Moved to Lake Of The Woods (LOTW)

Ben's nice 26.5" Walleye

Last Friday was the time to shift gears and retrieve the Salem wheel house from it's parked location at JR's and haul it up to Springsteel Island Resort on the southwest side of LOTW's.  Knowing Ben Aiona was going up there, his dad Kevin and Kevin's friend John Felix decided to join me.  The cold weather made a point to linger into the weekend with -35F predicted for Saturday night.  Meeting me at the pole shed we left by 8:00 AM on Friday with our intent on being at JR's by 12:30.  Arriving at JR's we backed the truck up to the wheel house only to see that my propane storage doors were wide open.  Damn, someone must have gotten in and took the 2-30 pound cylinders.  Kevin got to the doors and said Oh oh!  My heart sunk but he laughed and said he was sorry!  After hooking it up and securing the doors the plan was to start the furnace and let it run the 90 minutes to Warroad.  After bidding Adam at JR's a good bye till next year, I paid the storage fee and took off.  It never got warmer than -11 F and that was near Deerwood, MN and   by the time we hooked up it was back down to -15.  Our next stop was the Warroad Cenex station to get minnows, fill up the truck, and fill up the assumed now empty propane tank.  Part of the idea to start the furnace was to get it warm but also there was still propane left in the original tank and wanted to empty it.  Everyone said I should not run the furnace while pulling the house but it seemed to work out OK.  At the Cenex they are gracious enough to only charge you for what they put in it and to my surprise it still had 5 pounds left.  That was a lot of run time on that cylinder, 2.5 days on Red and at least an hour and a half of steady running on the road.  With the propane full, the minnow bucket running, the truck full of gas we were ready for a cold adventure.  After paying the road access we called Ben who had met us 6 miles out on the road and guided us near where he was settled in.  Kevin is getting pretty good at helping to get set up and did a great job as we were fishing within 20 minutes of arriving, just in time for the evening bite.  We managed a few keepers the rest of the day however the cold weather kept the bit to a minimum.  The next day, Saturday, would prove to be more eventful.  We caught a number of nicer 15 - 16 inch saugers and walleyes while Ben, just 20 yards from us managed to bring in a nice 26.5" walleye.  It was definitely chilly out but we managed to keep more than enough fish to go in for a fish fry at the resort.  It's a pretty good deal as one gets diced fried potatoes, cole slaw, beans, and they fried my fish in the gluten free batter for me.  It was a nice change not to have to make and clean up after eating!  After a filling supper we headed back 7 miles out on the ice to turn on the television and relax for the evening.

Sunday's catch

Ben got up and left Sunday morning while our plan was to stay and leave Monday morning.  It still never got above zero with Saturday night low was -34.  By the time we got up it was already up to -28!  We stayed the rest of Sunday getting a fish here and there.  I would not say that it was on fire but it certainly was better than Red Lake was 4 weeks ago and although the numbers were not as good as fishing Lake Winnebigoshish 2 weeks earlier, the number of keepers was significantly better, as we had fairly consistent action throughout the day.  We were surprised at the clarity of the water as LOTW tends to have dingy water.  This lead to a few rattle reels going off after dark.  AT midnight on Sunday one went off and no one got up to service the line so I got out of my warm sleeping bag and found the reel that had my line marker bobber underneath the water, felt it and set the hook.  It was a nice walleye and when I got her up I was impressed, nicest one of the trip in our house.  I put it in the fish pail, reset the rattle reel and hopped back into the sleeping bag.  After about 30 seconds the thought came to me, damn that was a nice walleye, but I failed to measure it.  On LOTW all walleyes over 19.5 inches have to be released.  So, back out of the sleeping bag and over to the fish bucket, pull her out and got the measuring tape that is on the slush dipper, 21 inches, back in the hole she went.  Luckily she swam right away.  No need to get the ice house confiscated over 1.5 inches of walleye.  Again we woke up to under -20 but decided to get packed up as Keven and John had at least an 8 hour trip ahead of them.  Stopping at the Springsteel Island fish cleaning house they had made some improvements such as running water to clean up everything.  We ended up parking the Salem at my friend Dave Johnson's place at the resort, ready for the next trip.  I suppose we caught around 30 - 40 fish total with 20 keepers that we either ate or brought home.  The plan is to leave it there till the middle of March when my good friend Bill Dull from Southern California is flying up to try ice fishing.  It's too bad he didn't come this time and experience what the real cold feels like!  I am trying to arrange a big group so he will have the full feel of an ice fishing adventure in Northern Minnesota.  As a side note the road we were on is the beginning of the ice road that runs across LOTW to the Northwest Angle, an isolated part of Minnesota the is usually only accessible by going through Canada either by highways or motoring across the lake via the portion that is in the United States.  The ice road has been important for the residents of the Northwest Angle as the Covid restrictions have limited their options to return to their properties.  It's a pretty good deal as the road provides easier access to those resorts in that area for guest to get there.  Snowmobiling is an option but it limits what  you can bring.  I know last week's weather sure made ice!

Fishin' With Mark

Large crawfish Mark caught

 My good friend Mark Applen had decided to base his wheel house out of Denny's Resort on Lake Winnebigoshish, about 3 1/2 hours north of home as he lives less than a mile from me.  He was heading up last weekend and asked if I would like to join him.  Lake Winnie was the first lake that Mark introduced me to wheel house fishing when we took his older wheel house and met his friends the Praught Brothers on the lake for a weekend of fishing.  I instantly fell in love and within a year there was a Salem parked by my shed.   Winnebigoshish was part of a number of lakes in northern Minnesota that were created in the lat 1800's to serve as water storage for the Mississippi River for the summer.  Pokegama Lake, Winnebigoshish and Leech all are part of the Mississippi River watershed and are quite large lakes.  Because Mark's house was already there we simply drove my truck up to the resort, hooked up his Salem and we pulled it out on the lake.  The structure of the lake is quite interesting as the main road out from the resort basically followed a miles long edge topping out at about 12 feet then dropping to 30 in about 100 - 20 feet.  It was pretty interesting a the houses were parked along the drop off, almost in single file.  After about a 6 mile drive we were close to the end of the road and decided to pull off to the left as there was a larger space in between houses.  The trip off the plowed road started out okay but as we headed towards our destination, the snow got deeper and it was what I call sugar snow, did not pack down well and made it hard to get any traction.  That's another story!  We had the house in an ok spot along the drop but really didn't know how deep we were.  Because we were basically stuck, this would have to do.  Drilling the holes we were in about 18 feet of water, on the drop.  Because both Mark and I have the same wheel house it is pretty fast as we both work in unison and we were ready to fish in record time, set up by 3:00 PM, just in time for the evening bite.  And bite it was, as fish appeared on the screen immediately and within a few minutes a hit.  Quickly an 8 inch walleye came through the hole.  We caught many walleyes of that size as we had a self imposed limit of 13.5 inches minimum.  The lake is quite clear so Mark put down his camera and connected it to the TV.  We saw a nice northern pike swim by explaining why the bite had stopped.  There was a huge crawfish sitting just on the bottom below Mark's minnow.  He lowered the bait and it grabbed onto the minnow, he hauled it up.  The are actually a beautiful creature with bright orange with a vibrant blue claws, the picture doesn't do it justice.  Mid day tends to be slower than the morning and evening bite.

