The Boat is Back

Example of a Bow Fishing Boat

After 4 weeks of being in the shop I finally picked up my boat from Frankie's on Friday night.  It was pretty hectic at the dealership as they were sponsoring a Bow Fishing Tournament for carp, dogfish (bowfin), and gar.  The tournament started at 10:00 that evening and ended at 10:00 the next morning.  It looked pretty interesting as they had 37 team entries which drew which lake they were allowed to fish on, which keep the amount of traffic on any one lake to a minimum.  Bow fishing carp consists of going on the lake at night with a special boat rigged for this type of sport.  Generally there is a platform for the shooters, lights to shine into the water, and a generator to power those lights for an extended period of time.   Once the sun goes down the carp cruise the shallows in search for food.  Using the lights, it's pretty easy to see the fish but it takes a knack to actually hit them with an arrow.  The water causes the light to refract and if you are looking at a fish under water its actually closer than they look.  Therefore you must shoot below where the fish appears or the arrow will go right over the fish.  It takes a few shots to get a feel for how much refraction verses the depth verses the distance and most people tend to miss a lot of fish at first.  When I was about 15 we all had re-curve bows and in the spring the carp would come into the back sloughs carved out from the meandering Buffalo River which ran through Eleva.  Carp Slough (later we named it Northern Slough) was a favorite spot as it had a wide opening into the river and the carp would be in there thick.  Today carp shooting is much more advanced and it looks like fun as you can hire a guide to take you out for a few hours.   Well, when I got my boat home and started putting it back together I discovered they had given me the wrong stern light.  Back up to Frankie's in the morning, I arrived just in time for the weigh in.  Set up like a bass tournament, all the guys lined up as they drove their boats into the shop area where the guys would unload their fish, count and then weigh the largest.  To win the tournament, you had to bring in the largest fish.  In case of a tie, the number of fish brought in was next.  All together it was a slow night as a cold front came through and the wind made the conditions tough.  326 fish were shot and the winning carp weighed 34.18 pounds, a monster.  I was thinking about grabbing a couple of the smaller ones to take home and smoke but with having to get the boat ready and dealing with the rain,  I decided it would be too much work.

Rockin' and a rollin'

The boat looks great and pictures would not do it justice.  My earlier post showing the damage included a number of deep gouges in the gel coat, which is poly-flake to make it nice and glittery.  The finished product looks just like new and you cannot even tell there was any damage.  It's impressive what they can do as I feel like I got a brand new boat back.  Of course, for $6400 I suppose it better look good!  The nice thing is it forced me to reorganize the boat, vacuum out everything, rearrange my rod storage, clean up the anchor storage area, and throw away all the stuff that seems to accumulate over time.  With everything back in order the plan was to head to Mille Lacs on Sunday and see if she still recognizes me.  Sunday morning was greeted with rain, something we have been inundated with lately, and by the time it lifted north a 30 mph wind took it's place.  Too rough to fish I decided to simply drive my motorcycle up to Lundeen's and finish some electrical repair work that I had started the week before.  Going up Hwy 47 I arrived at the lake stopping at the Scenic Overlook just north of Isle, MN.  I'm glad the boat stayed home as there were 4 - 5 foot rollers coming into shore, it would have been extremely uncomfortable fishing in this wind for sure.  It turned out for the better as it gave me enough time to fix both Bill's commercial coffee maker and cappuccino machine the right way and not just kludge it together. With my mission accomplished it looks like next week will be the first time since opener that the boat will be out.  I have made arrangements with my friend Hondro to meet him at Mille Lacs on Saturday, providing the rain stops.

This Friday is our annual ENA golf tournament where we raise money to help families of children who are suffering from cancer or other devastating conditions.  We raise close to $25,000 each year and this is our 12th annual.  Our projections should put us at over $300,000 raised for a great cause.  The nice thing is we give 100% of our proceeds as everyone works hard as a volunteer for the simple satisfaction that the work is gratifying.  The garden is a mess as we have had at least 10 - 12 inches of rain during the last 2 weeks and every time I try weed or plant the mud swallows my shoes.  It looks like my second crop of sweet corn is going to be pretty late.  On the other hand, as I said last week, those onions are blue ribbon bound!

No Boat Yet

AIM's Walleye Length to Weight Conversion

It's been a month now since my bonehead move on Leech Lake, hitting another boat.  As stated the damages definitely required a major repair as I brought it into Frankie's the day I returned from opener. After getting all the estimates and settling with my insurance company, it's simply a matter of getting in line with the body shop and everything points to it being ready for this weekend.  Of course getting the boat back doesn't necessarily mean that it's ready to go.  Knowing that it would probably be at the repair shop for 3 - 4 weeks I removed pretty much everything that wasn't bolted down, you never know.  It only took about an hour to empty all of the compartments out however putting all of the stuff back in will be another story.  This will be a great time to clean up everything, sort through the good and the bad, kind of like getting a new boat!  Having expected it a week earlier, I have resigned myself to the fact that it's probably a fair punishment if you may, for damaging it in the first place.  Never the less I am getting restless as the water temps on Mille Lacs are now in the low 60's and the mudflat bite should be starting to turn on.  There was a catch and release tournament on Mille Lacs last Sunday at the Red Door put on by the AIM Pro Walleye Series (read the story here).  This is a great venue for the lake as the teams would turn in their top 5 fish caught.  I understand that the fish were assigned a weight based on a method given to all boats.  Each fish was required to have it's picture taken with a specially formatted SD Card, in a provided measuring trough, and any discrepancy from the strict rules resulted in disqualification of that fish, and I understood there were a few.  Here are the AIM Rules if you are interested.  Although the total results of the tournament have not been officially released the winner, Bob Nitti's (Hunter's Point Resort) team submitted 5 fish that weighed 38.13 pounds, over a 7 1/2 pound average.  In the press release referenced earlier, the winning strategy was using slip bobbers with leeches on the top of the flats.  Pretty impressive, which brings me back to my boat.  I'll have to scratch that itch pretty soon as i get really excited about 26 - 28 inch walleyes that roam Sherman's Flat this time of year.

Onions!

So, while the boats away it's given me a great opportunity to get caught up on a few things around the house.  It's not that I haven't had a fair number of times fishing as 3 days at Lac Seul feels like a month of fishing around here.  I would never say that that's satisfactory yet it's nice to have the pole shed half cleaned out, the garden planted, and the lawn is starting to look pretty good.  It's been a very wet and late spring which has delayed a my gardening as the soil continues to be saturated causing it to lump then dry hard after tilling.  It's really almost too hard to till but it's got to be done.  Because of this my potatoes are just poking through, the first rows of corn is about 2 inches high, but wow, my onions are looking pretty dang good.  Last year I'm sure that they were planted too deep and never really developed any bulbs of a decent size.  This year we ordered onions from Texas, Long Day varieties for our long summer days, as well special onion fertilizer with trace nutrients.  The instructions state to also us a 23-0-0 fertilizer 2 weeks after planting to boost the tops of the onions.  Having 46-0-0, I simply used half the recommended application rate and did it ever help as my onions have never looked so good.  I guess we'll see in another month or two how they turn out.  Another thing I did was spray my apple trees for the first time.  Getting a $50 coupon from my neighbor Pete, I bought a 26 gallon tree sprayer, big enough to spray all of my apple trees in one mixing.  This thing will spray 30 feet vertically and does a great job, as long as I mix the orchard spray correctly.  My first batch didn't turn out too well as I doubled the dose and instead of mixing 2 TBS per gallon I mixed 2 ounce per gallon.  Well, the trees did not like that one bit as it burned the leaf tips.  Worried I might have killed the trees, they are finally coming back and looking pretty good......another lesson learned, haste makes waste.

