This month, it’s all about boats and motors. With this in mind, let me tell you about my life as a boat owner. I have owned Dusky boats since 1981. Back then live wells were a secondary issue. My 25 foot 6 inch Dusky had a deck hatch covering a 30 inch by 30 inch watertight compartment with 2 holes through the bottom for circulation as a live well. It would keep a dozen mullet or blue runners fairly well. Pilchards or herring were hopeless.
The boat, now known as a Dusky 276 was and still is a fantastic center console or Fish around cuddly cabin fishing machine. They now offer transom wells and several seat/ live well combos.
Today I still run a Dusky boat. But, it is 33 feet long with a 10 foot 8 inch beam and a stepped hull allowing a very sharp entry, but a relatively flat stern. This combination gives you the ability to charge through rough seas, but not rock your brains out drifting in a beam sea.
I now have a huge transom well and round seat well. They are supplied water by a Hooker pump. One pump can supply both wells, but we have a back up in case we suck up a plastic bag and lose water supply to one of the pumps.
We have gone from the 4 rod holders in the first boat to 20 rod holders today.
We have gone from a radio as the only electronic to VHF radio and two 17inch Simrad screens providing chirp sonar to over 3000 feet, side scanning to search out wrecks and fish out both sides of the boat, radar, Sirius radio, GPS and chart plotter and Nite Track night vision.
For power we started out in 1961 with a 40 horse tiller pull start Evinrude. We had a 235 hp Evinrude on my first Dusky. We have tried several different power options on the 33 Dusky to help the Brown family learn what would be the best choice for different clients. For me nothing can beat the Evinrude Etec G2 300s. With these twins we cruise at 35 and top out at 45. If Abie took some lead and castnets off the boat we could do well over 50. We get 30% better fuel mileage than ever with these engines.
The fish don’t stand a chance. Come join us for some boat testing and fish catching by calling or texting 305-439-2475.
Capt. Bouncer
CaptBouncer@bellsouth.net
(305) 439-2475