Nice pile of Walleye and Perch Fillets

Bringing my new K-drill  auger with, now that I had the right sized drill, mid afternoon on Saturday was a perfect time to try it out.  The fish house was on a north south line so east it would be shallower and west it would get deeper.  Drilling 4 holes each way I went deep and Mark went shallow.  We each did well as I nailed the largest walleye of the weekend, a 14.5 inch fish while Mark hammered the perch. It was cold out but trying something different was fun as we both saw constant action.  Finally the action cooled off and we decided to head back into the warmth of the house to finish up the weekend.  As the sun set the walleye bite picked up again and we caught quite a few, granted they were small but it's still fun to watch them come up on the depthfinder and match your skills based on what you see on the screen.  It was interesting that neither over nights produced a rattle wheel hit, or maybe we just slept through it.  Sunday morning it was time to leave.  Mark's friend Scott had came out to fish by us earlier and had parked on the path that I had made prior to shutting the truck off in order to have a clear path out.  It really didn't matter because I got stuck immediately.  Mark had commented that it almost felt like my traction control was off.  Below the radio is a set of buttons that control these things and each had a light to designate if they were on or not, at least that's what I was lead to believe.  Yet being stuck, the RPM's were 1500 yet no wheels were spinning, prompted a closer look.  Sure enough when the traction control button was pressed a light in the dash by the speedometer had the traction control icon off.  With the traction control off the truck walked right out off our spot.  Making a few loops to make sure we got out okay we hooked up the house and drove right out.  Interesting as I've never had that problem before but it's possible that I wasn't paying attention.  I am getting old you know!

Eelpout, no respect!

Back on the road it was pretty rough so we headed slowly at 5 mph.  Rough ice can cause a lot of problems in a wheel house, scattering things inside as well it's hard on everything.  Finally getting back to the resort, I took the fish to the cleaning house while Mark parked and unhooked his house, as he has kept it there all winter.  Denny's has a nice cleaning house, heated with water, perfect.  No one was in it and when I arrived there was a nice eelpout laying there, apparently someone caught it but decided to leave it for someone.  Nobody had to hit me in the  head as they are excellent eating.  Ugly but taste great.  Almost done cleaning fish, Mark came in and did the honors while I finished the walleyes and perch.  We ended up with 4 small walleyes, about 12 decent perch and a gift from someone who doesn't understand what they left.  Oh well, we got cleaned up and headed south, stopping at the Y in Garrison for something to eat.  It was a lot of fun to get back to Winnie and fish.  It is really supposed to get cold this weekend, -35 up north.  At this time the plan is to head to Red Lake and pick up my wheel house then haul it to Springsteel Island Resort, north of Warroad, MN on the southwest side of Lake of the Woods.  the plan is to leave it there for a month and try our luck there.

Fishin' With Dave

nice largemouth bass

Last Monday I had the pleasure of fishing with a good friend of mine Dave Grant.  He is the son of Mike Grant, who I worked with for many years.  My good friend Bruce Wiley has it right, you can only have so many good friends in your life and Mike is one of them.  Well Dave asked me to go fishing with me a few weeks ago but he ended up having to work.  That's OK as he is trying to work his way through college, something that will make him very successful someday.  We decided that Monday was a good day so after meeting me at the pole shed at 8:00 we loaded everything up and headed northwest about 60 miles from Alexandria, MN to a smaller lake fishing for panfish.  It's a long drive but spending quality time with Dave is as fun as fishing.  He's a bright young man and has the qualities for a very successful future.  He met me at the pole shed and we loaded up my ATV, 2 man Clam, the auger and I decided to take my new KDrill 7.5 inch auger that is powered via my M18 Milwaukee portable drill, or so I thought.  I bought it since I already had a M18 drill driver.  It says to have a drill with at least 750 inch/pounds of torque and one that has a side handle.   Charging off to find a side handle for my drill, although not expensive, I bought 2 that didn't fit before calling Milwaukee Tools customer service for help.  Giving him the model number he told me that he had some bad news, first that there were no handles for that model and second, that model only has 500 inch/pounds of torque and will burn out if you use it.  After recommending the right drill, a trip to Home Depot got me me just what I needed!  We got to the boat landing, unloaded the ATV then loaded up the shack and headed out.  The lake is a long narrow lake with a deeper basin on the west end, maybe 1/2 mile from the east shore.  Using the Navionics app on the phone we got into the 25 foot basin and drilled a bunch of holes with my 9" gas Strikemaster.  We set up the 2 man and got comfortable.  After an hour of fishless time I decided it would be nice to try the KDrill.  Heading straight north I drilled about 5 holes going shallower.  It wasn't terribly cold and fishing outside was tolerable, the second hole produced a nice mark on the Vexilar then boom, it was a nice fish, sort of felt like a northern.   Yelling at Dave to come and help with the fish as I was using 3# test and a panfish setup he got there just in time to lip this nice largemouth.  Back in the hole she went, rebaited and 5 minutes later there was another bass on the line, not as big but still fun.  All together I landed 4 bass, a small sunfish and a  hammer handle northern.  It was fun.  

Dave's one of two 8 1/2 inch sunfish

About 4:00 we decided to move in shallower for the evening bite. Back off a point there were 2 permanent shacks, a good sign that it was a consistent place to catch fish.  We set up close to the shacks, not on top of them and started fishing.  Right off the bat we started marking sunfish, then began catching them. I call them hate to's....Hate to keep em, hate to throw them back.  We were catching a fish a minute and sorting through the better ones. Dave called his dad and asked him if he wanted any fish for his grandma.....yes bring some home.   We had about 6 fish on the ice when Dave gets a nice 8 1/2 inch sunny.  Five minutes later he gets another one.  This was only after watching him with his fishing pole, I just shook my head and dug another single action light pole out of my bag and handed it to him....here try this as I could see the set coil in his line was taking up any feel that the line gave him.  Dave started catching fish and managed to get another nice sunfish.  We were fishing waxy's on #8 frosty glow jigs.  That Vexilar Glo Ring that I picked up a few weeks ago really works slick and for that evening bite seems to keep the fish interested longer.  We ended up with about 14 sunnies, I threw in a smaller one just to make his dad clean a smaller fish, told Dave to tell your dad he's lucky we didn't save all of them.  Dave is going to St. Thomas University for Mechanical Engineering and he will do very well for himself.  He's a smart kid and utilizes every minute of our time together to ask questions, seek advice as he looks to the future.  Working his way through school he is extremely conscience of student debt and is working hard to graduate debt free, a fabulous goal.  Sometime during our trip he asked me some advice on an upcoming internship he applied for, or any opportunity that presents himself.  I told Dave...Don't let the grass grow under your feet, make sure that if you are done, go find something else and don't wait for your boss to give you something.  Companies really recognize self starters.  The other thing I like about Dave is he's a realist, not wrapped up in the what if's of the world.  Of course I am turning into an old curmudgeon however it's fun to see that there is still some common sense left...just like his dad!!