Besides getting the Ranger back and ready, I have been working on my Jon Boat for the Mississippi River.  Our steady rain has keep the river close to flood stage for the last 6 weeks but it's starting to recede.  I need to look for a 25 hp short shaft motor as the 15 hp Evinrude that's on it is not quite enough power for 2 guys. I do like fishing the river and is always my short term escape when I have a few hours to kill.  

Lac Seul, Part 2.

Pete with a nice walleye

So how good is fishing at Lac Seul?  Well, from a consistent standpoint, it's probably the best place I have fished yet.  Starting at around 2:00 on Tuesday afternoon till my final cast on Thursday night, I estimate that both Pete and I landed over 300 walleyes, maybe 400 as you just start losing count after a while.  The bait of choice is a simple 1/4 ounce gold colored jig with a rainbow minnow yet I was determined to buck the trend.  Armed with a good selection of Berkeley Gulp and the appropriate 1/4 ounce jig heads I am pretty satisfied with the results.   My technique was a method perfected by The Griz, a famous walleye guide from Minnesota.  I have met Dick Grizinski many times at both the local sports shows and at Frankies, my boat dealer. The Griz is a pretty well known guide, has a website www.fishwiththegriz.com, and has made Snap Jigging a signature presentation.  An interesting side note, my 2008 Ranger 620T was ordered for The Griz but certain circumstances prevented him from taking delivery and in 2009 I picked up his boat.  So, what is snap jigging?  It's a simple technique of letting a jig settle to the bottom the quickly snapping your rod a foot or so causing the jig to jump off the bottom before settling back down.  I decided to try it on Leech this year as the bite was difficult and had some success.  The problem with snap jigging is the walleyes usually hit it on the way down just when you have the most slack in your line.  Often you can see the fish hit your jig via movement in the line or simply the next time you snap there's a solid hook set and the fight is on.  You do tend to miss some fish as they often hit the jig before you have time to react yet I think the excitement of the strike outweighs the negative aspects of snap jigging.  Using Gulp and snap jigging results in some amazing strikes and I think its much more exciting than simply dragging a jig and minnow.  Looking at our catch rates, I would have to say that my strategy caught as many walleyes as the traditional methods but I didn't have to deal with constantly rebaiting with minnows.  Sharp hooks and special jig heads that have a straight hook shaft with a wire bait holder worked great, my preference is VMC Neon Moon Eye Jig which worked great in combination with Gulp Alive Minnow Grub.

A nice 22 inch Walleye

Fishing was focused in shallow areas on or near points and in 4 - 12 feet of water.  Personally I felt the fish were in very shallow and I did really well casting into the shorelines.  Chamberlain Narrows is a necked down area where the walleyes pass through on their annual spawning migrations and they certainly were in the area last week.  Quite honestly we seldom ventured more than a mile from camp as the walleyes seemed to be everywhere.  One of the best spots was about 300 yards across the channel, anchored in 10 feet of water.  I took a video that shows Pete and I hooking 17 walleyes in 17 minutes.  This wasn't untypical as it seemed everywhere we went we caught fish.  Lac Seul has a slot limit where all walleyes between 18 - 21 inches have to be released, a total of 4 fish per person which only 1 can be over 21 inches. One of the other interesting regulations is that if you keep a fish, you have to kill it.  We accomplished this by simply folding back their heads and breaking the neck.  It's a big fine to have a live fish on board so it's important to make sure the fish are dead.   You can bring back 4 walleyes and luckily you can eat what you want and eat we did.  Bruce has a nice propane cooker on the deck of the cabin and using a deep cast iron frying pan (I call it a chicken cooker) we had fish each night to compliment or main meals. On Wednesday night Garith made his "infamous" fish boil.  Using Zatarain's Crawfish-Shrimp-and-Crab-Boil-In-a-Bag, I was skeptical but after looking at the ingredients ( I am severely allergic to crustaceans) and seeing it was just spices, I couldn't wait.  Apparently Garith is the master at this and after boiling rutabagas, carrots, potatoes, in the pot with the spice bag he added walleye when the water became minimal.  After using a ladle to transfer to your plate, he had melted butter to pour over the mixture and using a little salt and pepper I got to admit it was seriously fabulous.   On Thursday night we had Surf and Turf when Garith made a prime rib and we cooked up the remaining walleyes needed to keep us legal.  I have decided that Garith and I make a great pair!  Along with being his co-pilot, we have the same philosophies, same tastes, same attitudes, and we like the same stuff.  It's never too late to meet new friends!

Cessna at Sunset

I did take some videos of the plane then uploaded them on YouTube with the help of my smarter engineer, Welly Chou.  They are pretty interesting and if you have a fast internet connection, change the resolution to 720P or 1080P, it's pretty incredible.  Here are the links for your convenience.  The first is when we land at Lac Seul called Arriving at Chamberlain Narrows.  Turn the volume up to hear the distinctive sound of a 9 cylinder Pratt and Whitney Rotary Engine  It's really cool.  Next is Parking the Beaver, again a short clip of Garith driving the plane to it's parking spot.  Finally a parting shot of our departure from fishing heaven on Lac Seul called Leaving Chamberlain Narrows. Outpost.  Our flight back took a little longer as we bucked a 20 knot headwind most of the way.  Taking off at 7:30 we stopped at Scotty's Seaplane Base on Crane lake to go through US Customs and refill the gas tanks.  Dropping Tom off at Round Lake, we took off just as Bruce landed his Cessna.  A quick flyover to say goodbye to Bruce and Wayne, we head back to Surfside arriving by 2:20. With plenty to do it was back to the same old grind, planting the garden and getting caught up because the late spring.  Here is one of my more interesting pictures as I walked down to the beach at sunset to capture Bruce's plane, a Cessna with amphibious floats. Certainly after a day of fishing the show Mother Nature put on each night was incredible.

With a sad heart I also learned this week that a fellow fisherman and friend had died over the weekend, Bernie Konter.  Bernie was from my wife's home town of Independence, Wisconsin and was a friend of her brother, John. Back when I first started blogging in 2008, Bernie was one of my first subject, even before I started adding tags to the posts.  Bernie Konter's Fall Fest Pickles apparently caught the attention of his daughter Tonya of Wilmar, MN and on Monday night while I was helping Adam with his boat I received a phone call from a 320 area code.  Answering it, I learned that Bernie's family had searched his name and discovered my post of almost 6 years ago. I was also told that he passed away on Saturday at the young age of 70 years old.  Bernie was a good man as he moved to Buffalo City, Wisconsin after he retired to be closer to his love of the Mississippi River and fishing.  For some reason he was always very nice to me as our relationship was based on the occasional running into each other and talking about fishing.  In 2008 he called to see if I'd meet him and his family at Mille Lacs and I couldn't refuse.  Bernie was famous for his Fall Fest Pickles, a recipe that I make every year without fail.  He loved the outdoors and I guess my only regrets will be not spending more time with him.  Maybe in another life, God bless you Bernie and I hope there's a fishing pole waiting for you somewhere.

Back From Lac Seul, Part 1

Our Ride Awaits!

