Native water sports?

[How shallow can you really go (in actual use) with the mirage drive and not worry about it jamming up with weeds, etc??

With my fat behind (270) weighing it down the Adventure with the fins laid up on the hull needs about 6" of water. By short stroking (leaving the pedals at their maximums (one fully forward and one fully back) and moving them a few inches back and forth) I can maintain a good headway (maybe 2-2.5 knots).

That said, make sure you understand that when Yak monkey said  "fold up against the hull" he meant that they lay flat to each side against the hull at the extents of the stroke, Don't mistake that for folding back from going forward like a dagger board or something. If you hit the drive on the bottom while your moving forward, you can do real damage to the drive (do you really need to ask? )

I can see a couple of situations where having instantaneous forward and reverse would be handy.

• Back trolling on a big river with plugs, it would be easy to maintain the proper thumping action.
• Straight line jigging for walleyes on a big river, like the Columbia

That said, I'd prefer a self-bailing boat with scuppers.

I agree it could be advantageous. The problem is when you pedal backwards the rudder is then in front of the craft and steering is really inefficient. I flipped my mirage drive around to see how it performed and I was frustrated in seconds. It may be able to work in very clam waters at a really slow pace but I can't see it doing much more.

Z

My Revo will do "short stroke" pedal in 8 to 9 inches of water.  but when it gets that shallow, I break out the paddle and pull up the drive--not in that order, tho!!

My Revo will do "short stroke" pedal in 8 to 9 inches of water.  but when it gets that shallow, I break out the paddle and pull up the drive--not in that order, tho!!

yeah, I'm probably underestimating at 6".   
8"or 9" is a better number, but definitely less than a foot. This is where the fishfinder is useful as well. It tells me that the bottom is coming up. When the FF reads 3'- 2', I pull out the secondary depthfinder (a stakeout pole aka ski pole) and  start using short strokes. When that gets to about 8" or 9", I'll unclip the paddle.