Merry Christmas

A Tree Full of Goodies

It just seems like a few days ago when we were in Naples fishing but I have been back to reality for 3 weeks now!  Christmas as well as this goofy weather has put a damper on ice fishing this start of the season.  With Christmas on Wednesday, it seems to break up the typical schedules as last Saturday I spent time with my family so that weekend was shot, and the weekend after Christmas was supposedly to be with my wife's family but now it's changed to New Years Day so there is some time to sneak up to Red on Thursday and try my luck.  This year I have been inundated with requests to join me as my usual first trip includes my brother Steve and friend Keith Holtan, however things are getting crunched and with little time to plan it looks like a full house this weekend.   My brother Steve lives in Onalaska, Wisconsin and the Gander Mountain store is closing there.  Like a good brother should he called me with some of the deals (up to 80% off) so I had him pick up a few rods, and he said there was a ton of the Northland Tackle Long Shanked Fireball Jigs there as few people use the Canadian style of baiting the jig with a minnow, and at $1.00 for 4, that is $3.00 cheaper than the usual $3.99 for 4.......pick up as many as you can!!!  Well, on Saturday he brought them with along with a few other nice lures hung nicely on a  small Christmas Tree, it was pretty nice.  There must be at least 20 packages of jigs, some traditional hair jigs and a few perfect sized crankbaits for trolling walleyes on Leech Lake this opener.  My plan is to take this to Lac Seul this year and sell the jig packs for $5.00 each and there are plenty of Gold plated ones which seem to be a favorite in Canada.  I am also now determined to try the white hair jig on the top and get a walleye as these were the preferred jig pattern 50 years ago, I know as I used to tie our own for the walleyes in Catfish Slough up from Alma on the Mississippi River.  Actually I caught a keeper grouper on a white haired jig in Naples so I am excited to try it.  The early Christmas was the first time my family got together since my mother died in 2017, it was nice to get together as none of us are getting any younger.

Jerry and 2 nice walleyes from Mille Lacs

So it's exciting to finally get the wheel house out on the ice as Red Lake is reporting a good 17 - 18 inches of ice extending out at least 10 miles from the landing.  Mille Lacs has been in quite a predicament this year regarding ice.  Yes, we did get a nice below zero cold snap right after deer hunting which normally puts a good layer of ice, which it did on Mille Lacs however we got 2 significant snowstorms right after the cold which dumped almost 16 inches in the area.  That much weight on the ice causes the water to seep up through the cracks and flooding the top of the ice, which combined with the snow makes slush.  Also the snow insulates the ice from the freezing temperatures and further delays the ice forming.  Along with the warm weather we have experience in the last week, there is a lot of variance in the thickness of the ice on Mille Lacs from 2 inches to 8 inches, but it's hard to tell how thick the ice is over the layer of snow so venture at your own risk.  On Monday night we had 2 great things happen, first it was Jerry Kiffmeyer's annual Christmas fish fry.  Jerry fished with me in my boat last September at Lac Seul.  He is a great guy and happened to be in Naples fishing the weekend before I was there.  His fish fry included most of the fish he brought back, snapper and grouper.  I am allergic to wheat and need a corned based fish coating but by the time I got there all the fish had been breaded already........but wait, here came Jerry with some grouper fillets, perfect as they coated them first with my stuff and fried them up.  Absolutely delicious.  Jerry showed me his catch on Mille Lacs a couple of days ago when they dragged out their light weight shack with the snowmobiles, pretty nice.  It looks like a couple of keepers which have to be between 21 and 23 inches.  Jerry says that he was using my method of posing with fish as they do look bigger!  Hopefully I can post next week with a good report and some nice fish.  I am already planning for our Lake of the Woods trip for January 9th.  And by the way, the Ranger is still in the shop!  I did volunteer to work for Frankie at the Northwest Sportshow this year and he was happy as it is in the first of April, probably one of the worst times as boats are coming in and it is really busy.  It will be a fun time for sure!

Long Lake In Wisconsin and Lac Seul, part 2 (that should be enough!)

