4th of July Rememberance

My Good Friend, The Late Tom Emmons

My apologies however this 4th of July has got me missing my good friend Tom Emmons as this was our traditional fishing day, we usually went out every 4th of July to Mille Lacs for the day and sometimes we'd stay till dark to watch the Garrison Fireworks from the boat.  I know that this is a repeat post but sometime keeping memories alive is more important!  Tom was the perfect friend, a big mass of a person that would give you his shirt off his back if he could.  He loved going to Mille Lacs with our friend Tom McAtee and myself, the 4th of July was always good for fishing the flats with crawlers and spinner rigs.  We always good some nice fish and as stated, it became a tradition anyway so the date was automatically put in our calendars.  Tom was a Viet Nam era veteran and although did not serve in Viet  Nam, he was a dog handler/guard in the Army and was in charge of guarding the USA's nerve gas stores in Okinawa.  Military life was not too bad for Tom however it did change him for the rest of his life, unfortunately.  In the end Tom was dependent and despondent, and eventually ended his time on Earth way to early.  So I sat down on Tuesday wishing something that can never be again, Tom was going to show up tomorrow and we'd head out for our annual July 4th trip to Mille Lacs.  Instead the boat sat in the pole shed, waiting to hooked up and pulled somewhere.  I guess when you get something in your head what simply cannot be, it takes some of the wind out of your sails.  One can simply be lucky to have memories as none of us can change the past.  Anyway, to you Mr. Emmons, I miss you tremendously. 

So someone did some fishing this weekend as I still am getting caught up with my chores around the

Ben and His Son Jared.

house from being gone in Canada last month.  My good friend Kevin Aiona's son, Ben called me about Mille Lacs Lake.  The fish have really been biting and he wanted to go on up to try his luck.  Last year Ben bought a Ranger 618T with a 90 hp Merc tiller and after being in aluminum all his life, I know he's enjoying the advantages that fiberglass has on bigger water.  The fish Devils Lake alot however that is quite a ways for them, so Ben, his wife Heather, and their son Jared ended up at Eddy's resort.  They stopped by my work on the way up as I gave him my detailed map chip for his Lowrance, as well my prop was a little bit dinged up from the trip to Wapesi last month, so I had him drop it off at Lundeen's to get fixed, he has a guy that picks them up and does a nice job for quite a bit less than the prop shops in the cities charge.  I gave all of my hot spots to Ben however his complaint was they were only getting smaller fish, the 15 - 20 inch walleyes (The enormous 2013 year class).  Despite my advice, they were not getting any larger fish.  Finally on Monday and after it rained, Ben Figured it out.  He is a dang good fisherman and can generally figure out where the fish are.  Not being a regular, I applaud him for finally finding some better fish up to 28 inches. 

My plans are to head to the lake on Sunday and fish with Greg and his son Marcus.  It will be my first trip to Mille Lacs this year, hardly believable yet with 3 days of fishing on Leech then another 6 at Lac Seul this year, I have gotten my normal time of fishing in however they tend to be concentrated more.  Admittedly my boat control techniques with the wheel boat still need some refining but as they say, practice makes perfect!

Knocking at the Door

Waking up to snow!

Well, I wook up this morning to a fresh layer of snow, the first accumulations of the year.  As I stated last week, in 1991 we had 31 inches by the time it ended on November 1st, so this morning's 2 inches on the ground is pretty uneventful in the grand scheme of things.  It does represent the progression of winter and early snow hopefully means early ice, as I am anxious to get out.  One thing that is different this year is that even after a week, the leaves are stubbornly still on the trees.  I did get out on Saturday to put my tree stand up for this weekend.  We are still hunting on Rich Allen's place near my friend Jack's cabin, west of Onamia, MN.  Rich passed away a number of years ago and we sure do miss him.  Our tradition is to serve a steak dinner at his place on Friday night, a time now dedicated to reflect on our friend, his generosity, and how he enjoyed life.  You can be sure there will be a few toasts to Rich, a few stories, some deer hunting strategies discussed, and the general camaraderie I enjoy so much.  I'm not sure we'll solve anything but it is certain to be a good time.  Hopefully that big buck will walk by my stand, if it doesn't well, no big deal!