I am desperate to get caught up as I went to Lake Winnebigoshish last weekend with my friend Mark Applen so I have more fishing stories!  At least I am fishing. 

First Trip to Red

First Walleye, 20 inches

 Enough of the questionable ice reports, traffic jams, little fish, and cancelled trips.  My friend Andy Achman was heading back to Red Lake last weekend after a report that his friend got 45 walleyes the previous week.  My regular crew had moved to Lake Winnebigoshish and Ben Aiona, who did well on Lake of the Woods 2 weeks ago was staying home.  The traffic on Red had subsided quite a bit and I prefer to go with at least one other house for safety reasons, I called my brother Steve and friend Kevin to see if they wanted to go.  With the rain and very wet snow predicted for last Thursday and Friday we decided to leave on Saturday and come back on Tuesday.  Because Andy had Monday off he was going to leave Monday morning.  Steve and Kevin met me at the house as I was hooking up the Salem, once on the road we headed north for our 4 1/2 hour drive to JR's.  A quick call to Andy and he was about 90 minutes ahead of us.  A quick stop at Deer River for gas and bait and an hour later we were on Artesyn Spring road heading for JR's.  Andy called and said he had some troubles and just got on the ice, I said we will be there in 5 minutes.  He has the coordinates to the area where his friends did well so he waited.  Our destination was to the north of Center Bar, out 2 miles from JR's, take a left and go 6 miles then a right along the Reservation line, maybe 3 miles then to the right.  There was a fair amount of snow on the ice but it wasn't too bad as I got turned around making sure my truck was facing the plowed road for an easier exit.  With 3 seasoned guys it doesn't take long to get set up.  This was to be my first experience using my new Strikemaster 40V 10 inch auger.  It was pretty impressive as it cut about 4 times as fast as my old chisel bit 10 inch Big Volt auger.  It also has a reverse feature so once the hole is done, put it in reverse and push most of the slush back down the hole.  As I got done Steve and Kevin were letting the house down.  The next priority was to get the DirecTV set up to watch the Packer/Rams game.  I always have a little trouble the first time but by 3:40 we had the game on.  We started fishing and almost immediately Kevin's rod was bent down pretty good, he had a nice one on.  About 1/2 way up it came off.  Within a minute a big mark appeared on my screen and it hit like a runaway truck.  Telling Kevin this was a good fish he took out my transducer.  Got it's head to the top of the hole and the bait came flying out.  A quick reach into the hole and Kevin had the fish, a beautiful 20 inch walleye.  We thought....Here we go!!!  Well that ended up being the highlight of the trip as far as fish goes.  The master plan was to watch the games on Saturday, have chili in the house.  Sunday and Monday was hopefully having fish at JR's.  Kevin caught a 14 incher later Saturday evening and then we were skunked till Monday night when Steve got a 14 incher.  Therefore we never got the chance to have a fish dinner at JR's

Sundogs at it's finest

Time seems to go a lot faster when one is fishing.  Tuesday morning came fast as it was time to pack up.  It is always nice to have Steve and Kevin with as they are trained very well to do the things that need to be done to leave.  With the 3 of us we were cleaned and hooked up within a half an hour.  The biggest challenge was to make sure we could get back on the road, however the cold temperatures hardened the snow up somewhat and we pulled right out of our spot and back on the road.  With about 18 inches of ice the speed limit is about 15 mph.  Our route took us south to the curve then southeast to the main road from JR's.  The sun comes up in the southeast and the light cloud cover produced a beautiful picture of the sundogs on either side of the rising sun, I had to stop and take this picture.  Once at JR's I decided to leave my wheel house there and pick it up in a few weeks to go to the Lake of the Woods out of Springsteel Island Resort.  Ben just came back from the there and I am excited to get a report.  Although it was disappointing to get so few fish,  one can never replace the time spent with friends.  I have finished this sort of late and my friends Mark Mayerich, Adam Mayerich, and Gary Ullom are fishing on Red and I just called them.  They are not doing any better.  I'll have a better report for yesterday's trip but that will have to wait a few days, not this many however!

Fishin' With Pete

Our launch point before it was froze

 I've started this a number of times and hopefully it get's finished.  On December 26th my neighbor Pete invited me back to his families land north of Grand Rapids, MN to catch some nice sunfish and crappies.  Meeting me at 8:00 Saturday morning, it started on the wrong foot immediately.  We hooked up the trailer and the coupler never got latched.  When driving the ATV onto the trailer, the front of the trailer came off the ball and put a little dent in Pete's new truck.  It's a stupid mistake that I've seen before.  In my mind I thought Pete locked it but apparently I wasn't seeing things right.  Either way I got a quick scolding, we hooked it back up and proceeded to load up.  Pete kept his cool pretty well as there is little one could do now.  It's sort of like getting the first scratch on the boat, not a great event but life goes on regardless.  After stopping by his house and loading up his stuff we headed north.  We were in no particular hurry and had time to stop by Bruce's place, just east of Garrison, to get our coffee cups refilled.  A quick visit and we were back on the road. Our next stop was in Grand Rapids to get groceries and go to the L & M farm store to get a battery for the inside lights for my portable shelter.  It's the first time in that store and I was really impressed as it reminded me how these types of stores used to be like.  Picking up a 12V 9 AH gel cell, I also bought a Vexilar Glow Ring for charging up my UV coated baits.  About 40 minutes north of Grand Rapids we stopped at the Frontier store to pick up bait and a few fishing items.  Arriving at the cabin, Pete's brother Tim arrived earlier and fired up the stove and had done some scouting for the fish.  After getting everything unloaded without incident, we hooked everything to my ATV and pulled our shacks out to the lake through the cattails.  It was quite slushy on our first drive through but we made it.  After stopping to see Tim, Pete decided to head up the lake further off a point, around 19 feet of water.  Pete kept talking about all the nice fish so when I caught an 8 inch bluegill and showed it to him, there was little reaction so back it went.  Although I had caught 5 fish in the few hours left, there were fish there and fishing out in the open didn't help our concentration.  The fish stopped about 30 minutes after sunset so we headed in for a nice meal of Cheeseburger Soup Tim had brought.  Tomorrow we'd hit it hard!

Nice 8 to 9 1/2 inch bluegills

Sunday morning arrived and after breakfast we headed back out.  Tim decided to fish the 23 foot water while Pete and I decided to try the point again.  After seeing what size fish Tim had kept there was a better understanding of what a nice bluegill was.  Setting up my portable that hadn't been used in about 6 years, there were a couple of things needing readjustment.  One of the screws on the bracket that held the front vertical poll support had come out.  Luckily it fell on the bare ice and was easily found and using a larger ice jig was able to make it work for the day.  The other is I mistakenly shoveled all the snow from the floor of my shack making it very slippery.  I like using the newer direct drive single action reels with 3 pound colored monofilament line on a very soft tipped 24 - 30 inch rod.  The key to catching these fish is to pay close attention to your line and the feel of the tip as the fish were biting very soft, often just inhaling the bait.  Moving the tip softly up and down would allow you to feel if a fish was there without pulling it out of their mouths, a quick set and up they come.  I ended the day with 14 nice bluegills, a small crappie and a very nice tullibee, about 18 inches long.  They are really fun to catch.  Tim had some really nice crappies in his bucket, in that 11 to 13 inch range as he was in deeper water.  Another fisherman came out to his area and did pretty good using larger baits.  I thought the glow ring really helped in that deeper water as you could see the fish come up to the bait as it drifted down.  My friend Kevin is a really good at this kind of fishing so I called him but he didn't answer.  We used to do real good in Alma using Purist's, a small panfish lure with a hard plastic attached on the hook shank.  It has a perfect sink rate, slow and inviting.  I did put one on and caught quite a bite of fish with it.  Kevin and I finally got connected and we talked about the using the Purist.  I laughed as he said you are fishing how deep!  It does take a while for those baits to get down, they can be deadly.  We cleaned about 30 fish that evening.