George with a nice walleye

So while the boat was still wet from Lac Seul, I had the chance to fish with a couple of my favorite people, Andrew Rombalski, my wife's uncle, Jason Rombalski, her cousin, and George Wimmer, their in law and a friend of mine.  Jason's wife's parents have a cabin on the channel between Birch Lake and Lake Chetac, in Birchwood, Wisconsin, just Northeast of Rice Lake, Wisconsin.  We usually try and get a fall trip in each year looking for some nice crappies or a walleye or two.  Just west of them is Long Lake, a larger lake in the area known for it's walleyes.  Because of previous commitments the plan was to join them at the landing on Long Lake around 3 in the afternoon on Saturday, fish for the day, then stop and have supper at a Supper Club on the lake.  Wisconsin is famous for their rural or lakeside restaurants that are referred to as Supper Clubs.  Dinner in Wisconsin was always at noon!  We had fished that lake a few time however the forecast of the rain stopping by noon did not materialize and at 3 it was still drizzling.  We launched anyway and headed south to a few areas that we had been before.  While looking at the lake map on my preloaded maps on the Lowrance HDS, there was a spot marked:  Fall walleyes can be found along the drop off fishing with live bait rigs or jigs and minnows.  It wasn't that far away and with such an understanding audience in the boat we approached the region where I began marking fish immediately.  With the Motorguide in deployed and in anchor mode we started jogging around the area looking for fish.  Once on a pod of fish Jason pulled out a #7 Jigging Rap, a popular ice fishing bait however it is becoming popular using the lure as an open water jig and within 2 minutes he had a nice 16 inch walleye, however with the minimum length of 18 back in the water it went without even getting a picture!  All of a sudden we were on the fish as George catches a nice 17 incher.  I did get him to pose for this nice example of how our late afternoon was going.  In less than 2 hours we landed 10 walleyes and a nice 16 inch smallie that took my Jigging Rap. It was a significant improvement

Andy's nice 19 inch Smallie

over the last couple of times we fished Long Lake so it was decided that on Sunday we would hope to repeat the same as Saturday.  It really didn't stop raining till we left as we stopped by the Reel Em Inn Supper Club on the west side of the lake, just down from the boat landing.  There we enjoyed a few cocktails and ordered the Saturday night special, a 16 ounce prime rib with all the fixings.  It was very relaxing with the locals enjoying supper and us 4 patting ourselves on the back for having a quite successful couple of hours of fishing.  George went back to his cabin in Chetek, Wisconsin to attend to his dogs while the rest of us heading back to Jason's in laws house on the lake.  After a couple of glasses of fine whiskey, including a nice 21 year old scotch, we got up in the morning to have breakfast and head back out again.  Not knowing if George would rejoin us that question was answered the minute we pulled in the landing, yes he was there!  Of course we headed back to the scene of yesterdays success however the sky's turn a beautiful blue as the front went by a few hours earlier.  Not that we minded but you know what happens right after a cold front moves through.  Well it still wasn't that bad of fishing as we did get a couple of walleyes and Andy landed this very nice 19 inch smallmouth fishing a small sucker minnow.  We were marking a school of suspended crappies on the screen but wasn't very successful to see exactly what was stacked up in 25 feet of water (It was crappies, I know it!).  Never the less we did get a few more hits then decided to look for other identical looking area on the lake to expand our outlook on fish location.  We we should have just stayed were we were!  Never the less it was nice to fish with these guys and I hope that we may be able to get out ice fishing on that lake this year.

Jerry and his giant 16 inch walleye!

So finishing up the Lac Seul trip was pretty exciting.  Our favorite spot on the lake was Craig's Corner, named after a friend, Craig Biegert who fished with us a few years back. Sort of a nice place close to camp that always seems to have fish on it, it is now our go to spot if we need to fill out for the day, or for the trip if needed.  With 4 guys in the boat including Barry, Jerry, Ricky and myself, it was a good place to stay organized and catch fish.  Jerry had a 500 series spinning reel on a nice St. Croix Avid, sort of like walking around in a tuxedo with old dirty tennis shoes on!  At least it was something to give him some harmless ribbing.  Jerry did get some nice fish and I did get some pictures but not before correcting him on the proper way to display a fish for the camera.  Of course his response was...Do you think I am stupid?...Well here.  So this is a nice 16 inch walleye that is presented in the correct way for a photograph and he does deserve some credit.  The hand hidden to take away any reference for size, hide you arm holing the fish with the fish, and stick it out as far as you can.  Of course this fish looks a lot bigger than it is, in fact Jerry looks puny compared to this gigantic fish!  Never the less it is a great example of the fun we had in my boat with these 3 guys. Looking back we didn't kill them but our daily catch was acceptable with 60 - 70 walleyes a day in the boat.  My biggest mistake was to try and teach them how to tie a improved clinch knot ti tie the jigs onto the line.  Making it look super easy it resulted in me tying most of their jigs onto their lines, I guess it's nice to be thought of as useful.  All in all it was a great trip, having fun with my friends from Eleva including my brother Steve, and friends Kevin and Paul.  It was also nice to be able to show Jerry and Ricky a good time as this was their first time to Lac Seul.  We are already discussing next year!

With snow in the forecast it's probably time to put the boat away for the winter as my wheel house is scheduled to get the roof and door leak fixed as well as some electrical issues.  Hopefully next week will find myself with Bill Lundeen fishing our secret trout lake!  He sent me a picture of a dandy he got a couple of days ago.