 

Record of jig fishing off 7 mile Flat

Digging around the office I ran across an old section of graph paper from my Lowrance X15B.  A state of the art fishing tool, it had a stylet on a belt that would pass across thermally sensitive paper and burn the image of what was under the boat via the transducer.  A precursor to today's super sharp color LCD/LED screens, it still provided images in detail that is still not available today, although admittedly they are pretty good!  The problem was that the thermal paper cost between $4 and $6 per roll, and if you ran it at the right speed, could last for over 6 hours.  Compared to what a dozen shiners cost, it really wasn't that much and gave a nice printed record of the days fishing.  I used to buy paper at a dozen rolls at a time and would probably go through 12 - 15 rolls a year as I never ran it while traveling from on spot to another.  The first picture is a shot of a jig I was working on the bottom off the edge of 7 Mile Flat in the middle of Mille Lacs Lake.  Graphs were super sensitive and you can see the jig fall almost from the surface to the bottom, watch it bounce off the bottom, and observe the fish come up and look at the jig as it rises off the bottom.  In the middle is a suspended fish, all of these were more than likely tulibee's as they inhabit the deep areas of the lake, just off the flats and throughout the deeper basin.  As a side note, I have never caught one during the summer yet if the water temperature gets over 75 one starts seeing them floating on the surface, a victim of the warmer water as Mille Lacs is about a south as their range goes.  On the other hand ice fishing can be very good because they are a cold water fish and seem to be quite active under the ice.

 

The day the wind came up.

The next picture is taken a few hours later as the wind abruptly came up and blew exceptionally hard.  Although I can never be sure, I believe this segment of the recorded events shows a wave that is 5 feet from peak to trough, the largest wave that I have ever experienced at Mille Lacs.  Granted, one night while fishing with my friends Eric Hayes and John Delestry, those waves were insane, yet nothing records better than the old paper graphs and the paper doesn't lie.  Another significance to this picture was my passengers for the day, Tom Emmons and Tom McAtee.  Although Mr. Emmons is no longer with us, I can still remember after riding this rather large wave I stopped the boat to put on my life vest.  Of course back then we were all invincible yet this one did shake me a bit.  Tom never forgot and through the years used this event to make fun of my vulnerabilities.  I wish he was still here to give me some crap!   Today I wear my inflatable vest 100% of the time as I've gotten quite a bit smarter than I was 20 years ago.  Funny, I still have the graph and if paper was available, I'd love to hook it up and make some recordings of the bottom readings.  The reality is the new HDS 12 has and extra SD card slot and one can simple insert any SD card and record the events of the day from the HDS's perspective.  Still unrolling the exposed graph paper kind of made one feel you just got back from a secret mission and were reviewing the findings.  Times have changed for sure.

 

Lory and I just finished up our last cider making day exceeding more than 40 gallons pressed this year.  I still have about 13 boxes of apples but with the cold weather, we are done.  Making wine, giving it to the neighbors who stopped by to help, freezing a bunch, we are all set for the rest of the year.  It looks like the garden tilling will have to wait till spring, I nailed my 6th pocket gopher this week, and the next week will be a push to get everything set for the winter, no small task.

The Feed Bag is On!!!

Despite last weeks sad turn of events, getting out on the boat can help wash all ones sorrow away.  Having a few sorrows to wash, the hot Mille Lacs bite has been nothing more than phenomenal and I have been taking advantage of everything she offers.   My first real trip was actually on Sunday, May 27th.  Although my friend Tom Emmons would more than likely disagree, he did take priority over what turned out to be a pretty good fishing trip.  This trip included Lory Brasel bringing his 18 foot Lund to fish with Tom McAtee, and I showing the newbie to walleye fishing, Welly Chou, the finer points of the Mille Lacs post spawn bite.  After stopping for bait at Lundeen's, Lory got the jump on heading to the landing on the west side by 10 minutes.  The wind was brisk from the east and my concerns about the rough water were confirmed as the lake came into view, 3 foot rollers hitting the shore.  As we passed the Conoco/Subway we spied Lory's truck parked, probably loading up for lunch.  A quick call confirmed my suspicions, it would be a lot easier and comfortable if we turned around and launched on the east side.  Although about 20 more miles, it was a smart move for sure.  Launching at the new Liberty Beach Landing, the ramp was full as we had to park the truck on the main highway.  There were 3 tournaments being held in the coming week (more on that) and with the bite strong, every landing was overflowing.  Finally getting on the water we headed to the first structure 2 miles out.  The east side of Mille Lacs has a ton of unnamed humps that come up from 35 feet to 20 - 24 feet, some are rather large and some are very small.  After drifting over a few times we fired up the Suzuki and headed a mile south to a small unoccupied structure topping at 22 feet.  We drifted across and the Lowrance lit up with fish hanging a foot or two off the bottom.  Usually this means the fish are active and it prompted me to try out the anchor function on my Minn Kota Terrova I-pilot.  Wow, what a fantastic feature for bobber fishing walleyes!  The anchor in the boat just became 99% obsolete.  With the bow into the wind the trolling motor kept us exactly in position above the fish with little sway.   Rigging up Welly line and casting it out he watched as this was a new experience for him.  As the bobber hit the stop on the line, set at 20 feet, it just kept on going.  I was wondering where his bobber went when we realized it was down.  Now bobber fishing has a technique all it's own as you really need to tighten the line before you set the hook.  With the fish moving and you stationary, this can be difficult to teach the right touch.  With that, Welly missed the first bite, the second bite, and the third bite before asking me to set the hook on the fourth hit.  Refusing, he finally got a nice 16 inch keeper.  While the Terrova held us in place a large thick mark appeared on the screen of my HDS 10.  Quickly reeling in my rig and letting it back down right next to the boat, the leech and sinker came into view as the fish swam up to meet it at 18 feet.  Back down it went and as the bobber hit the water it just kept on going.  A quick flick of the wrist and the above picture is what ended up in the net, a really nice 27.25 inch walleye.  Not bad.  The 4 of us ended up with 8 keeper walleyes, enough for each to enjoy a nice fish fry.