Staying on plan and picking up Pete at 5:45 on Tuesday morning we headed over to meet our pilot Garith before driving to Surfside Sea Plane Base, our starting point.  Loading the plane took a few minutes and by 6:30 we were in the air.  I have to confess it was pretty exciting as they put me in the copilots seat where I could monitor everything that was going on.  Before leaving Bruce Fishbeck, one of our electrical engineers at work helped me with downloading an app for my phone used by private pilots for navigation.  With a flight plan set we started the plane and idled out into the lake for takeoff.  First thing I was told by Garith was never leave my seat until the engine is stopped.  Not that I didn't need to be told but it was still good advice as I have a fondness for my head staying attached to the rest of my body.  After warming the engine to the required 60 degrees C we pointed the plane into the wind and hit the throttle.  The de Havilland Beaver is a workhorse of a plane.  With the capability of carrying 2000 pounds of cargo it's a big plane yet didn't take long to get the floats on plane before lifting off the water. Actually I used one of my apps to monitor our speed at takeoff and was impressed at lifting off the water at about 50 knots.  The weather was light rain and a pretty low cloud ceiling so we flew about 1000 feet above the ground, watching

Our host, Garith!

for towers and other obstacles.  Admittedly I was somewhat surprised how low we flew yet after a few minutes it felt comfortable as the view was outstanding, even in the rain.  Our destination was Round Lake, on the northeast corner of Mille Lacs Lake, it was very cool to see the terrain that I drive by frequently.  As we arrived over Mille Lacs, one could see the skies were clear to the north giving us clear sailing to Lac Seul. Landing on Round we picked up Tom then headed for Sand Point Lake Canadian Customs just north of Crane Lake before departing for the Chamberlain Narrows.  Leaving Surfside at 6:30, we touched down at our destination at 11:15 4 hours, 45 minutes later.  It sure beats driving, which would have taken almost 11 hours to get to the outpost camp by road and boat. Our pilot Garith was fabulous!  As stated, Pete let me sit up in the copilots seat because he knew I would be interested in what was going on.  There is a lot going on to fly the plane from retracting the steering rudders, pumping the flaps to lower them for takeoff and landing, keeping the gas tanks balanced (there were 5 on this plane holding about 140 gallons), adjusting throttle, propeller pitch, fuel mixture, elevator position, altimeter, radio frequencies, GPS destination points, and other critical aspects of flying.  The engine is a 9 cylinder Pratt and Whitney rotary engine and has a distinct rumble as it powers up as smoke clears from the cylinders.  I'm not sure how many hours Garith had behind the stick but I can attest to the smoothness of our takeoffs and landings as well his willingness to share some of that knowledge with a curious passenger.  Spending 10 hours next to the guy was a pure pleasure and hopefully I will get another chance to fly with him.

Sunset on Chamberlain Narrows

Arriving at Lac Seul Outpost our arrival committee, Bruce Wiley and Wayne had flown up a few days earlier and as requested, had the frying pan ready for our first lunch, fresh walleye!  It just doesn't get any better than that, get off the plane, unload, and fill up on the best meal there is.  After getting settled in and cleaning up,  Pete and I loaded the boat and by 1:30 we were fishing.  The Chamberlain Narrows area is a necked down area in the northeast section of Lac Seul, a huge reservoir about 200 miles north of the US/Canadian border.  There is always a little current going through the narrows and is a major migration route for walleyes moving to and from the spawing areas.  Because the spawn was just completed the fish were shallow, often less than 5 feet.  Our first stop was across the channel from the outpost, about 300 yards.  Unfortunately the boats did not have depth finders so it was figuring out via the old fashioned way, drop your jig until it stops then pull it up and go from there.  Pete is very familiar with the area and is knowledgeable where the shallower underwater points and sand bars are located so it wasn't that difficult.  The current allowed us to drift the areas looking for active fish before anchoring to pitch jigs.  Starting at 10 - 12 feet we started catching fish almost immediately.  It seems like the fish would move through in waves as we could catch 5 - 10 walleyes before it would be quiet for a 10 minutes or so before starting again.  Fishing till around 7:00, I guess we caught and released over 60 walleyes as we kept 4 of them for supper.  Lac Seul has a nice slot limit where all fish between 18" and 21" must be released and you can keep one over 21".  We basically let everything over 18 inches go back in the water.  A short ride back to camp, I cleaned everyone's fish before firing up the cast iron frying pan to make supper.  One of the things I showed the guys was how to "zipper" a walleye.  It's always fun to teach old guys new tricks and this was a good one.  A simple way to remove the pin bones in a walleye fillet, it makes cooking and eating them a lot more pleasurable.  After a great meal and cleaning up we we settled down for a nice cocktail of TX Whiskey, brought to me by my good friend Matt Davis from Texas, and enjoyed the beautiful sunset on Chamberlain Narrows.

There is too much to write in a short time as there is a lot going on.  Trying to get the garden in before the rains came this weekend, it's always something.  I have some video's to download and as Paul Harvey would say, "The rest of the story" will have to wait till next week.  Hopefully I can get back on schedule with some interesting accounts, pictures, and fishing tales of my trip.

Finally Settling Down

de Havilland Beaver Float Plane

Well, they say time heals everything as it's been over a week since my star performance on Leech Lake last Monday.  I've settled down a bit, maybe being without my boat serves a good purpose.  The Ranger is at Frankies, my dealer waiting in line to get repaired.  The final damages amounted to over $6000 and I've been assured it will be as good as new.  Although my boat is 6 years old, I'm glad they didn't total it as I really like my layout.  The 2009 and newer Ranger 620T has some nuances that I don't care for and as well,  this 2008 boat is tricked out just the way I like it and it would be tough to start all over.   The boat should go into the shop for repair next week and should be ready to go by June 1st (hopefully!).  Normally the Memorial Day weekend means the first trip to Mille Lacs to pre-fish for the MTT (Minnesota Tournament Trail) that Mark Applen and I usually fish.  This year everything is tight including the slot limit at Mille Lacs and we may not even make it.  It's a far cry from our first time we fished the MTT on Mille Lacs as we took 3rd place, good for $1060 towards the Mark's charity however it's kind of been downhill from there.  Fortunately the end of May should turn out to be successful as I will be accompanying my neighbor Pete Sipe, his friend Bruce, and 3 other guys to Lac Seul Lake  in Ontario, Canada.  The plan is to meet at Surfside Seaplane Base in Lino Lakes and jump on board a de Havilland Beaver float plane. After stopping at a lake north of Mille Lacs to pick up a fourth passenger, it's back up in the air heading for the Seaplane base at Fort Francis, Ontario.  Once we have cleared Canadian Customs its off to Lac Seul Outpost located on the northeast portion of the lake on Chamberlain Narrows and about 2 air hours from Fort Francis.  The Chamberlain Narrows area is known for the early season walleye fishing as the fish travel through the channel during the spawning season.  I'm cautious in predicting anything other than a great time, Pete claims that every year someone usually get a 30+ inch walleye, that would be sweet. Although I have flown in float planes before, it's usually for only 40 minutes or so as we did this in Alaska a few years ago.  This trip is scheduled to take about 5 hours total with over 4 hours in the air.  I'm pretty excited as the guys want me to sit in the co-pilots seat in front, I'll never relax!   The plan is to fish next Tuesday afternoon, Wednesday and Thursday before heading back south on Friday morning.  With limited time to write and the need to take advantage of my fishing location, I suspect next weeks blog will be late. Oh well, here's hoping the pictures will be worth it.

