The Schmidt Family would like to take this time and wish everyone on the TFF a very Merry Christmas.

As some already knew I have been fighting a nasty bug for 3 weeks. Ended with an Ear Infection.

Finally, on the mend.

Dad and I along with many others were blessed enough to be able to hit the water on a zero wind day yesterday.

We chose Fork and I know we drove right by Tommy Ezell when I watched his videos. If we had known it was him we would have stopped and said hello. Awesome Videos.

We managed to fill the Livewell yesterday with a few HOGS. See them on the bottom of the table picture.

Even when you have to keep everything you catch I thought we had some nice quality fish at the end of the day on Fork.

After watching the Tommy Ezell videos and looking at his HOGS he definitely won the better fish collection of the day contest.

Dad managed to catch one of those HOGS off a bridge pylon. Bridges were pretty vacant though.

Timber, the Tire Reef, and Points with ledges were the better producers. Bite was slow until 10am. Then it was steady until about 3pm then they shut off. Tommy Ezell mentioned the fish nipping the baits. There was a lot of that yesterday.

It was a great day to be on the water.

I got some early morning pics with the Sun coming up.
One with the Fog that made it look like the water was on fire. Cool picture.

Did anyone feel the rumble yesterday?
No worries, it was just ACC and Bonehead hitting the water at Fork.



The end of the day we blew a Hub.

It was bad. We have extra Hubs in the Truck. Roadside Assistance refused to help us with changing the hub.
We ordered a Flatbed wrecker and due to some incompetence it took us 5 hours before a wrecker showed up.
Got the boat to the house. Went over this morning and cleaned fish. Then went to change the hub.
Should have been no big issue. The Axel is completely jacked.
We are out of commission.

We have to order a new Axel. Found a guy that is going to come replace the axle once we get the part.
Hopefully, we will be up and running within a week.

We check the grease before every trip. We check the hubs on every stop.
Three hubs in 6 months. The Axle in my opinion is a huge part of our issue.
We are all over it.

It was obviously our turn in the aw shucks barrel of fun that comes with life's daily adventures.

Still an awesome day despite the hub trouble.

I was lucky enough to spend some great quality time with my Dad.

Hope you enjoy the Pics. Thank you for letting me share.

Wishing everyone Tight Lines and Safe Travels.

First picture reminds me of William Shatner for some reason,..

That is definitely the "CAPTAIN CHAIR" with all the comforts for Crappie Catching at Arms Length.

you catch all them at the bridge,..which one..?

Um, I must have one of those chairs ....

You two are wearing the crappie out! Awesome job! Have a merry Christmas guys!
PS- I think your on the right track by changing out the axle. Especially if all your bad hubs have been on the same side. Good luck!

Nope. We only caught 6 off the bridge.

We fished the 2946, the 514, the Big 515, the small 515, and the 154.

It was one of those.

BPS5168:

https://www.pontoonstuff.com/produc...u0_bP5gIVUvDACh11BAOyEAQYASABEgLWV_D_BwE

Good stuff on the fishing, not so much on the hub.

Merry Christmas to you and your family.

>E

Nice Haul HOGON

Nice pics of the sunrise. Been there done that with the hub.
Great catches.
Merry Christmas

Awesome report and pics!

Merry Christmas!

Looks like a great time...glad you got to have another day on the lake with dad.

Those Bearing Buddy's are way over rated IMO. They actually lead to more blown seals from overfilling than anything else. A properly maintained hub and good seal won't let you down. Letting hubs cool down before launching will eliminate water being pulled into the hub. They usually cool in the time it takes you to get ready to launch. Definitely time to replace the axle as its tearing the new seal up each time its replaced. Sometimes, you can use some emory cloth on the axle seals surface and clean them up enough, but its a [censored] shoot.

Get'r fixed up and get back out on the lake!!

Merry Christmas!!

Outstanding!

Sorry for your boat troubles, part of the game though. Good job on the Crappie and awesome on the time spent with pops!