldn't hear me or didn't want to hear me. I have talked to people on it before. I went out of the Rasin river and the wind was blowing right to the mouth. I also have a bow mount and a transom mount electic trolling motors. Even using both trolling motors and the wind it took 2 1/2 hours to get into mouth of river finally I was able to get a tow almost back to the launch by a guy who was coming in. I bought the hand held radio so I wouldn't have to hook something else to a battery but I am now saving money for a dash mount. Was I doing something wrong or is the hummin brid radio just not powrfull enough? The guy at Cabela's said it should work up to 2 to 4 mile at least.

[Homer]

On the flip side of your story, I took my elderly father out for some perch fishing this morning off of Stony Point. It's not too often that Erie is calm enough to take him out, plus we usually launch before the crack of dawn, and he can't handle that any more. We launched at 8:00, were off the water when it started to get hot at 11:30, and had calm seas and real good fishing while we were out there. It feels good to pay him back after all of the times he took me out as a kid.

One amazing thing was that were no other fishing boats for as far as we could see on a perfect weekend morning.

[Fried Fillets]

Catchem, I have been told a general rule to go by is 1 watt per mile, but I believe that's a little exaggerated. I just bought a ship-to-shore this spring and debated over a hand held vs. a dash mount with the 6' or 8' antenna. The hand helds I priced were virtually the same amount of money as a dash mount. My decision was simple, why would I buy something of equal value that would only transmit 20% as far as the other. I have learned in boating, after several mistakes, it's better to have a little extra than not enough.

[kroppe]

The boating regs are pretty clear about distress signals for the great lakes. Visible signals (flare, orange flag, flashlight) and audible signals (air horn, whistle), as well as navigation and achorage lights are all mandatory equipment. I would be skeptical that if they were using the mandatory visible distress signals that another boat would not have come by a lot sooner than 7 hours. Plus, with a whistle, each person could take turns blowing on it for quite a long time, in order to attract someone.