Team Walleye

Last weekend was spent working on the garden and attending my nieces annual dance recital in Osseo, Wisconsin.  It's quite interesting as in includes young girls dancing with their fathers to high school seniors doing complex routines.  My niece Kaylee does an excellent job as I think she's bound for stardom some day.  After having treats at the local Dairy Queen, it was off to see my mom and brother in Eleva.  We always bring mom a load of groceries as she doesn't get out as much as she would like.  Heading back home also allowed me to return my Scheels One Titanium Spinning rod that had the tip break off last week. Scheels has a no nonsense guarantee on this rod, break it for any reason and return it for a new one.  Because it broke right at the base of the tip, I suppose one could have just glued a new tip one it and it would be as good as new.  On the other hand, a deal is a deal and they replaced it, no questions asked.  This rod is a one piece 7 footer and has become one of my favorites in the boat.  Paired with a Shimano CI4 2500 reel, it's incredibly light.  I love the way it loads up when a walleye barely grabs the bait, something that happens quite a bit on Leech.  With an extra fast tip you can feel the slightest pressure without ripping the bait out of it's mouth.  Of course being 7 feet long, one has to be careful when putting it back in the rod lockers.  This Memorial Day weekend is our family reunion side on Saturday, Sunday and Monday is garden planting time as well, get everything packed for Tuesday.  The other thing to do this weekend, replace the Stars and Stripes that I fly at the house.  Buying the good embroidered flags,  they still only seem to last about 6 months so Memorial Day and Veterans Day has become my reminders to get this done.  Monday is packing day, it's going to be a busy weekend.

Two things to leave you with........one, a picture of Team Walleye.  We almost forgot to take it as 3 of our guys had already left.  Shows you what happens without our fearless leader Ron Edberg.  The other thing is this is the last post of my 6th year of writing the blog, next week will start my 7th.  I appreciate the support as Fishin' With Dave approaches 60,000 hits.  Time sure does fly.

A Night to be Thankful

When the Ranger meets a Yamaha

Last week was our 41st Annual Team Walleye fishing opener at Leech Lake.  There is a lot to tell however I am compelled to write about my experience on Monday night as we were leaving to fish the evening session. After enjoying a wonderful steak dinner for the last meal of our stay at Leech Lake Jeremy, Jared, and myself were determined to make the night a successful outing and as always, was anxious to get going.  I'm not as nervous as I used to be and was one of the last to leave the dock which was OK as the bite hadn't been very good anyway.  Leaving the harbor at around 6:10, I headed out about 200 to 300 yards off shore as Monday night finds very few boats on the lake.  Although the rain made driving difficult, never the less it was OK as we headed out to Pine Point.  As we left I scanned the path ahead and as expected it was clear. With my passengers on the left side of the boat, I usually ask them to keep an eye out as they form my blind spot but with nobody on the lake, I felt we were safe.  We hadn't gone a mile when out of nowhere the boat hit something hard..............another boat.   Everything turned to slow motion as I caught the boat in the corner of my eye as we passed by.  Immediately I turned around to find we had clipped the back end of a Lund, hit the motor as we glanced off.  What went through my mind is every boat owners nightmare yet my first impression was to check my passengers then return to the other boat to make sure they were OK. Fortunately they were understandably shaken but fine, we spent the next few minutes calming down.  Mike, the owner of the boat was surprisingly gracious as his concerns were the same as mine, everyone was still in one piece, shaken but unscathed.  With the rain coming down I managed to give him my information while he already had his friend coming to pull him in.  Finding out he was staying in our old cabin at Brindley's I would meet him later that evening.  After insisting that he needed no further help we decided to stay our course and fish the rest of the evening.  Returning at 10:15, I had already called my insurance and secured a claim number and contact information to give to Mike.  After a brief talk he went out of his way to assure me that everything was fine, boats can be fixed.

My Ranger damage

 Being the guy that ruined his night and could have made his life much more difficult, Mike is an amazing person.  Back at the cabin the Cass County Sheriff's deputy showed up to take a statement. He was a very nice guy as I cooperated fully with his requests.  Stopping at the resort office in the morning, I talked to Tim and Greg about the previous evening while another man was sitting at the counter having coffee.  Being right there he looked at me and explained that Mike and him broadsided a boat 5 years ago, something that I remembered.  I guess you never know how it feels until it's happened to you.  Bottom line for me is the fact that I always have high expectations and this shattered it.  My friends have told me that it should be a humbling experience as I am always on the Guy's case to be better, I guess it's my nature. Thinking about it I'm not sure humbling is the way I feel.  Embarrassed, angry at myself as I look back at everything that lead up to the event, looking at what I did wrong, I take full responsibility.  I am in charge of the boat and assuming that I can count on anyone to assure a safe trip is simply wrong.  The safety of my passengers and those who share the waters is on me, something that I do understand, one can never let his guard down.  As far as being humbled, I don't need to run over a boat to be humbled. On the other hand, dealing with Mike and asking for his forgiveness, which he accepted, that's humbling.

My first Walleye of the Season

So, I did catch some fish! Honestly the fishing was quite a bit slower than we expected as 2008 had ice on the lake as we fished and the fishing was fabulous.  Usually we fish with large shiners however the late spring assured that the selection would be limited as we settled for what we could get, about the size of a standard fathead minnow.  Along with small shiners we did take about 2 dozen small pike sucker minnows, a decision that would prove to be successful.  Thinking the walleyes were shallow it was difficult to establish a pattern. Some caught them in 12 feet while others did well in 8 feet.  We divide our fishing into 6 sessions, one in the morning and one after dinner for 3 days.  With 21 guys and 7 boats, 3 guys to a boat, success varied from 5 walleyes over 12 inches per boat to no walleyes caught.  It wasn't till Monday night before the fish really started turning on.  There was a lot of 20 to 26 inch walleyes caught with few under 20 inches, the top of the slot.  The population of large walleyes prompted the DNR to move the protected slot from 18" - 26" protected to 20" - 26" protected.  Apparently the smaller males had not come into the shallows yet to spawn and the whole lake was in flux.  For the first 2 days most of the walleyes were caught in 10 - 12 feet of water and we sure worked for them.  Monday afternoon I drove to Reed's Sports in Walker and after picking up a few stinger hooks, some 12# monofilament line, and some shiner minnows, my nephew Kevin Anderson and I contemplated the advice.....go deep, the fish haven't hit the shallows yet.  Something told me that there still has to be something somewhere as we headed back to the cabin.  After having a nice steak then dealing with my issue, Jared, Jeremy and I headed to Duck Point, an area that had produced a number of fish over the last 2 days to try to nail some walleyes.  We did manage to get 2 keeper walleyes in about 90 minutes however my plan was to troll shad raps on the east side of Ottertail Point.  At 8:25 we headed over and started trolling Shad Raps in 5 - 7 feet of water, about 40 feet from the rocky shoreline.  I did this on Sunday night and only caught 3 yet I just had the feeling.  The feeling is something difficult to explain as it's almost an