Last weekend was tournament time as Mark Applen and I fished the Minnesota Tournament Trail event on Mille Lacs, Sunday June 2nd.  We have fished this tournament for the last 2 years with the highlight being our rookie year where we took 3rd place, winning $1046 for the ENA Charity Fund.   Last year we gambled and may have placed 6th, in the money but our strategy pushed us to 16th place.  This year we ended up a respectable 69th out of 83 teams.....not very good!  Although the fish were biting like crazy we decided to stay close to our east side hot spots and caught a bunch of 21 - 25 inch fish yet no slot fish under 17 inches and no lunkers over 28 inches.  The primary issue was the early spring have moved the fish into deeper water, into their summer peak locations.  Our traditional hot spot of 2 years running was basically void of fish.  I was pretty confident that one needed at least a 28 inch fish to play the game and the winning team brought in 2 plus 4 slot fish (you can weigh 6 fish per team) for a total of over 18 pounds.  This along with a number of teams who did bring in a 28 incher made placing in the money very difficult.  Never the less after working our spots we headed out to the flats to try and salvage the day.  We were in the first flight of 50 boats to start at 7:00AM and as you can see the majority of the boats headed north to the mud flat areas.  We headed to the gravel bars and humps off the east side and really never got a slot fish or a 28+ until we moved to the Midget Flat.  Immediately we started marking fish and soon employed our trusty I-Pilot to hold us in place while we through out the bobbers.  Almost immediately they went down and within a 20 minutes we had 2 slot fish under 17 in the live well.  We continued to work the flat and caught about 19 fish total with the majority being again in the 21 - 25  inch range.  With a few hours left we decided to go back where we received a good tip that there were some slots being caught, as well be closer to the weigh in.  We managed to catch our third slot fish then had to head in to be counted as arriving before 3:00 to avoid disqualification.  Hindsight is 20/20 and the chances of getting a 28+ are as good where we fished as anywhere yet thinking about it, the area's were hit hard by the launches and they probably took most of those fish under 17 leaving little for us.  Oh well, it was still a blast to fish with my friend Mark, a great prelude to our big event on June 15 to raise money for the ENA fund to help the families of children with cancer.  This year is our Tenth Annual and we should surpass the $250,000 raise for a great cause.  If you feel like helping click on this link ENA Fund and hit the donate button on the bottom of the page to give through your Pay Pal account.  It's really a worthwhile cause and I will report on our success after the Golf Tournament we hold as our major fund raiser.  The last picture is a 25 inch fish that we got early Sunday morning of the tournament.  As I said, we really caught a lot of nice walleyes however Mark refused to take any more pictures unless it was of a 28 inch fish.  As a result this is the only picture I have for a reather successful day of catching the wrong sized walleyes!

Sunday I am taking my neighbor Blair and his friend from Chicago to Mille Lacs hoping to repeat the success of the last 2 weeks.  Blair asked if I would be interesting in hiring out but since he moved my shed (another story), it's the least I can do.  I hope the bite is still on, which it should be and I look forward to an exciting report next week.

