Rick, looks like I have my bait buddy for the winter!!! Lol

Great thread guys! Well written info rick!!!

Great info Rick!

So the conversation last night...

Me, " I have to get a new TM before winter..."
Wife, " you already have one?"
Me, " yea but it's old and don't work real good anymore.."
Her, " WTH will it cost!?"
Me, " the one I like?, about $1000."
Her, " seriously?"
Me, " sounds bad but I'll have it for a long time, helps when drifting, finding bait, pulling anchors," blah, blah
Her, " you do all that when we fish and all without using the trolling motor..."
Me, " you don't understand"
Her, " I guess I don't." Then she walked off....

So looks like I'm good, she didn't say no!!!..

You always anchor, all year?

yep, I always locate fish and then fish... i've alwAys thought that drifting was kind of a dumb way to fish after I'd figured out how to locate and catch fish due to the environment and weather conditions giving me a place to start looking. I just wrote and deleted a big ole long book almost and deleted it all thinking ... what are you doing Tiny???? I guess it's too early in the morning for me hahaha. but anyhow,,, drift fishing won't work here as our fish population here isn't but maybe .10 of what ya'll got down there. Possibly even less than that so you gotta know where the fish are. Can't just take off drifting and hope you'll run into some up here because you won't run into anything.

how do you decide whether it's catfish you're seeing of if it's scaley fish ... like if you're looking at lumber below the surface how do you know they're catfish and not scaley fish? What kind of numbers are you talking about that you catch in the deep water now... we talkin dinks or big fish or what? If you're stopping where you see lots of fish ... like hundreds on a submerged tree and you catch 3 three lb'rs is that sufficient numbers or we talkin bout catching 20 fish about 10 lbs average. Just wondering about your terms of success when you're fishing deep and what do you expect is a good haul because if it's not a regular catch of 20 to 30 lb fish and you're fishing a lake like tawakoni then you're doing it wrong or even backwards because the old wives tale that fish are deep in the summer because it's cooler is totally backwards to what actually takes place up here in OK because fish are going to seek out the most oxygenated water this time of year as I think and have seen that fish can't metabolize their food if the oxygen levels aren't fairly high. Seen that on discovery channel. This also holds true when I find active fish in the summer months because that's my main concern is to find an oxygen source whether it's a running creek or windy shallows or whatever and there aren't' too many other whatever type situations that there can be. For instance if you were to take and build a man made oxygenation source in a lake right now there would be hundreds of fish to take advantage of the higher oxygen levels from bait fish to big fish ... they'd all come a runnin. also if you haven't done so yet then you should drop fish down with a fishing pole ... both scaley and skinned fish with a weight on the end of the line .. a heavy weight and see what your fish finder looks like when you're looking at the fish on your line ... easy enough to do also ... just get you a weight of a lb or more that'll attach to your line then tie the fish above it and drop it down so your transducer can pick it up ... you'll see it as a long line because if it stays under the transducer andyou don't pass over it it won't' look like an arch but pay attention to the difference between catfish and scaley and there should be a difference unless you're using a color humminbird ... color lowrance will be a lot different in the two and that'll help you out a lot if you can tell the difference between them