My Nephew Kevin

instinct emotion.  Following my instinct has proved successful as a number of times my boat and the guys in it have taken advantage to win the biggest fish, most pints, and best team.  Well, trolling 1 1/2 hours we managed to catch 11 walleyes in the boat, good for the best single session points total and allowed me to wind the best points total for the tournament.  What was more important, Jeremy caught 4 walleyes using a method that only I tend to use...he was pretty happy.  Of the 11 walleyes caught 9 of them were under 20 inches that we could keep.  With keeper walleyes at a premium, it was a welcome addition to our total catch.  We do keep track of our catch rates with a scoring system on Sunday we hold a draft, the lowest point total can chose who he fishes with.  Because there is 2 guys per boat we have 2 rounds.   I was lucky to have my nephew Kevin Anderson as well as my great friend, Mark Taylor.  While fishing was challenging, Kevin caught a nice walleye, about 23 inches.  He is a great guy and I love hanging around with him as he's not afraid to work and loves to fish.  Unfortunately Kevin's score for 6 sessions of fishing was dismal at best and he ended up receiving the DCS (Didn't Catch S**t) Award for the least amount of points.  Mostly fishing with his dad who is my brother, they didn't do very well.  Someday he'll learn who he needs to align himself with, Uncle Dave or Dad!  In the end we had a great time.  Adam got a full workout with his new boat, we still had enough fish for our Sunday Night Fish Fry, and were still able to bring a couple of fish home.  It's been 2 years since we last fished Leech and quite honestly, it seemed like yesterday.  It's always fun to see Tim, Greg, and Paris at Brindley's and we are already planning for next year, something that will come too soon.  Thanks Mark Mayerich for arranging a great trip, we could not do it without you.

All I can say is be safe, pay attention, and have fun.  Stuff happens and when it happens to you, learn from your mistakes.

Ice Out and St. Louis

Gateway Arch in St. Louis

Last week brought me to St. Louis for the TTA's (The Transformer Association) Spring Meeting.  Having served as it's President for 2 years, I now simply sit on the board as an adviser as the new guys coming up the ranks can handle all of the difficult work.  I have never been to St. Louis before so it was exciting to travel to a new destination.  Traveling with my production manager, Rich Rebella, he picked me up at 4:45 AM as we had a 6:55 flight to make.  Forgetting to make a car reservation, I quickly booked something on Expedia before we left, not the cheapest route to go but at least Rich would have some transportation as I attended the board meeting.  Well while on the plane we decided that the car was stupid and as the plane landed it was clear that St. Louis had a light rail line.  After getting our bags and calling the hotel it was $4.00 a person to ride the train from the airport, a far cry from the $300 car rental.  As we rode downtown I started thinking about my friend Chuck Teasley, I seemed to remember he lived close to St.Louis. A quick text and it was confirmed, he would gladly pick us up Thursday afternoon , take us to Bass Pro Shop then drop us off at the airport, a pretty good deal.  With two days of meetings behind us Rich and I headed across the street to the Jefferson National Expansion Memorial which has the Gateway Arch as it's main symbol.  At  630 feet above the foundation, the Gateway arch is the largest free standing arch in the world and the tallest man made monument in the United States.  The method was pretty interesting it get to the observation area located at the top, one entered a small pod where up to 5 people fit into some tight quarters as the cable driven "train" pulled you up to the top.  The ride was about 4 minutes up to the top as the pods would constantly ratchet to stay vertical as it traveled the arch shape.  This is not a ride if you are claustrophobic as you are pretty cramped for the ride up and down however I think it was definitely worth it.  One of the things I was amazed at was the width of the Mississippi River.  Even with the Missouri River joining it above St. Louis, it was still a lot narrower than I assumed and it was flowing pretty fast.  We were done by 2, just in time for Chuck to pick us up and head to lunch then the Bass Pro Shop in St. Charles, near the airport.  When traveling I love to go into the sporting goods stores to see the different inventories they carry to support the type of fishing they do.  Although Missouri has walleyes, muskies, and northern's, most of the emphasis is on crappies and bass as they had a huge selection of lures and equipment focused on these two species.  In the end I just bought 4 pairs of my favorite socks that they sell, enough to last me the summer.

Opening day accommodations

So the ice is off at Leech Lake!!!  It's been 2 years since Team Walleye has fished on Minnesota's Fishing Opener and we are as ready as ever. An update on my Suzuki Engine Interface cable, it finally arrived on Tuesday after I was able to talk to Browns Point on Monday.  I got it connected, routed, and the motor put back together just in the nick of time. It works perfectly but like anything electronic, there's a lot of learning to set it up properly.  One thing it shows is the motor hours and I was surprised by the number, 245.  The boat was new in June of 2009 so in 4 years I put a total of about 70 hours a year,  that doesn't seem like much considering how much I troll but numbers don't lie.  Once the motor was put back together it allowed me to completely clean out the boat, wax it up, and get everything stowed away.  As most of my friends know, I like fishing out of a clean and uncluttered boat.  Team Walleye has 21 guys going up this year and we are back in the Taj Mahal of cabins at Brindley's Harbor Resort.  A log cabin duplex which sleeps 11 guys each side, we have a beautiful view of the lake and it's closer to the harbor.  Looking back 2014 looks like it will be the 3rd time in the last 6 years where either the ice has just gone out on Leech or like last year we were completely iced over.  So much for global warming as I have stated before.  The good news is that the fish should be shallow and hungry as the last time we had these conditions on opener, we had caught more larger walleyes than ever including shattering the big fish record by 2 1/2 pounds.  It looks like the daytime temperatures will be in the 50's and with water temps in the mid 40's, it's probably a good idea to bring the Ice Armor suit to stay warm.  Mark Mayerich has done a great job again, replacing our good friend Ron as the coordinator of our trip.  The minnow reports last weekend were not very encouraging as we prefer fishing with shiner minnows on Leech.  The quick ice out has changed things somewhat and we now have at least some shiners for the trip.  Maybe it's just a mental thing as we always used fatheads when I started in 1990 yet you can't argue with the success we have had with the shiners.  This year we have a few new things, Adam has a new boat, we have 3 new members of Team Walleye, and as always, I have some new and interesting things planned for the weekend, you'll have to come back next week for my report.  By the way if anyone is interested in seeing our Minnesota Bound episode again click HERE

Good luck to everyone, stay warm, dry, and safe and for crying out loud, wear your life vests as the water is still pretty cold this time of year.

April Showers Bring May Ice Out!

Tom's Tom

With rain predicted for Saturday through the following Thursday and I was scheduled for flying to St. Louis, Missouri on Tuesday, Saturday was my day to finally get some things done around the yard.  First order of business was to unload all of my apple tree branches from my pruning job a couple weeks ago.  Living in Dayton allows me to dump them free of charge at the Maple Grove Yard Waste facility.  Simply show them  your drivers license and unload all you want.  I used to just stack the tree branches behind the house but the pile started getting unmanageable.  Last fall our neighbor Gary rented the biggest wood chipper I'd ever seen and made a deal, I'd help him if he's let me use it.  Well it took almost 6 hours of work to chip up the pile, it was a lot of work and thank God Lory and Lyn came by or I'd have never finished it.  Deciding the 10 minute drive to the yard waste site prevents a lot of headaches in the future, it's worth the time.  On my way I stopped at Ricky Shermer's to check out his 3 point rototiller for the tractor.  He was in the back working in his garden as I met him at his garage.  Commenting how well his yard looked he insisted I take his Kubota ZD21 Zero Turn Diesel lawn mower with a dethatching attachment and large capacity leaf vacuum attached.   Having to get a different trailer, we loaded it up and I brought it home.  Now running a zero turn mower takes some practice an it took a while to get the hang of it but wow, what a great job.  I have over an acre of yard to dethatch and clean up but this was one serious machine.  As I was finishing up the south side of the lawn my neighbor and fishing buddy Tom showed up with a nice wild turkey he had bagged a couple of hours before.  Returning from his mom's in Illinois, he stopped in Southeastern Minnesota camping Friday night and going out on Saturday morning.  He weighed it at over 23 pounds, a nice bird for sure.  This is something I'd really like to do some day but with fishing season, conferences, it gets tough to find the time.  Tom left and got back on the zero turn to finish cleaning up the yard.  Next was to lay down some fertilizer then plant my onions that were special ordered from Texas.  With the rain coming there was a short window to till the soil and get them planted.  Luckily my tasks for the day were completed just in time as it started to rain about 8:00.  Just returning from St. Louis last night it was evident that we got some serious rain as I have buckets with over 5 inches of water standing in them.  Even though the temperatures have been on the chilly side, the rain does wonders for helping melt the ice on both Mille Lacs and Leech Lake.   Reports from Brindley's Resort, our destination next weekend states the harbor is ice free and Traders Bay is pretty much clear.  Team Walleye was greeted last year with a completely frozen harbor so this is great news as the walleye's have to be hungry!



