Any old tubers around?
 

The other day I was getting my camping gear together, looking for my two burner stove and I went through some old boxes from may parents house. In one of them I came across my old float tube I used to fish back in Texas as a teen.

I bought it when I was maybe sixteen in 1976, for fishing stripers in below lake Grandburry on the Brazos.

http://img215.imageshack.us/img215/5719/grandbury.jpg
When the water was high they'd open the big gates. The strippers would congregate in the eddies between them, feeding on shad that washed through the gates then got caught in the back current. I'd put on some cutoffs, hike in with the float tube (no roads in there), put on some fins and go right went right out into the whitewater. Different age. It was legal back then, the only rule was you could not climb on the dam structures itself. So I'd go right out in the thick of it, fishing the eddies in between the running gates created by the flow on each side.

Lot's of turbulence, lots of shad out there, lots of big stripers, lots of fun, I remember it like it was yesterday. At the time, people thought I was absolutely insane, if my parents had seen me do it they probably would of had a fit but they didn't know, the fishing was incredible, I was the only guy doing it, and I had a blast.

I honestly have not been in a tube since maybe 1980, or seen even inflated this one, pretty much just forgot about it, until I found it recently.

I started looking at it closely and it's in great shape. Then did some research and it turns out I have a piece of float tube history.

"1940, a company surfaced called the Tucker Duck & Rubber Company. They were a small commercial tube manufacture out of Fort Smith, Arkansas. They started to produce the first inflatable float tube known as the ‘Fish-N-Float’...

http://www.flyangler.ca/images/stori...sh-n-float.jpg

These boats were very heavy when wet and the seams would fall apart fairly rapidly but even so, the Fish-N-Float was a success...

In 1947 a new company appeared on the scene out of Oklahoma City. The Fishmaster MFG. Company offered a new quick connect seat release and gave the Fish-N-Float some stiff competition. The Fishmaster Mfg. Company became a major float tube supplier offering more and more models over the next few years."



So it's a vintage Fishmaster, the second company to ever make production fishing tubes, and the model I have was pretty much unchanged from their originals from the forties.. Evidently these tubes are well known for lasting the test of time. Here's some old timers talking about them back in Texas:

http://texasfishingforum.com/forums/...Number/2014538

"I love may Fishmaster tubes. I have one that is 40+ years old as well as a newer nylon. They are the best. "

"I love mine as well. Mines 20 yrs old. Still works great...They're almost indestructible."

I found a website for floattube history http://www.greenhobbymodel.com/float...e_history.html it says the fishmasters were "the" premier tubes of the fifites sixties and seventies, it links to this tube in their 70s section of their timeline.

http://www.greenhobbymodel.com/float...r-in-brush.jpg

That looks like he's fishing Toledo Bend, and I have that exact same early seventies model tube.

So here it is right out of storage box I had it in and inflated for the first time tonight in 30 years:

http://img826.imageshack.us/img826/7186/76float1.jpg
http://img826.imageshack.us/img826/2581/76float2.jpg
http://img826.imageshack.us/img826/4914/76float3.jpg
http://img826.imageshack.us/img826/319/76fishmaste5.jpg
http://img836.imageshack.us/img836/6...fismaster6.jpg

Patented quick connect seat release and all. :D

Basically it's still absolutely perfect 35 years later. I figured it might just fall apart when I put air in it but it's just as I remembered it. They sure built them to last back then.

Like I said I used to fish this thing all the time in the summers in Texas when I was a teenager. I swear running my hands across it for the first time in 30 years almost gave me a woody. It is so evocative, I remember the feel of it so well. It's like running my hand on my first girlfriends thigh again after all this time. Now I'm definitely going to have to buy some fins and take it out fishing. I'm thinking possibly Castiac Lagoon, but am open to suggestions.

So the question I have is where should I fish it, but also what's the tube history out her in So.Cal. Did they even have float tubes here in California in the seventies?

Not only was I tubing 35 years ago (don't tell Baytubers) but I can now still fish the exact same tube I fished all those years ago. Too Fn Cool.

Jim.

Thats the coolest shit Ive ever seen.

I use my tube more than the yak...it's damn easy to get in and out. You can go places where the shore guys, yaks and boaters can't...they don't drift as fast as the yak too so when it's a bit windy you've got the tube as an option. SD River in and out of the tules can be a killer. Same with the lakes. Same types of options in the bays...fish where others can't access.

Wow, old school tube, museum worthy!

Can't say that I ever fished any water like the one Jim described but I still have two tubes stored in my garage. Most of my memories come from fly fishing private ponds or Sierra lakes. They are very good memories.

When I bought my kayak a couple years ago, it opened up a whole new range of "big water" fishing opportunities. Personally, I prefer the freedom to go just about anywhere which a kayak provides. Somehow, I just can't imagine trolling across the LJ Canyon while sitting in a float tube with my legs hanging down, dressed up like a tasty seal.

Bob

I hear that Bob. Whitewater I can handle, salt would freak me out.... :D




Jim

That's pretty darn cool! I hope in thirty years I'll be pulling my Caddis out of the attic and recollecting on it! To this date my largest large mouth bass came off my float tube... just over the double digit mark!
I've actually been considering getting my parents to ship my waders, and float tube to me here in Waco, so that I could do some more bass fishing here on the Brazos! With the river right next to campus, its pretty tempting!

You know what get's me is it doesn't weigh anything. especially compared to my kayaks. I'd forgotten about that part. I bet could hike a mile with this thing on my shoulder. I'm also thinking I could deflate it then carry it on my motorcycle to some remote areas.

Jim

Great read
 

Your story sure brought a smile to my face. Extreme float tubing, by yourself, and scoring. Funny, I bought a surf kayak and a float tube to fish south SD bay about the same time. Took me about 6 months to try fishing off the yak (duh). But I still use my float tube fairly often. I usually hit J street in the afternoon after work. If it's very windy, I kitesurf. If it's glass (rare in the afternoon), I'll do some drifts in my small yak. If it's in between (too windy to hassle with the yak but not powered up enough to kite, which is sadly often the case) then I'll use the float tube, sometimes even with with my kayak drift chute. There's plenty of fish a short kick from shore at J street, usually nothing huge, but a good variety and lots of fun catching bonefish on ultralight gear. Still don't quite know what I'll do if I catch a large, pissed off halibut in my tube, but I look forward to having that dilemma. Thanks for sharing.

Hey Jim, Don't worry about the toothy creatures down below, they are not biting tubers, they are on a kayaker bite lately :)

Your comments about the tube being easy and light sure hit home as I am lugging my 150 pounds of kayak gear through the sand. In a tube I used to have one walmart rod and a plastic box of weights and hooks.

I fished the Seal Beach area a lot by Long Beach inside of the break wall. Lots of fish there, easy in and out, parking, etc.

I am mostly kayaking now, have some nice float tube fins that you can use for a while, save a buck. Matt

is that an M1A1 float tube, WWII surplus :D

I'll take you up on that. I'm near LAX. Do you fish local at all.... MDR Redondo Esco Castiac etc???? Just trying to figure out where we could meet.

Jim

Yep..
http://img829.imageshack.us/img829/50/tubewarrior.jpg

Wow!!! I told you its museum worthy!!!

It's just a photoshop :D My tube and a Life magazine photo from Bastone. It does look WWII vitage though no doubt.

Jim

:D...