Monday was our last day and we decided to fish the deeper water.  Although the good news was the crappies were there, I only kept 2 sunfish as many were too small.  Still good action, it's fun watching the fish on your Vexilar and trying to get them to hit.  The same guy came out in the early afternoon and set up right next to us.  He left early and I suspect the noise didn't help our late afternoon bite.  Never the less I ended up with 2 nice sunfish and 7 beautiful crappies.  No complaints.  Although I had many offers to head to Red Lake, Winnebigoshish, and maybe Lake of the Woods.  Not having fished nice crappies and bluegills for a while it was totally enjoyable.  Enough to maybe try and fish panfish a little bit more this year.  I've fixed up the portable, got my auger running and picked up a few new lures and tuned up my gear.  It looks like we might be on Red in a week, with LOTW's definitely in the target.

My Fishing Buddy Kevin

Kevin on the Right and Myself on the left

 Everyone has a special friend in their lives and mine is Kevin Aiona.  We grew up together as we live right down the block from him and his family.  His mom Donna was in the same grade as my dad so we had lot's in common to begin with.  If there was anything to do with fishing, Kevin and I were inseparable.  From fishing behind Bud Tollefson's house for suckers in April to cat fishing in August, when I fished Kevin was right by my side!  The memories are so many that it's almost impossible to name them all.  Since we were about 10, we fished special places on the Buffalo River like Carp Slough, the Buffalo Bridge, the Trestle as well as Big Creek, Trout Creek, areas on the Mississippi north of Alma such as the Cut, the Wiggle Waggle and Catfish Slough.  One of our best times and an annual favorite was fishing Wilbur's in April for the northerns as they spawned in the flood waters of Big Lake.  At first we'd rent a boat from Wilbur, and row up the shoreline casting daredevils.  In the late 70's I secured an old Martin 7.5 hp outboard and we had a motor to give us the status of a couple of big shots!  I am sure that we did really well every time we fished for northerns, but admittedly it was a long time ago.  Never the less we did very well as you can see by the picture.  Kevin is about a year younger than me but he looks pretty young in this picture, I suspect this picture was about 1978, I loved wearing old army jackets and Kevin, he still looks like he was in Junior High.  I am sure he will laugh at this picture yet those were the best of times.  Kevin was my best man in my wedding and I was his. His son Ben who has appeared in the blog is my God child, quite an honor.  From the age of 10 to 25 I am sure there were a number of great pictures.  I found an old photo album and it prompted me to pay tribute to my friend, we really caught a lot of fish in the day, with minimal help other than our own knowledge.  No depth finders, GPS, heck a good rod was maybe $15.

Kevin and a nice 4 Pound Largemouth

Both Kevin and I got pretty good at fishing bass along Catfish Slough.  I had bought a boat from Paul Wichmann which was laying in one of his pastures.  I fixed it up and ended getting a 15 hp Evinrude and we were in business.  One weekend Kevin and I camped just south of the Wabasha bridge.  We would throw Moss Boss's into the pond weed along the shore, working the bait on the surface as it would leave a trail marking where you had fished.  More often the bass would explode through the pondweed to hit the plastic lure as it skipped over the weeds.  The bass we caught were 3 to 4 pounds and would leave a hole in the pond weed, leaving a clue as to the success we had.  We caught a lot of bass like the one Kevin is holding.  That weekend we got back to our campsite after dark and walked up to the tent with our flashlight.  All of a sudden we heard this sharp rattling sound and we knew exactly what that meant, a rattlesnake.  Swamp rattlesnakes were know to be in the area and we finally ran into one.  Well we found it and quickly dispatched it.  Putting it into a burlap bag we got back in the boat and headed for Slippery's on the Wabasha side of the river, just upstream from the bridge.  The legal drinking age was 19 so we decided to celebrate our adventure.  There was a guy in the bar that was interested in our now dead snake so for a couple of beers we gave it to him.  BTW Slippery's is the bar where the original Grumpy Old Men was filmed, pretty cool.  It has changed now but at the time it was the same as in the movie.  We also fished alot of walleyes in Catfish Slough.  Both Kevin and I got good at making our own standup jigs then tying fake fur on them, we hammered the walleye while we drifted with the current down the slough.  It could be the middle of July and 100 degrees out and we'd still hammer them in 5 to 7 feet of water.  It's been a while since I have fished that area but Kevin says it's all filled in now.  I guess it's tough to stop change but the river is constantly changing.  Kevin and his son Ben are still river rats and my goal this year is to try and relive the past, a pretty big task.  Maybe I'll learn a few new things.  

Anyway my intent is to not forget those that were an important part of your being.  There is a lot of guys that fit this description, Paul Wenaas, Barry Kolden, Anyway running across these old pictures brought back a lot of memories and there are a few more that will give me an excuse to elaborate on the past!

Finally Ready!

Ready to go!!

 With the nice weather we are having the ice formation has deteriorated to a slow crawl putting a lot of pressure on some of the better lakes up north like Red Lake, my usual first destination with the Salem Ice Cabin.  Last winter, our trip to Lake of the Woods proved to be difficult for moving around as my wheel stayed up when I jacked the house up.  Luckily my friend Ben had a propane torch and by heating the pivot axle it came down and we were good.  the gave enough time to get it fixed over the summer........well you know how that often goes as procrastination is one's enemy.  Having the time to fix the worst side before the October snow  yet failing to get the other side done, it was obvious that this task is too big for one guy.  My friend Bruce offered to let me pull it into his heated shop and would help me so that's what we did last Friday.  Besides breaking a tail light backing in, Mark Applen who has a house just like mine, joined in on the task of pulling the axle pivot off to clean it, grease it and put it back together.  Not that 2 of us could not have done this but it soon became obvious that the 3rd guy made it happen. With a lot of work we had the wheel assembly off in about 30 minutes, now the work began, cleaning all that hardened grease from the assembly. Having the right tools makes a huge difference as we used power brushes to clean the big stuff off, special round brushes to clean the inside, and a special saw to cut a grove from the grease zerk across the face to help channel grease to the entire length of the axle, which was the initial problem in the first place, the grease would only go one way leaving 2/3rds of the axle with no grease.  It's a heavy duty axle but the grease system is not the best.  In addition, while fixing the right side, the grease zerk fell out so I bought some replacements.  Trying to install the replacement zerk, the 1/4 inch tread just fit into the hole, in other words the factory simply drilled a smaller than the thread hole then pounded them in.  This wasn't right so it forced me to go back to the auto parts store to get the next largest threaded zerk, an 8mm x 1.0 metric.  Then to the hardware store to get a metric tap and the appropriate drill, which they didn't have. The tap needed a 7mm drill, I had something close in inches so it would have to do.  The tap was hard to get through but it worked beautifully.  At the time I didn't think about putting a second grease zerk in the middle of the axle to make sure grease gets everywhere but when we had the left side off I bought the right drill size and put in the new zerk.  Admittedly the tapping went easier now I had the right hole!  Anyway we finished the job, now just to install the new tail light lens and I am set to go!  It sure is nice to have great friends when you need them as I know it would have been difficult to do this myself.  And to send it out to get fixed would have been $500 minimum.  I can buy a lot of Crown Royal for that!!!  Thanks guys!