At Peace

It's been a very difficult Memorial Day weekend with the passing of my dearest friend Tom Emmons.  Admittedly the right words have yet to come out but I will give it a good attempt.  Tom was working for CPT Corporation when we first met in 1980.  A brilliant engineer, we hit it off well.  In magnetic design lingo Tom was a pot core inductor guy.  This was a type of geometry for an electronic component that had great inductive properties and was self shielding.  In fishing terms it was like a type of reel, it was light weight, had lot's of line capacity, and a great drag.  Over the years one is bound to meet people through your work environment that stick and Tom really stuck.  From a business standpoint he was my best customer and the most consistent.  His designs were fabulous and had longevity.  First with CPT then with Stearns Computers, onto Moniterm Corp, DataCard, Teradyne, and a number of companies he consulted with, I still make a significant amount of components for the products he designed.  Through the years I had become a trusted confidant and friend.  Starting in 1998 until he was laid off at Teradyne in 2009, Tom and I would have lunch together at least 3 times a week, every week.  Teradyne was located a mile from my work which made for a convenient rendezvous.  That's many hours of getting to know your friend.  Our two big fishing events were the week between Christmas and New Year renting an ice house on Mille Lacs as well as our annual Fourth of July outing with the intent on watching the Garrison Fireworks Show while on the lake.  Along with our friend Tom McAtee we always had a great time and sometimes even down right dangerous!   Tom never like venturing on ice regardless of the thickness and it was quite a chore to talk him into the first ice scenario's.  As you see here Tom was a big man and probably had more to fear than Mr. McAtee and I in that department.  Either way he was the consummate outdoorsman who loved hunting, fishing, hiking, camping, and would rather rough it than enjoy the luxury of a comfortable bed, boat, or weather.  Here is my favorite picture of him with his ever present camo boonie hat, field jacket, shorts, and that impeccable smile.  This might even have been the largest smallmouth bass he had ever caught. 

The most difficult part of this is the fact that Tom, after a prolonged period of setbacks, personal issues, and depression, took his own life.  It is very hard to even discuss this however I feel that this post would not be complete without the whole story.  I think one of the best sentiments was written by my good friend Dale Stenseth, one of Tom's co-workers at a couple of companies he worked for.  Here are the excerpts:  "Yesterday, I attended a memorial gathering for a former coworker. He was also a Viet Nam era veteran, 4 years younger than me. While we remember those who have died in wars, we give less recognition to those who returned, particularly those who are wounded in body or mind. Many suffer from depression and other afflictions, like substance abuse and gambling. His demons finally became more than he could bear. Perhaps he had the last laugh. I had not talked with him in nearly a year. As is often the case for survivors, I feel guilty, as if I had somehow neglected him, even though I know I could not have saved him or changed his path.  I will remember Tom as a kindly person with a smile." 

Depression is a disease that like cancer can rip the life out of one's soul.  It is difficult to affect a person who is close to you unless they are willing to let you into their heart.  Those who were close to Tom and his struggles agree, we stood by him till the end, never giving up on our friend yet understanding that although our efforts failed, we still loved him to the end.  Our lives have been made better by our friendship with Tom, and even though our future maybe short one less friend, he has given the gift of resolve to always try to make our lives and those of others a better place.  Life is never fair as all of us have our examples.  The last picture was taken one October perch fishing while it was freezing cold.  Tom was never one for words and gave me the big hint, he was cold, let's go.  I made him stay, something I wish I could say today.  Love you buddy!

April Doldrums

The time between the last safe ice and fishing opener is always a challenge.  It is a time to get the garden ready, trim the apple trees, and get everything ready for fishing opener.  This year the opener is the second latest date it can be (last year was the latest) which basically means we have an extra week to wait before we hit Leech Lake.  My current project of  reconfiguring the electronics in my boat has hit a snag as it is less expensive and more convenient to order new sheet metal panels for my boat rather than simply try to make an adapter to cover up the existing holes.  Hopefully they arrive soon so I can get back to the work of finalizing everything.  I did replace my wired remote cable with the Ethernet cable and was able to link the two units together to see if they would talk to each other.  Like it is suppose too, I could display each units output on each other's screen which was pretty exciting.  The weather still can't decide what it wants to do, winter-spring-winter?!?!?!  Two times this week I woke up to snow, Saturday morning and this morning.  Although it was a beautiful scene, it melted fast and by noon on both days it was gone.  I know we can have snow into May but I have to admit, it's getting old.  The weatherman suggested that this winter is the 4th snowiest on record.  I think he is being kind!

