Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: MONDAY, July 26, 1993 TAG: 9307260323
SECTION: SPORTS PAGE: B6 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: BILL COCHRAN OUTDOOR EDITOR
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
It has a bow-mounted electric motor, but it's not quite a bass boat. The controls are in the center, yet it lacks the rails and high windshield associated with a center-console craft.
Printed on the side is a clue: Hydra-Sports 1650 CC Key Largo, a name that conjures images of tailing bonefish on a picture-postcard flat in the Florida Keys.
It is a 16-foot flats boat, designed to reach the shallow water haunts of bonefish, tarpon and permit. So what is Pendleton, who lives in Vinton, doing with one in mountain country where water depths of 100 feet or more aren't uncommon?
Pendleton wanted a boat that would work well when fishing for bass and stripers at Smith Mountain Lake or trout at Moomaw Lake, yet one he could trailer several times a year to the coast to go after gray trout and flounder along the Eastern Shore.
"You can catch more fish down there in a week than you can catch up here all summer," he said.
A bass boat can be used on sheltered saltwater, but Pendleton had a friend who took a Ranger to the Chesapeake Bay Bridge-Tunnel several times and the salt ate the fenders off his trailer and corroded the craft's hardware and switches. The fancy carpet got matted with slime and blood.
Like other freshwater-saltwater fishermen, Pendleton tried a standard center console craft - he has owned two. They worked well on saltwater, but on a mountain lake he found that the breezes tended to catch their high profile and the windshield would act as a sail.
"The wind would just catch them and spin them in a second," he said. "You would just constantly stay on the trolling motor. You couldn't even anchor and crappie fish real good."
So Pendleton began taking a serious look at flats boats. He liked what he saw, a tough fishing boat with a low profile and beam enough to offer gobs of uncluttered room for storage and fighting a fish. The fact that it would float in less than 10 inches of water yet shoulder the harsh demands of open-water operation was a big sell. In June, he bought a Hydra-Sports.
Flats boats have become one of the fastest growing segments of the boating industry. They aren't just manufactured by builders who cater to the saltwater business, like Mako and Aquasport. Several bass boat companies have joined the race. Ranger has a 184 Flats model; Stratos a CC Flats model.
Hydra-Sports, a Murfreesboro, Tenn., boat builder that is part of the OMC family, came out with its 1650 model earlier this year.
"The reception has been tremendous," said Mark Thomas, director of marketing for OMC Fishing Boat Group, Inc.
So good, in fact, that its first offering has been followed with a 19-foot model.
"There are a lot of fishermen going from freshwater to saltwater," Thomas said. "There is less fishing pressure, bigger fish and more opportunities for seclusion."
Also, the Hydra-Sports Key Largo, as well as other flats boats, caters to the growing interest in fly fishing. Spacious bow and stern decks offer plenty of room for working a big rod, and there is a minimum of hardware to snag your line. Even the cleats pop up out of the deck and the anchor locker is recessed.
As for use on freshwater, the Hydra-Sports will do everything a bass boat does, except go at "hot dog" speeds, said Thomas.
Pendleton gets about 45 mph out of the 90-hp Johnson on his boat. "I think that's plenty."
He is pleased with its dry, rough-water ride, after working it in some serious chop during an Eastern Shore trip.
A couple inches of draft were sacrificed to get that ride, Thomas said.
The boat has a 16-foot-4-inch frame and a 6-foot-10-inch beam. It weighs 975 pounds and is rated for a maximum of 115 hp. There are two fish boxes, and a 25-gallon baitwell that Pendleton believes is ideal for the live bait angler, especially those who go after stripers with shad.
As for drawbacks, the craft isn't exactly ideal for family cruising.
"My wife doesn't like the fact that the seats don't have backs to them," said Pendleton.
The backs aren't there because they'd just get in the way of a serious fishermen, he said.
by CNB