Milwaukee M18 grease gun.

One of the things that I make sure to do every year is to grease everything.  Adding grease to these axles can be difficult as the zerk is in an awkward place and to hold the hose and pump the gun takes a certain amount of coordination.  For this I purchased a Lock N Lube, locking grease hose tip to grab onto the xerk so your 2 hands are left to pump.  This worked OK but can prove to be a mess if it's not locked on.  Bruce had this Dewalt battery powered grease gun and it was the cat's meow!  Although most of my battery stuff is Milwaukee (must be my Wisconsin Heritage showing!) a quick search and they had one just like it for my M18 series stuff.  It's pretty good stuff as in my collection is a 1/2 inch drill, 3/8 inch impact driver, circular hand saw, brad nailer, hedge trimmer, and a hacksaw/reciprocating saw.  They all work great and it's pretty impressive the amount of time you can get off a battery.  So the grease gun comes in on Monday and of course who needs to read the instructions........right.  I pull out the plunger and lock it into place,  unscrew the cap and insert the grease cartridge.  So far so good.  The greas cartridge has a aluminum top that you pull off by the tab, got that done.  Well I could not screw the end back on.  Completely dumbfounded it sat till the morning when I called Milwaukee's techical service, of course they don't know much.  This is so frustrating as I've had grease guns forever!!  A quick call to Bruce and explained what I did, he said you have to unscrew the barrel and insert the grease tube in from the other end............DUHH.  Grease is messy to begin with but after getting reset, it works like a charm as it's supposed to, now that I have the cartridge inserted properly, it works great.  After cleaning it up it's ready to go.

So the latest situation on Red Lake is tenuous at best.  This warmer weather has slowed the ice development however the latest word is that trucks are parking on the ice along shore as well, they are allowing ATV's out to the crack that usually develops 1/2 mile out then one has to walk about 2 miles to the deeper water to find the fish.  Friends claim that last Saturday the DNR were kicking people off because they were worried there were getting to many people on the lake.  By Christmas things should be back to normal and hopefully will be getting out within the next 2 weeks.  Either way I am getting anxious to get out.

Getting Lazy!!

 Strikemaster 40V 10" electric auger 

 This covid has really affected things, especially my ambition.  There are a ton of things that need to be done before next weekend, especially making sure that the wheel house stuck axle gets done before ice fishing.   Thank the Lord I have friends like Bruce Wiley that has offered to help me in his heated workshop.  I did the worst one back before we got the 8 inches of snow in October only to discover that the worst side actually better than the "better" side so the help is greatly appreciated.  This pandemic has created a lot of disruption in what normally are events that I look forward to.  The Blaine Ice Show at the Sports center was cancelled, it's a great little show that has a lot to offer being the first show of the season.  The big Ice Fishing show at the St. Paul Civic Center which usually takes place the first weekend in December has been cancelled.  The Governor has shut down everything until December 21st but I have no hope that this will be it.  It is funny, when I was young it was interesting to see how cynical the older men like my grandpa was, now I understand!!  The big show is the Northwest Sportshow held at the Minneapolis Convention Center and is scheduled for March 25 thru the 28th.  At the present time it's not cancelled yet  don't hold your breath.  As well the "Black Friday" deals are around but most are online or run for a week, which results in simply regularly sale priced items disguised as "great" deals. Traditional Black Friday deals required a guy to get to the store before noon to take advantage of 50 - 60% off a few but nice items.  2 years ago I purchased 2 very nice Pflueger spinning reels for 50% off, which was $15 less than the standard sale price.  Last year there were some excellent deals on fishing accessories, this year....not much.  This years situation lead me to hit Cabela's last Wednesday and walked out of there with a new 10 inch Strikemaster 40V Electric Auger.  I do have a 10 inch Strikemaster Big Volt auger that is basically a 12 Volt starter motor attached to a transmission.  Rigging up a trolling motor plug inside my wheel house it works pretty good but it is slow and in the cold the chipper blade has a tendency to freeze up the cutting edge.  Although not on sale it was the last one left and with my $300 in Cabela's Points it prompted me to pick it up.  One issue these days is that many manufacturers now limit inventory.  A concern was that the existing auger bit and extension would not fit however Strikemaster did a great job and everything is interchangeable making my 9 inch bit on my gas auger useable, my extension, and the old 8 inch bit that sits in the pole shed. A quick check on Strikemaster's web site showed this item was sold out.  It was probably a good idea to get this over with.  Beyond that, this was the extent of my Black Friday week sales this year.  Now it's time to get ready to to go to Red soon!!

Jared's nice 8 point buck

Well deer hunting is over and it was pretty uneventful.  That's probably good as there is little room in the freezer.  Besides I have enough venison from last year to make another batch of summer sausage with Lory Brasel, we are getting pretty good at this.  Last spring we made 2 batches with adding Fermento, a powdered buttermilk product to add some tang to it.  Here in Minnesota there are few places that know how to make good summer sausage.   People argue with me but if your used to the bland sausage they make here, I guess ones prospective isn't developed as well.  This year we are going to add encapsulated citric acid, as the Fermento was OK, it still wasn't very tangy.  Last year my good friend Kevin Aiona and his son Ben provided me with all the venison I needed.  Ben leases some land near Eleva and do really well deer hunting.  Here is a picture of Ben's son Jared with a beautiful 8 pointer he took on the Wisconsin deer hunting opener weekend.  After hunting for 50 years, this is considerably nicer than anything I have ever shot.  To be honest it really doesn't matter anymore as getting out with my friends is more important than horns on the wall.  My friend Russ Praught and his nephew went up to Red on Thanksgiving day and was able to walk out on 6 inches of ice. He sent me a picture of some nice walleyes they got then the next day fished the morning getting a few more before parking his house at JR's, ready for the next trip.  The 10 day outlook has temperatures in the mid teens and maybe a week after my wheel house get's fixed we should be ready.  This covid has messed up the experience as one can clean your walleyes in the bar area, they will do their famous fish fry as take out so there is hope!  Either way I am excited as all of this comes together.  Our experience at Springsteel Island Resort on Lake of the Woods in Warroad was nice last winter so the plan is to fish Red a couple of times before moving it north.  Ben will bring his house there as well and in February and March we will fish there. It is a long ways but it will be a long winter.  As well my friend Dave Johnson has a cabin at the resort so we have a nice place to headquarter out of.  Hopefully my next update will include success with getting my axle loosened up.

