A New Member of the Family

Last week saw the addition of a new occupant for about 100 square feet of my pole shed.  She was a little rough and had not seen any tender loving care for a few years but underneath the dirt, cobwebs, and bird droppings was something special.  My late brother-in-law enjoyed fishing the Mississippi River out of Trempealeau Wisconsin and what better rig than a simple Jon boat.  Never one to travel far a 15 hp motor was more than enough to get him across the river for some good old sheepshead fishing.  Living next to the Mississippi River 160 miles north of Trempealeau, the boat would be a perfect craft for chasing Smallmouth Bass in the shallow and rocky section north of Minneapolis. Discussing the purchase with his wife Susy, we agreed on a price and I pulled it out of the old cattle shed.   After re-inflating the tires, fixing the lights, and finding an 1 7/8 inch ball, I got home in one piece.  A 14 foot square front Alumacraft with a 1976 Evinrude short shaft outboard, she needed a good cleaning, a new propeller, the trailer was begging to be repainted and have it's rollers replaced.   Having repacked the bearings by Saturday afternoon it was off to the neighbors river landing for her maiden voyage and a try at some smallies.

Having never been on this stretch of the Mississippi River in a boat there was a concern about the overall water depth.  The river is fairly high for this time of year but without a depth finder, it was a visual guess.  I was looking for a transducer to mount on the back and use my ice fishing flasher, an FL20 for the open water.  Deciding to take it with and hang the transducer off the side for a quick reference, there was a chance that this would be good enough.  Well that didn't work very well so I brought the transducer back in the boat.  As the boat came on plane I put the face of the transducer squarely on the aluminum floor with some water between then and voila, the bottom showed up on the flasher.  This proved to be a perfect solution giving me a great read of the river depth.  Traveling up 8 miles thru 2 known rapids I began the drift back fishing with a shallow fire tiger Bomber Model A.  The first cast into the riffle area produced a 14 inch smallie, life is good.  With the river high the boat drifted a good 100 feet before the fish was secured and released.  Motoring back to the starting point the next drift produced another 14 incher.  The 3rd drift resulted in a small northern pike.  Realizing there was a lot of water to cover it was off to the next spot, a deeper outside bend in the river.  A couple of cast later and a nice 17 inch smallie was on the line.  Man do these river fish fight!  I had my camera with but with no one there to record the fish, it was up to me.  Here is my attempt of a self portrait, not great but you get the idea.  The trip ended with a better understanding of the Mississippi from Dayton proper to Anoka and the lure of getting back to try it again.  I continue to add a few things to the boat like a permanent transducer, a Rock Hopper (a lower unit device for protecting the propeller from the bottom), and a trolling motor.  I love being a river rat again.

Last Sunday was Mille Lacs time with my friend Tom Emmons.  Lead lining was the goal with a stop at my favorite reef at sunset to round out the trip.  Arriving about 3:00 we headed to the north gravel bars and put out a couple of lines with the new hot bait, a Salmo #4F Hornet.  A smaller bait, I was skeptical however we did get a couple of keeper walleyes and a perch.  Sunset prompted us to abandon the lead and head for the 4 foot reef top.  The wind was perfect for my drift/casting technique which resulted in another 3 walleyes for the live well.  Leaving around 9:00 we had 5 in the box plus 2 nice perch, good enough for  meal but nothing large enough to take a picture of.  The one picture I did take of Tom's trophy rock he caught was done without a memory card in the camera..........oh well, it was pretty funny.  Hopefully I get back on the river this Sunday and try all the new crankbaits I bought.