$80 for 80

Last week it was Mom's 80th birthday and although I did mention it there was little time to post a picture.  She looks pretty young for her age and although my brother and I are always on her case to take better care of herself I suppose we can't complain.  One of her favorite things to do is catching the free bus that makes the rounds to all the small towns in the area and eventually ending up at a casino somewhere.  Mom really never drove a car and I don't even think she has a drivers license....maybe that was good! Her claim to fame is that she seldom loses and always has a nice jar of gambling reserves to fund her fun.  So far we are having a hard time disputing that as she's pretty tight with her money.  So what do you give your mom for her 80th birthday?  Steve and I decided to each give her $80 and we are pretty sure where that's going to get spent.  I'm just glad she still doing ok as she's a pretty tough gal.  She still lives at home which is probably getting too much to take care of however my brother has moved in to help her with things.  Before my dad died he had turned the house into an quite an energy efficient home and it's surprising how little it takes to heat and cool the place each month.  Besided being tough she can be stubborn which is probably good as we are already planning her 90th! 

As I earlier, having just got back from St. Louis and having brought the wrong computer with, I'm running late.  Last week saw my motor tore apart and unfortunately it still is.  Sending back the cable to get reprogrammed hasn't turned out very well as I still haven't heard from Browns Point Suzuki after a full week of left voice messages and e-mails.  They were excellent at helping me solve my problem yet when they stated I needed to reprogram, it went into a black hole.  Friday is pressure time as it seems patience isn't working too well for me.  Either way the rain has stopped and it's time to put the boat back together and get it started for the season.  The tackle needs reoganization, new line put on the reels, rod's need to be stowed.  With 7 days left, there's a lot to do. 

2 Weeks to Go!

Tearing Apart My Motor

Not unlike last year, 2014's weather, a late Easter, and the early Minnesota fishing opener date of May 10 is compressing my to do list to the limits.  The garden is far from dry enough to tiller, the yard is in various shades of brown, at least I was able to get all of my fruit trees pruned.  The list goes on and on and right at the top is getting my boat ready.  Because I winterize it before putting it away for it's 5 month sleep, usually my task is a simple cleaning up the accumulation of fishing stuff that ends up in the boat during the winter and maybe one substantial improvement.  This year I am running a Lowrance HDS12 Touch and decided that it would be nice to finally connect the engine data interface from my 115 Suzuki outboard to the Lowrance.  Seems simple enough as you just need to buy the proper Engine Interface Cable and an addition NMEA 2000 network T expansion port.  I order the cable online from  Browns Point Suzuki, a large Suzuki dealership in New Jersey who has everything.  When talking to them it was suggested that if I wanted to keep my existing tachometer/monitor gauge working, I would need another adaptor cable.  After receiving the cables I figure this would be about an hour job to hook everything up.  Famous last words.  After pulling of the right housing the first thing I noticed was there is no room in the engine cable grommet for one more cable.  After staring at the motor for a while, reading the installation instructions, staring more,  it became obvious that this task was getting over my head and fast.  The cable instructions said to plug it in the SDS connection yet the schematic in the Suzuki's Owner's Manual showed no such connection.  After posting a question on Walleye Central, the guy who help with the tiller handle replacement, Dan suggested I give him a call.  He was more than helpful especially solving my cable routing problem yet in the end I still couldn't see the Suzuki appear on the HDS12.  Doing a simple Google search of my issue lead me to a number of informative posts yet they seemed very complicated.  I finally e-mailed Browns Point about the confusing instructions that do not line up with the manual, a simple reply from their service department and a quick reconnect was met with success!  That was the good news, the bad news is the service suggested reprogramming the cables software to fix a fuel rate error.  I wish they would have suggested this before they had sent it to me but so be it as the cable is on its way back to Browns Point for updating.  Hopefully it will be here next week and in time to get it put back together for Wisconsin Opener as it would nice to try it out before we head to Leech Lake.  Once connected it will be a nice addition to the information presented on the HDS unit such as true RPM, fuel usage, trim position, engine hours, and a few other engine outputs.  I suppose in the grand scheme of things, it probably doesn't make a lot of difference as I've been running these motors now going on 14 years without a single problem. 

Fresh Cheese Curds

Friday was my Mom's 80th birthday so we headed to my brother Steve's in LaCrosse, WI on Saturday to take her out for dinner.  On the way down we stopped in Ellsworth, Wisconsin to buy some cheese for my friend Joe Stanfield, who lives in Dallas.  Joe was kind enough to help set up our Louisiana trip last month and at the time he was commenting on how good the cheese was that I had sent him a number of years ago.  You see Texas really doesn't have a lot of good cheese there as I remember when my uncle Dewey moved to Ardmore, Oklahoma he always brought a bunch of cheese back with him after visiting Eleva.  Ellsworth is known for their great cheddar cheese curds, the kind that squeak in your mouth as you chew them.  Leaving the curds their natural color, they are delicious.  When you buy them at the creamery, they sell so many that the packages are actually warm from the final process.  Those being the freshest create almost a symphony as you chew......ok, not really but it is pretty interesting.  The older they get the less they squeak so it best to eat them right away.  The other cheese I bought that was outstanding is their 6 year old Cheddar.  Cut from a block it almost crumbled as you handled it but the flavor was amazing.  I ended up with a number of varieties including Coly, Farmers Cheese, Smoke Cheddar, Beerkase, Havarti, Wisconsin Brick, Chipotle Colby, White Cheddar, and Jalapeno Monterrey Jack, Joe should stay plugged up for a while!  In addition, he loves the real wild rice that I get from my friend Bill so I included a couple of packages.  Until you've had real wild rice, you don't know what you are missing.

The weather made a substantial dent in the ice cover last week with most of the large lakes around Minneapolis ice free.  I am getting more confident that we will have open water on May 10th for the fishing opener at Leech.  If you go to Mille Lacs Lake Webcams you can see there is a substantial difference between this year's picture verse last years.  As of April 23rd the ice is slowly starting to pull away from the shore and is truning black, last years picture shows a lake still snow covered and shut tight.  There's not doubt however that it's going to be tight!