Deer Hunting, 2020 Back at Rich's

 

3 of the 4 deer bagged on Opening day

Well despite it getting more difficult to deer hunt each year, I decided to go again this year.  Hunting with my good friend Jack and his son Ben, a number of years we started hunting by his cabin on Platte Lake, west of Mille Lacs.  Soon we befriended a man named Rich Allen, who owned 160 acres about 3 miles southwest of Jack's cabin.  The land is mostly a peat swamp with some high ground east across the swamp as well as an wooded island that is slightly higher but not by much.  In the later years the water level had risen so high that it was almost impossible to get back to our hunting spots on the island.   Rich had passed away a number of years ago however his nephew Brett now has the land and he has always welcomed us to hunt.  Unfortunately we have chosen an easier path of hunting, another friend of Jack's, Loren has land about 15 miles from his cabin but for the most part it's dry and easy to walk.  This year Brett with the help of his son Trent and Jack's son Ben, they started clearing out all the overgrown brush that basically was holding back the water in the swamp.  After many weekends of work they were able to clear out the old drainage ditch enough to lower the water in the swamp by at least 6 inches.  Many years ago Jack had some solid aluminum catwalk pieces and gave them to rich to put across the ditch as a bridge.  Prior to clearing the ditch the water was about 2 inches above the deck.  When we walked over it on Friday to check out the stands the water was at least 6 inches under the bridge, however it was still pretty wet in the swamp as I soon found out that leaving my knee boots at home wasn't such a great idea!  Luckily Jack had some to use, I would have been wet without them.  One thing that Brett also did was allow me to use one of his plastic roto molded deer stands that he put up in strategic locations.  Admittedly it was very nice, a swivel chair, propane heater, nice windows, sitting up 10 feet off the ground supported by a number of treated 4 x 4's and a concrete anchor, it was very nice.  It was also nice of Brett to allow myself this luxury, maybe because I am getting old, never the less it was appreciated.  Either way it was nice to walk out to the stands on Friday to get familiar with the area again as it's been maybe 4 years or so since we hunted the swamp.  Friday night was our traditional Steak a la Kienitz night as appreciation to allowing us to hunt the land, we provide Friday night steak, baked potatoes, and fixing's.  It was always appreciated by Rich so we have kept the tradition going.  The first year we hunted with Rich, we brought a Flip Flop grill from Eleva.  Rich was so impressed he asked me to pick him up one, which after my mother got one for me, we had the next year.  Brett still has the grill as it does the steaks perfectly (although they were originally for chicken).

Plastic shelter on stilts!

We got up early, 5:00 AM on opening morning.  Being retired this isn't my normal routine however I did survive!  After a quick bite to eat we were headed to Brett's place to walk out to the stands.  It was quite dark yet the path was easy to follow.  Ben went south to a stand about 100 yards from Jack. Jack took the first stand on the edge of the wooded island, near where I would set up my old stand years ago.  Funny all those good trees were blown down and the feel of the area had changed quite a bit.  After wishing Jack good luck, my path took me about 150 yards north to the northeast point of the woods overlooking the edge of the swamp as well as the point.  It was unusually warm for this time of year with the high temperature predicted in the high 60's.  No need for heavy clothes so I removed my coat and sat down and got comfortable.  It was great!  With a nice south wind, it was just perfect as I stayed there till dark.  About 10:00 there were 2 shots very close.  Soon a call from Jack, Ben had a spike buck down and he went to get the special ATV to drag it back.  They were visible from my stand but it was just too comfortable to get my jacket and boots on to trudge my way over to see the deer, it would be there upon my return.  His buck is the one on the right in the first picture.  It was interesting as to the left of the stand was a pile of corn and 6 Mountain Dew bottles.  Legally one cannot hunt over a bait pile yet this was left over from bear hunting, in which it is legal to hunt.  Apparently the deer hadn't found the corn pile as it was still pretty intact.  Asking Brett what the Mountain Dew bottles were doing, he stated that bear love Mountain Dew and will rip open the tops and drink the entire half gallon, and there were 6 of them.  I didn't see any bear as the season closed a number of weeks ago and Brett had not cleaned it up.  Oh well, it was interesting about the Mountain Dew.  Because of my scheduled angiogram for next Monday which includes having a Covid Test on Thursday, I will be quarantined either way, if I am negative they don't want me to risk catching it between Thursday and the procedure on Monday, or if I am positive, it still means quarantine for 2 weeks........a lose lose deal so no more deer hunting this year!  The reason for all of this is my heart valve is slowly deteriorating.  This isn't an issue as I am schedule to have a TVAR type valve replacement which no longer requires open heart surgery. Previous test show not much change to the valve but one of my symptoms is getting out of breath easy.  A CT with Contrast showed some narrowing of the coronary arteries but not abnormal however a better test is the angiogram.   I think my issue is simply retirement and I am definitely out of shape.  After Monday we'll know more as my friend Mark Applen just had the same thing done and they put in 2 stents, which they might do to me.  Oh well.  Winter is coming and there's still a lot to do! 

Hanging with Pete

The home base on the Sipe property

 Last Wednesday Pete invited me to his family's compound east if Marcell, MN just north of Grand Rapids. Along with us was Pete's brother Tim, he reminds me of my brother, Steve.  He has talked about getting me up to the land that his dad and uncle owns, 200+ acres that border the Chippewa National Forest. It's quite the place, nothing fancy as you can see the main lodge on the land, however it is quite nice in it's own way.  Dating back to the 1940's, Pete's grandfather bought the land and today it is in the hands of Pete's dad and Uncle.  The land is basically in the middle of nowhere as one hears nothing but the wind at night, quite peaceful.  It's quite a hike off the main roads as one travels dirt forest roads to their land.  The landscape is full of huge old growth Red and White  Pines that stand tall and are impressive.  As well the area has been slowly logged off so it's an interesting mix of these large pines, quite a bit of Poplar Trees with a smattering of birch and oak trees.  Pete tells the story of his uncle that in the past would bring acorns with him and he would drop them in the woods as he walked, stepping them into the ground as he went along.  You can see the results all around as the woods have a lot of smaller oak trees growing.  The cabin in the picture is a single room building with a metal roof, old style shingle siding, with 4 bunks inside, a propane range for cooking, a barrel stove for heat, and and old style sand point through the floor with a hand pump by a sink that needed to have the plugs reinstalled and the pump primed.  Because the water used in the sink is pretty clean, the sink's drain empties on the ground outside the cabin.  There is electricity available for lighting and in both Pete and my case powering our Cpap machines.  No television, it was nice.  A simple picnic table served as our main seating area for eating and relaxing.  As you see there was a small amount of snow in the area with ice forming along the lake shore.  Pete and Tim gave me the grand tour of the surrounding lakes, forest roads and points of interest.  Along with the tour was commentary on the CCC projects in the area, the WW2 German Prisoner of war camps where German prisoners were transported back to camps in the US to work in the mines, cutting wood in the forests, or working the farms.  Many of these prisoners ended up staying in the US after the war.   