The highlight of my weekend was taking the MSF (Motorcycle Safety Foundation) course.  Lasting both Saturday and Sunday, a total of 16 hours of classroom and road course training proved interesting.  There were 6 guys in the class with me being the oldest.  Most people take this course to get their motorcycle endorsement however having passed my test last year, I was interested in learning the correct way to approach riding.  Having some experience was interesting as the course assumes you have never been on a bike.  The first 6 hours was classroom work and I aced the 50 question test at the end.  Being multiple choice questions I approach each one by looking at what are the wrong answers.   The next 10 hours consisted of riding a small course in the parking lot.  We were all given Honda Rebel 250 motorcycles (pictured) and it was obvious they had seen better days.  All had the mirrors and front turn lights tore off, half had the back turn signals missing, and a couple showed evidence of some horrible event the bike experienced at the hands of a seasoned rookie!   It was pretty thorough and although it seemed as though I knew the material, it was good to have someone critic your habits and work on good fundamentals.  The highlight of my course was when I wiped out on the bike while working on a curve exercise.  Rolling through the corner, we were to accelerate and apparently I exceeded all expectations by having to lean enough for the right peg to hit and grab the pavement.  Ending up under the bike the instructor came running.  Expecting a good lecture, I was pleasantly surprised at the rather mature discussion of my misfortune.  I went on to secure a perfect score on the road test, something that even surprised me.

My last picture is of me celebrating the gifts from my co-workers Welly and Tom.  Both had spend a good amount of time in Mexico lately and each brought me something that I am truly grateful.  Of course everyone at work is aware of my Green Bay Packer status so Welly found this beautiful Poncho in lovely Cancun.  One look and he knew it was me.  I simply can't wait to wear it during next year's Super Bowl!  In my right hand is the special gift I received from Tom.  In a traditional hand crafted bottle is some of the finest Tequila in Mexico.  Both are wonderful gifts and allows me to reflect how special these guy are to me.  Of course I did have to model the Poncho to all of our factory workers, most of whom are die hard Viking fans.  I was definitely a good way to remind them which team to support next year!  Easter is this weekend and I hope to get most of my boat electronics completed, assuming everything comes in by Friday.  Speaking of Good Friday, it's a great time to plant potatoes and that might be the goal for this weekend as well.  Three weeks to opener, I am getting anxious for sure.  The fishing sales are in full force as I am doing my annual accumulation of the latest and greatest.

Mille Lacs 2010 Maiden Voyage

Having skipped last week's opportunity to hit Mille Lacs Lake, it gave me time to get a few things caught up around the house.  Memorial Weekend is usually my first real excursion to the pond and this year was no exception.  Monday is a great time to hit the lake as most of the traffic is heading south and the lake is substantially less crowded.  The reports from Mille Lacs has been excellent with a lot of fish being caught and a good number of them acceptable for the live well.  Mille Lacs has special restrictions due to the current Native American netting which goes on in the spring, during spawning, and before the fishing season opens.  These restrictions include a bag limit of 4 fish which must be under 18 inches with one allowed over 28 inches.  In the past 5 years the average walleye was exceeding 18 inches and bringing home some fish to eat was difficult.  This year has started out much better with many slot fish available.  The Minnesota DNR regulates the total amount of fish harvest based on the Indian harvest and available sportsman harvest.  The last few years the total harvest has been less than half of the total allowed (around 460,000 pounds).  This year we may have the opportunity to utilize our full allowable take of fish.  The first picture is the largest fish I landed, about a 22 incher.

Deciding to go out of the west side, we headed for a deeper rock reef south of Sherman's Point.  My friend Bill Lundeen had insisted that we fish deep, 26 - 30 feet.  The water temperature was 62, a number I expected to be higher.  After 30 minutes on the rocks I called my friend Jon Bathke to see if he was on the pond.  He answered the phone but was at home.  A short discussion of yesterday's success changed my strategy.  Hitting a special spot on Sherman's Flat, I nailed a couple walleyes, one keeper and one to long.  Action was slow so we moved to another favorite spot of mine, The Cut.  Although we marked a ton of fish as well I had a very nice fish on, that was about it.  I finally conceded to Mr. Lundeen's suggestion, headed south and bobber fish the deep water gravel.  Picking a popular gravel bar, we anchored in 28 feet of water, away from the assembled crowd.  Using slip bobbers set about 18 inches off the bottom baited with a leech, I had our first fish within 5 minutes of anchoring.  The next 3 hours proved to be quite successful as we put 7 more in the box giving us a total of 8 walleyes with a couple of nice perch thrown in for a bonus.  One interesting experiment that I like to do is target the fish just below the boat which show up on my depthfinder.  My guests were a couple of frequent friends, Tom McAtee and Tom Emmons.    Mr. McAtee had some issues with his line so I let him use my bobber rig as I jigged directly under the boat, watching the jig and fish on m depthfinder.  It was just like ice fishing as I caught at least 4 walleyes this way.  In an interesting experiment, I have a very cool stereo system in my boat.  As I marked fish directly below me, I cranked the volume to a definite uncomfortable level (Lot's of bass!).  The fish never moved.  So much for noise scaring fish.  This picture is of my good friend Tom Emmons with a nice keeper walleye.