Back in the Snow Again

Glaciers and the Driftless Area

I am trying to stay positive about the current state of the weather here in Dayton, MN but it's getting harder by the minute.  Of course with the snow piling up by the minute certainly doesn't help.  I try hard not to be too political as this is a blog about fishing yet those who know me understand I have some passionate views on things and one is Global Warming.  Now I actually believe that Global Warming is happening, in fact I am pretty sure it's been a positive for the last 10,000 years.  The last Ice Age was the Wisconsin Glaciation period when most of Minnesota and Wisconsin were covered by ice over 3000 feet thick except for an area called the Driftless Area.  My home town of Eleva, Wisconsin is in this area, often called the Coulee Region and consisted of a number of bluffs and valleys where we fished and hunted, a sportsman's paradise.  Most of the lakes in Minnesota as well as the Mississippi and Minnesota River valleys were formed during the current warming period we are in today.  If you dig down a couple of feet anywhere on my property you will run into sand and gravel deposits left from the last glaciers.  Well, if Global Warming is happening, I'd love it to move back to Minnesota for a couple of years.  Our 2013 Minnesota Fishing Opener was significantly delayed as the ice had not gone out of Leech Lake by May 11th.  This year has the feel of a repeat performance as the lakes like Mille Lacs and Leech have significant ice on them. Minnesota's fishing opener is on May 10th and I know a lot can happen in 3 weeks but I tell you, this is getting old! The forecast for Leech has night time temperatures in the low 20's until Saturday where it gets back into the 60's for highs.  We will have to keep our finger's crossed for sure as I would sure be disappointed to miss 2 fishing openers in a row because there was still ice on the lake.  As a note, I don't have any problem with some ice as one of the best ever openers for catching fish was when the Narrows Area between the main lake and Walker Bay had significant ice, enough so resorts on that side could not launch boats.  We nailed the walleyes and as well, one could literally scoop up the "ice cubes" out of the water and throw them in the cooler to keep the beer cold.  I guess you could say it was a perfect combination!

Saturday I attended the funeral of a friend, Mike Melleen of Onamia, Minnesota.  Mike was quite a fisherman on Mille Lacs Lake where I had met him at Lundeen's Tackle Castle a number of times before I really got to know him.  I guess you cannot be in Onamia without noticing the Meleen name.  A fixture in the area he originally built the Meleen's Holiday Sports (now the BP station across from Bills), Trophy's Sports Bar, and various business's in the area.  I got the chance to fish clients with Mike a few times and one of those days really sticks out in my mind. Check this post from 2012. We had fished the day before with 5 other guys, 2 in my boat and 3 in Mike's.  I had been doing really well off of Sherman's flat and decided to fish there first.  After getting a number of nice fish by 12:00 one of my guys had to leave so I brought him back to the landing.  In the meantime Mike headed north and by the time I got back on the water they were at the Blue Goose having lunch.  My guest suggested we meet them there, a nice 20 minute boat ride from the landing.  Once lunch was finished we headed straight east to a flat I had never fished before and we started hammering them.  By the end of the day we had caught over 50 fish for our guests before bringing them back to the landing.  The next morning was set to leave from Izaty's resort on the south side.  He still had the 3 people from the day before while I still had one.  We fished like crazy that morning but didn't catch a thing.  By 11:00 it was back to Izaty's for me to drop my guest off and pick up 2 more for the afternoon. They finally showed up around 1:00, invited me for lunch before we took off around 1:30.  My conversation went something like this..."Well, we fished the south end this morning and it was pretty slow.  I am confident the bite is still going on the flats, the waves aren't too bad and it would take about 30 minutes to get there".   Luckily they agreed that if we were going to fish, we had might as well catch some.  Off we headed back to Sherman's flat were we immediately started catching fish.  In the meantime, no Mike.  About an hour later he calls to tell me he's struck out so far.  Telling him we are hammering them on Sherman's, he shows up just as we pull one in.  As suddenly as he shows up he leaves, getting out of my way before returning 15 minutes later.  "Mike, anchor right here!" which his reply was that he did not want to horn in on my success.  Reminding him that we are working as a team, please anchor and I'd work around him,  really it was no problem.  Well once anchored it was like fishing wash tub as my first pass brought a "We got 3!".  The second added another 4 to that number, the third pass brought his total to 12.  We left 2 hours later with another 45+ fish caught between us.  At the dock Mike, who when it comes to fishing is as competitive as I've seen walks up and said to me "Dave, you saved my day, Thank you".  I know damn well I didn't save his day yet to receive a compliment from him was priceless and I'll always remember that time.  Later we worked together at Lundeen's while Bill and Kathy attended their daughters college graduation, it was a lot of fun hanging with Mike.  At the funeral I had learned many things about him I never knew but the most impressive was his sort of pragmatic attitude about things.  What ever hand you are dealt in life you have to play it.  I had heard him say his line "You gotta do what you gotta do" but he really lived it.  I was glad to have come to know Mike Meleen.

April 17, 2014 with 12 inches of Snow....Uffda

I was going to post this last night however when I got home it was snowing more significantly than when I originally wrote the post, enough so to take a picture of my plight!  By 8:00 this morning we had accumulated close to 12" of snow.  I quick took this picture of the end of my property where I have a road going back to the bee hives (something for next week's post).  My thought was to simply not do anything and wait till the weather melts the snow but as you see it got to be too much.  Unfortunately I removed the snow blower attachment and chains from my John Deere lawn tractor so I decided reattach it.  Luckily it's a quick hitch and only takes about 10 minutes to attach.   Thinking I could get by not putting on the tire chains on the tractor it only took 50 feet to get stuck so it was back into the shed to finish the job.  The weather forecast claims the rest of April will have above normal temperatures including 70 degrees for Easter Sunday, we'll see. The Ranger 620T is slowly starting to wake up from it's long winter's sleep.  I am enhancing my Sonic Hub audio system with a new input for my bluetooth receiver giving me more choices for my audio system.  Another project is trying to connect my Suzuki engine interface port to the Lowrance HDS12 so I can better track the engine functions and admittedly that's not going so good!  We have ordered our onion plants from Texas and here's hoping the garden will be dry enough to get in and rotor till.  Like I started the post, I hope it doesn't take too long!

Mille Lacs 2014

Mille Lacs Lake, Minnesota

It's time to comment on the current changes to the fishing regulations on my favorite fishing lake Mille Lacs.  Those who follow this blog know that I love fishing Mille Lacs for walleyes from May's opener to the end of February.  I would say that fishing has been pretty good the last few years with plenty of nice walleyes caught and like any lake it can have it's good days and bad days but on average I can't complain.  Unfortunately there are significant issues with the walleye population and it perplexes guys like myself that have fished the lake for over 30 years and have seen the changes.  Since the Supreme Court ruling in the late 1990's allowing the Ojibwe to harvest walleye for substance, the State of Minnesota has allowed them to gill net walleyes prior to the spawn.  Right or wrong this has set in motion a number of yearly adjustments in "safe allowable harvest" numbers, ever changing slot limits, and bag limit restrictions.  For me the last 3 - 4 years has been exceptional for consistent catches of nice walleyes in the 20" - 28" range yet these fish looked like the were starving.  While the perch fishing disappeared, days of 30 to 50 fish on a nice June day were not uncommon.  Once called "The home of the quarter pounder" few fish under 20" came in the boat for me during the last 2 years.  With the fisherman's slot at 16" - 20" and the nets targeting the same fish, it seemed inevitable.  Add to the fact that the explosion of both smallmouth bass and now northern pike just added to the predator base, the fish had ate itself out of house and home.  Now, personally I don't buy all of this yet I'm not in charge.  So we have a crisis, to many big walleyes, pike, and smallmouth....not enough forage and no survival of significance for young walleyes, perch, or tullibees for the future.  The DNR's strategy for 2014 is to significantly lower the allowable harvest, increase the limits of northern pike from 3 to 10, open up the slot limit for smallmouth, and institute a year long night fishing ban from 10:00 PM to 6:00 AM.  In addition the bag limit stays the same as last year which is 2 walleyes in the 18" - 20" slot.  Top this off with what turned out to be a terrible ice fishing season (the DNR claims only 450# of walleyes harvested from Dec 1 - Feb 23) has created a tenuous situation for the business's that rely on fishing such as the bait shops and resorts.  Some are much more vocal while others are trying to figure out how to survive by creating opportunities.  It's definitely not easy.  For the DNR's take on the lake you can check out this link:
Mille Lacs Lake.  Also, the DNR in an attempt to soften the issue has started a newsletter called Hooked on Mille Lacs which can be accessed by clicking on the link.  Interesting.