View from the shoreline.

One thing I found unique was the entire lake called Heinen Lake was completely within the property.  Although not a big lake it is fed by a river that runs through a number of lakes on it's way to join the Big Fork River in the city of Bigfork.  Apparently the lake's outlet seldom freezes over the winter so they leave their docks in.  Between the lakes one experiences a lot of beaver activity which constantly changes to water levels as the lake was quite high for this time of year. Claiming there is a nice 20+ hole in the lake, the fish seem to be hard to find in the winter.  There is another lake that borders the property that is better for fish in the winter and I am looking forward to possible trying my luck sometime this winter, maybe later in February or March. Because the forest roads are not plowed in the winter, generally the mode of transportation into the land is via a snowmobile.  Hopefully I will have my sled running by then and get the chance to chase those nice crappies Pete and Tim were talking about.  We did end up putting a ladder stand together for Pete then selecting a nice tree in a stategic location.  There seemed to be quite a few deer around however a few deer can make a lot of tracks.  Tim had a trail cam by his stand and we brought it back to camp to look at what has been walking by.  A couple of does, a fox, and a very nice 8 point buck staring right into the camera.  Pete claims that over the years one usually finds the area is dominated by one nice buck and usually a smaller spike buck and a few does.  There used to be a wolf pack on the property however both state that it is not a factor.  There is only a few doe permits allowed so it's mostly buck hunting.  I guess we will see what next week brings.

As far as my hunting, Jack, Ben, and I will be hunting our old stands on Rich's old property owned by Brett.  We haven't hunted the area in the last few years because it's been so wet however this year Brett had a couple of guys clearing out the drainage ditch that runs through the center of the property.  Apparently this had significantly drained the water, enough that one can walk or take an ATV and not get wet or stuck.  This well be nice as it make it easier to get to our stands.  Unfortunately I need to leave on Saturday night to attend a family event in Wisconsin, but that's okay, Jack and I can hunt all next week as he is also retired.  The weather has been nice with highs in the mid 60's helping to allow getting done at the last minute.  I should be able to get all those things that the early snowfall a couple of weeks ago stopped progress.  

Winter is Early

Evinrude 250 HO G2

 Winter has definitely arrived here in Dayton, and around much of the upper Midwest.  Along with winter comes the mad scramble to get things done, or at least as much as one can.  As I grow older it is unclear as to if I am getting wiser or simply lazier!  Upon returning from our delayed Leech Lake Opener it was decided that October 13 would be a good day to get the boat winterized, seeing it was forecasted to get colder in the next week, and there was time, the water was still hooked up, yeah one could possibly go fishing one more time but......  I have mentioned this before regarding my Evinrude 250 HO G2 outboard, unfortunately BRP has decided to quit producing them.   Being a fishing forum geek, you'd swear anyone owning a recent G2 Evinrude is going straight to hell, yet my dealer, Frankie's does a good job with Joe being a certified mechanic, heck the engine may very well out last me so what's the issue?  Anyway this outboard has a great feature for winterizing it as it's been discussed before.  It is a oil injected 2 stroke, V6.  In the digital display control data center it has a function called "Winterize".  Sometimes I have done this at the boat landing as I load it up one last time, however lately it's done at the pole shed, simply hook up the water to the engine, start and let it warm up then hit the winterize button.  The engine goes into a high idle, I suspect until it hits a certain temperature then it starts to fog itself.  From a virtual no smoke in the exhaust to a heavy blue oil smoke it runs for about 15 more seconds before shutting itself off.  The last check is the lower unit grease which is a plastic reservoir under the hood, the big boy is all set for the winter.  The 9.8 hp kicker is a 4 stroke and when it was in to get the livewell valve fixed they changed the oil and the lower unit grease.  Dumping in some gas treatment as this engine is carbureted,  the kicker was started and run for about 15 minutes.  The last act of winterizing was to pull off the gas line and let the engine run out of gas.  With that out of the way she is ready for a long winter's sleep.  The boat needs to be cleaned as it is pretty dirty from the October Team Walleye Opener.  More on that later as there is another boat in the shed that needs some attention as well! 

7.8 inches of snow overnight

All of this was with amazing foresight as last week we had a record snowfall for this early in October.  Usually Tim Kuntz would help me blow my sprinkler system out before it snows and freezes.  Of course Tim passed away in April yet it was amazing the people who stepped up and offered their services.  Bruce has a big compressor and he offered to let me use it, my neighbor Rich had an extra compressor as backup and offered it.  As well Limo Joe Hanson has a big compressor to run his sand blasting equipment, he went and did Connie's (Tim's wife) system before coming over to my shed and hook up.  It was just in the nick of time as you can see by my truck, 7.8 inches fell last week.  Of course with the snow comes the cold and the big scramble to take care of the rest of things needed to be done.  The list is crazy because the leaves didn't get picked up, with a lot still on the trees as of today.  Potatoes are still in the ground, garden supports need to be removed.  Mover deck removed and the snow blower attachment and cab attached.  Oil changed on the 25 hp river boat.  In normal years one usually has till the first of November to get these things taken care of.  Oh well, it is what it is!  Not only that but the Salem needs some maintenance.  The last trip to Lake of the Woods, the wheel stayed up.  Luckily Ben had a propane torch and with some heat it went down.  Well of course waiting until the last minute, the right side came off with a little convincing needed however the left is being really stubborn.  Bruce has offered to help me and I will be taking him up on the offer soon, or at least before Thanksgiving.  It's really a 2 man job, figuring the best way to remove the wheel pivot assembly, not an easy job.  The weather forecast for the end of the week calls for more normal temperatures, say in the lower 50's, maybe some things will get done!!  Deer hunting is coming soon and with the snow on the ground basically through most of Minnesota, ice fishing is just around the corner!
 