This weekend I will be competing in the MTT Walleye Tournament on Mille Lacs.  Held out of Hunter's Point Resort on the east side,  Mark Applen will be my partner in our attempt to capture the $5000 grand prize.  It should be interesting as I have never fished an open water tourney on Mille Lacs.  I will report our results next week with the hopes that both bank accounts will be substantially larger on Monday!

My 4th of July Tradition

Sticking with a tradition that has lasted over 15 years I had the pleasure of taking the Tom's back out on Mille Lacs on Saturday the 4th of July. As usual they met me at the pole shed with Caribou Coffee in hand. A quick transfer of gear and food, we headed north. Our first stop was at the Milaca Hardies for lunch. This restaurant has all but disappeared from Minnesota. It is too bad as they make an excellent burger. Our next stop was Lundeens for some bait, ice, and advice. After obtaining all three it was off to the landing. It could not have been a more beautiful day. The wind was none existent as the surface of the lake was like glass. This certainly was a turn around from the last 2 weekends, and a welcome one at that. Launching the boat we headed to the first rock hump which produced a single fish. Next stop was The Cut, a long stretch of an edge on Sherman's Flat. Dragging a combo of crawlers and leeches produced nothing. The weather was really getting hot and I recognized my guests could use a break. Pulling out the planer boards and line counter rigs, I threw on some #11 Tail Dancers and had Mr. Emmons let out 150 feet of line. After putting the board on his line we set up Mr. McAtee. Both boards were running great so it was my turn. I had not let out more than 20 feet and the port board started to dance. After a 5 minute battle the lunker showed itself, a 24 incher. A quick picture and back in the lake it went. Alright, that was quick! Resetting the lines we trolled for the next hour with nothing more to show. Oh well, it was 3:00 and I figured we would head to a favorite mid lake reef to check out the shallow rocks. In years past it has been common to see hundreds of walleyes with a muskie or two mixed in, leisurely swimming on top of the reef in 3 feet of water. The walleyes where not there so we spent 20 minutes fishing for smallies. I have become very proficient with a tube jig and immediately hooked into this nice fish. Catching 3 more smaller fish we moved south to a small gravel hump for some bobber fishing. The wind had picked up some what and it would be perfect to anchor and try our luck. I tend to look the area over first with my depth finder to verify if there are any fish in the area. Having registered quite a few marks we threw anchor and started fishing. The bobbers went down almost immediately. McAtee lost 2 real nice fish right away before Mr. Emmons hit this beautiful 23 incher. We caught 6 walleyes before moving back towards the landing to be closer to the Garrison Fire Works show. Settling back at Sherman's Flat, we anchored on the top side and decided to keep bobber fishing. As we were anchored I noticed a number of fish directly under the boat. Almost like ice fishing, I dropped a jig/leech combo over the side until my sounder displayed it on the screen. You could literally see the fish chase the jig up and down until finally one hit it, the only keeper we got for the day. As darkness descended on us, the fireworks had not started yet, we decided to move in closer. Bad move. Once anchored it was like the 3 stooges trying to figure out the best way to reset our bobbers. Tom dropped his depth finder weight overboard to set his depth and it immediately wedged into the rocks below. A quick response resulted in leaving most of his rig on the bottom. In the meantime I was trying to move my bobber stop and it just tore my line to shreds. In 10 seconds my line had snapped without putting it in the water. Looking at each other we decided it was too dark to retie, the fireworks were still not happening, and if we were going to eat supper, it might be smart to head in. Once the boat was loaded we headed south for our meal at Chico's. I was looking forward to having a cold beer with a taco however it was closed. Back to Hardies! Over all it was a fair day. The weather was great plus we ended up with 8 walleyes, 4 smallies, and a nice perch. We are all getting alittle older and I hope we can continue this tradition for years to come.