Big Head, Little Body ( the fish, not me!)

So what do I really think?  First and foremost, no lake in Minnesota has been able to be managed while netting is present, not Red Lake, not Lake of the Woods, not Leech Lake.  Even if a certain allowable harvest is permitted, taking these fish prior to spawn only reduces the hatched biomass which is contrary to what the DNR claims as they say has more than enough spawning females.  It is well known that the lake is full of young fish, the perch hatch is the best in years.  This coincides with the complete shutdown of the fall bite as the fish had plenty to eat, were fat as pigs, and didn't need to chase down lures.  So what happened in 2013.......the ice was still covering the lake on opener, no significant netting was done on the lake.  Maybe it's too easy to assume yet something has changed.  Another interesting fact is that the Ontario's Ministry of Natural Resources have looked at walleye populations and have determined that the 18" - 21" fish are the ideal spawning size with the highest success rate.  These are the exact fish that are targeted by the nets and is also represented on the current slot size fish we are allowed to keep.  The Minnesota DNR does not agree yet on the "Blue Ribbon Panel" to study the issue is a biologist from Ontario, go figure.  I am in agreement with the smallmouth regs going back to where they were.  Quite honestly a 16 inch smallmouth is delicious.  As far as the northern limits going to 10, I guess it opens up a lot of opportunities if you like them and know how to take out the Y bones.  The lake is getting clearer which definitely can affect fish populations as zebra mussels haven't help.  Whatever the changes, it certain that the good old days of fishing Mille Lacs, especially in the late 1980's thru 2006 may remain as such, good old days.  Lets hope not.

An interesting parallel to our issues at Mille Lacs is the early King Salmon run on the Kenai River.  Because of the low return population of these magnificent fish, the first run which occurs in June has been closed to any fishing.  Guiding on the Lower Kenai River consists of 3 major salmon runs, the early Kings in June, the 2nd run of Kings in July, and the first run of Silver Salmon in August. For my 2 friends on the Kenai who make their living as guides, both Jeff King and Keith Holtan understand the measures taken yet have a common concern for netting that has a huge effect on the returning population.  I guess we all have our agenda and thoughts.....ah to be King for a day!  Either way you will see the results of both fisheries as we document our experiences.  You can see Jeff's experiences to the left on Mile 14.  The weather is finally warming up as opener is just 4 weeks away, I think we'll be on the lake for sure!

In Between

Guidlines for Pruning Apple Trees

It looks like we are heading into a long "In Between" period again this year, from the last ice fishing trip until opener.  Just when the snow is finally melting away, we are bracing for another major snow storm to pass through Dayton later tonight, with 10 - 14 inches predicted by Friday evening.  Now I know it snows in April but this is getting old.  There actually is enough ice on the lakes to fish yet my list of things to do before opener isn't getting any shorter.  One of my big chores in the March/April time frame is to prune all of my fruit trees.  I have 3 pear trees and 9 apple trees that need constant attention if I expect fruit from them this fall.  Pruning helps the health of the tree by thinning out the branches and allowing the fruit to develop better.  The pear trees really sucker bad and can grow over 6 feet in one growing season.  These all have to be removed as the suckers take energy away from the fruit development.  Both the pears and the apple trees can grow quite high which causes 2 issues later on.  The first being my hose sprayer doesn't go that high so I try and keep the trees at around 15 - 20 feet at the most.  Second, when it comes to picking time it's a lot easier if I can deal with the fruit using my standard ladders.  It takes about an hour to really do a good job on each tree but in the end it's worth it.  My friend Rick Shermer has a small orchard and last year he really went to town on his trees.  I just shook my head as he basically gave each one a butch haircut.  I promised him that this spring would see me come by the house and take over his task before he turns the trees into wood for smoking.   With the storm coming it will probably be next week before I can get mine finished and head over to do his.  Our neighbor Brandon has been maple syruping the last week and has 4 of my large sugar maples tapped.  His goal is about 1500 gallons of sap which will produce around 40 gallons of pure maple syrup.  It's a nice treat as he brought over a bottle from his first evaporation batch and it's very good. 



Dick's Fried Walleye Louisiana Style

Last week Lory and I attended the Northwest Sportshow at the Minneapolis convention center.  Attending on opening night, which was last Wednesday assured there was plenty of room to look at everything as it really gets busy on the weekends.  The first thing we got was a nice lighted bobber that the first 300 people got free.   It's pretty nice however with the night ban on Mille Lacs this year for the entire season, I probably won't have an opportunity to use it.  The next thing was to pick up some Cajun fish spices from Wayzata Bay Spice Company of Roger's Minnesota.  They have a couple of excellent blends as I needed them for the Redfish caught in Louisiana a few weeks ago.  The rest of the show was pretty normal, nothing really new this year, or at least I didn't think so, yet it is always fun to check it out, especially seeing my friends Judy and Ken Marlow.  We have stayed a number of times with the Marlow's, at their cabins on the Kenai River in Alaska.  As usual, he had a jar of canned smoked salmon, definitely worth the price of admission!  Sunday was our fish fry to try out the fillets sent back from my trip.  Dick Daugard, my Texas friend called me about a month ago and offered to trade me flounder fillets for walleye fillets, if I had any to spare. He reads the blog and had never had walleye before.  Eating walleye is common here in Minnesota and it seemed to be a pretty good deal so I brought a couple of packages from the Red Lake trips earlier this year and gave one to Dick and the other to Robert.  Dick fried them up after we left camp then sent a picture of  his work just before they got consumed.  His comment was that they were spectacular, which we already knew.  Dick is quite a chef and can really cook up pretty much anything you give to him.  We did get catch some flounder as we fried that up on Sunday and although I am a big fan of saltwater fish, admittedly the walleye is better.  The menu was decided as we cooked up 3 types of fish, flounder, redfish, and black drum.  The flounder was pan fried, we put the black drum and a smaller red on cedar planks, then cooked the large redfish fillet "on the half shell".  Describe a couple of posts ago, I was anxious to show my neighbors how it was done.  We all agreed that the pan fried flounder was good, the cedar planked method was good, but the redfish on the grill was absolutely fabulous.  I do have a few more redfish fillets and look forward to our next cooking event.

Opening my Outdoor News Sportsman's Weekly paper, on the front page has the headline: Ice-covered opener: Two years in a row?  All I can say is Uffda!  Living here in Minnesota for 38 years now, I can't imagine this happening again so Team Walleye is simply keeping their fingers crossed.  A lot can happen in 5 weeks so it's no use to get too worried yet to be honest, there is still quite a bit of ice on the lakes up north.  Our best fishing was the year we had significant ice on Leech Lake yet we could easily get out of Brindley's, where we stay.  Oh well, there is little we can do about it anyway as their is a lot to do before opener.