Exactly how good does a MM work in thick green cattail and tule?

I have some areas that I would like to hunt but the cattail/tule constantly winds up around my prop shaft. Water depth is not a problem but having the cattail/tule wrap around the prop is.

Anybody run in thick cattail/tule with MM on a regular basis.

Any videos?

Some of the areas I hunt are so thick that I've been able to push down tule and walk on them and not even touch the water. I'm going to be thinning them out for the boat with a cutter but it sure would be nice to just run over them.


Thanks

Tules are no match for a mud motor. My 50hp honda would get tules wrapped around the prop and could barely push me far enough into a patch to hide the boat. Now I can run through them and it feels like I'm in open water.

If the tules are, as you say, so thick you could push them down and walk on them without touching water your boat hull is going to end up on top of them and you will be stuck...mud motor or not. You can't push a boat with that much friction holding the hull, whether the prop is in a small hole in the water or not.

Cutting through tules with water between them...depends on how thick they are.

x2- If your hull is on top of a mat of anything (high and dry), 9x out of 10 you are stuck. The hull you pick will be a big part of your success in this terrain. But if the area is as choked out as you described, I would be thinking about an air boat not a mud motor.

You will get the best performance on those thick mats out of a true slickbottom hull.

The only thing that has stopped mine is dry ground.....even then it keeps going a little ways.

The first time I went out with my mud motor at night during early teal, I thought I was unstoppable since I was coming from an outboard to a MM. Down here we have a lot of saw grass and cattails and I was just plowing through everything with no regard. Well, I learned real quick that I wasn't unstoppable. I hit an island of cattails at 30mph and went in so deep that I could walk on the cattails and they were so high that standing on top of the boat I couldn't see over them. I took me almost two hours to get the boat out and I was close to calling for help several times since it was almost impossible to get out since I had to literally jump in the water, flatten the cattails, then push the boat over 1 foot at a time until I got it turned around. Then even with the boat turned around, the MM was useless since it would get wrapped up immediately and stop running. I finally got my arm under the boat and cleared all the grass from under it, then reved the motor out and dumped the clutch and incredibly the boat got out on plane.

So regardless of what you have, you still need to run it with some caution if you want to avoid getting stuck.

Thanks for the replys. I might be rethinking how I'm going to access this area.

I'm still going to get a MM though.

Thanks for the replys. I might be rethinking how I'm going to access this area.

I'm still goung to get a MM though.

once you drive through the cat tails and switch grass you will "clear" the trail. I got stuck the other day running an airboat trail, took three passes getting stuck the first two to "clear" the trail of the clumpy veggies. It was not the standing stuff but the root balls that would bog me down. Its clear now except for a dry hump about halfway down the now 3/4 mile trail. The trail is very passable with a fun jump in the middle. Im gonna have to run the trail about once a month to keep it open and easily passable. Now we have to dig out dry ground for about 50 yrds to make it all the way to the pond, but the walk isnt bad, few spots entering the pond with bottomless mud but hey I can pull the kayak with decoys 50 yrds and then paddle!

Man that must be some honey hole to do all of that work! Congrats.