Leech Lake Opener, Team Walleye

Andy with a Nice Walleye

Because of concerns about the Covid virus, Team walleye decided to move it's 47th annual Minnesota Fishing Opener from the traditional weekend of the second Saturday in May to October 9th at Brindley's Resort on Leech Lake.  It was absolutely beautiful with the surrounding green pines and the yellow aspen trees complimented with the chestnut to red leaves of the oak trees, it was very nice.  Not unlike spring the walleyes tend to return to the shallower haunts that they are in May, however the wind plays a very important role in determining where the walleyes are.  Also the water temperatures are about what they are in a normal May, 50 - 55 degrees F.  Also not unlike the May opener, minnows and trolling crankbaits were the strategy.  Our first issue was to find minnows.  In May spot tail shiners are the preferred minnow species and we will use some fathead minnows, however the fall is not the season for spot tails so we were forced to use golden shiners instead.  These are available as they are grown in commercial minnow ponds and serve the winter market for larger minnows.  As well we were able to get some medium sucker minnows which turned out to work very well.  Having done well on Redtail chubs this summer and fall I decided to get a gallon and split it with my brother Steve.  These minnows are supposed to be work very well but they are expensive, much more than the suckers so we were the only 2 boats using them as we purchased them separately.  Everyone arrived at the resort on Friday, October 9th by 5:00.  Some had come earlier to scout the popular spots and did okay, a great sign.  The weather was supposed to be nice on Saturday with little wind, Sunday was ahead of a cold front and had very strong southerly winds and rough, turning to rain that evening lasting through Monday, with northwesterly winds on Monday, we were hoping that cold front would not effect anything.  It turns out that the nicest day, Saturday was my worst day of catching.  My strategy was to find the mid depth humps off Submarine Island and pull Lindy Rigs or jigs in 14 -16 feet of water.  Heck, we never even marked a fish.  Although disappointing we headed back towards Pine Point to drift across the area which is about 10 feet.  There my friend Jay Johnson managed to get 5 fish bringing our total to 7 walleyes which included zero for me! Back at the cabin the guys were giving me a hard time about possibly winning the DCS (Didn't Catch Sh!t) award, well the tourney was still young.  As stated, Sunday the wind took an abrupt shift 180 degrees and blew with vengeance out of the northwest.  Because the other  6 boats seem to catch something out between Pine Point and Grand Vu Flats we decided to try there.  It was much better with my friend Andy Achman nailing this nice 21 inch walleye.  The walleyes were very good sized and matched up with the Leech Lake limit of 4 under 20 inches or 3 under 20 and 1 over 20.  There were a lot of fish in that 20 - 23 inch range and we definitely kept one apiece. That evening I had Ben and Mason in the boat and we spent a lot of time trolling the east side Ottertail Point, usually a very good spot.  We must have made 4 trolling runs and nothing to show for it.  The moon was not out resulting in the night being very dark.  This time of year 8PM is completely dark and it became difficult to see the shoreline.  Relying on the GPS tracks works good but the kicker motor doesn't respond that quickly making it somewhat challenging.

24 inch Walleye

When fishing Sunday I happened to pull in beautiful fish measuring 24 inches.  We set our own limit at 21 inches as the biggest we would keep to that went back into the lake.  The north wind was cold for sure but the bite was not deterred. All of our 7 boats stayed in the general area and did pretty well.  I ended up with 3 walleyes, at least I was out of the basement!  Because the bite was good on Pine Point we decided to try it again after dinner.  We got a few more but admittedly the bite wasn't very good after 7:00 PM.  We switch around boats and Monday I enjoyed the company of Mike Kimpel and  James.  Quite honestly my boat wasn't on fire so we decided to try the shallows for perch as Leech Lake has a nice perch population. After drifting Pine for a few hours we headed for the Narrows, an area between the main lake, Walker Bay, and Steamboat bay.  Averaging around 4 to 5 feet deep, there are a lot of isolated reed beads and the perch congregate in those areas.  We have seen some 12 inches caught back at the resort so we figured we'd try it.   Because all of the buoys were already removed it was a challenge to find a spot to start.  Picking a reed bed we drifted into it using the Motorguide to anchor us at the edge.  There were perch but the average was only about 5 inches.  We caught a ton of them but only kept 4 in that 9 inch range.  After an hour or so and about 100 small perch we decided to finish the afternoon off back at Pine Point.  At 2 we decided to hang it up as it was important to eat early so we could get out before dark!  Deciding to drive to shop at Reeds, arriving at Walker it was closed.  The guys that had been there on Sunday made no mention of the big sign on the door.....damn!!

Gill Net set on OtterTail Point

Monday night proved to be the most interesting for me.  With Mike and James still with me they both agreed that experimenting might be worth while.  The northwest wind was blowing into Duck Point all day and it seemed a natural for walleyes to be in that area.  Well they weren't.  I really wanted to try trolling again and my guests agreed to try it, maybe 30 minutes earlier in the day.  We headed east to Ottertail Point again as I really marked fish in 12 feet there earlier and maybe they would head to the shoreline to feed.  We started trolling when Mike noticed a laundry detergent bottle floating on the surface.  Well maybe some one was marking something.  Trolling well outside the makeshift buoy my shad rap got hung up.  Getting just above where the bait was stuck, the line finally snapped.  Deciding to try a Rattlin Rouge we kept goin up the shore line when we passed a bleach bottle floating.  This time our normal route took us to the shore side of the buoy and we passed just fine.  Turning around  and staying to the outside there was a third buoy and sure enough, I lost my bait again.  Now we were thinking someone might have secured a rope to the bottom to collect trolling lures but side scan showed nothing.  This time a cheap Sassy Shad, $1.49 went on the end of the line.  Sure enough it also got snagged and lost.  All but frustrated as I have made at least 50 trolling runs along this course and never lost a lure.  Before leaving we went up to one of the jugs and pulled it up, it was making sense now.  Mike found a gill net attached to the buoy line with a 15 pound barbell weight attached to the bottom.  As we pulled more up, there were 4 walleyes caught in the net.  Not sure if anyone was watching us we freed a couple of the walleyes and dropped the mess back down.  I have never experienced that on Leech before yet we had never fished the fall before.  Greg at Brindley's acknowledge that the Indians can and do net the lake in the fall however he was surprise they had gone that far.  As stated we were tempted to retrieve our lost lures but decided that $15 wasn't worth the potential hassle.  At least the mystery was solved!  We cabin ended up being able to keep 84 walleyes, 4 each for 21 guys.  They were the nicest sized walleyes we had caught in as long as I remember.  The total was 170 walleyes caught, probably not our best year however the overall size was excellent. The fishing was good enough to want to go back there in the fall and we'll see if next year we can get a group of guys to go!  As always thanks to Mark Mayerich and his dedication to our group.

Preparing For Our Delayed Opener

 

Bush King Acorn Squash

The last few weeks have been filled with preparing everything for our delayed fishing opener.  Usually held on the second week of May, due to the covid situation we were able to reschedule our big cabin at Brindley's Harbor to the weekend starting October 9th till the 13th.  One of my big things was to try and get my livewell valve working as it is supposed to.  When we went up to Leech on the traditional Minnesota Fishing Opener, it didn't take long to discover that my livewell valve had frozen and cracked. 
This is a problem that was the first time in almost 30 years I have seen one crack.  Maybe it happened when they replaced the axle last December, it was inside for a while and it might have melted some water along with the need to jack the trailer up, but no difference, it was cracked.  Having it repaired a couple of times, the livewell simply did not seal right when switched to recirculate.  This mode allows one to recirculate the water inside the livewell without draining it, great for moving from spot to spot with walleyes in the livewell.  Well, the valve continued to leak even after a few ideas were tried.  This time Frankie's put a new control cable in and it works like new now.  I have my suspicions but will leave it at that!  It is also harvest time in the garden as we finally had a killing frost a couple of nights ago.  A bumper crop of raspberries have had me look at the method of freezing that works well on my sweet corn.  Pick them and put on a tray to freeze.  Once frozen vacuum pack them, they should be sealed and fresh for the coming winter. Did some rhubarb this spring, it will be interesting to see how these turn out.  If it's anything like the sweet corn, stuff I did over a year ago still tastes a fresh as the day it was picked.  In fact our neighbor Lynn Brasel introduced us to a new way to prepare.  Take the corn and heat it in a pan, add about a couple tablespoons of butter then a good portion of cream cheese.  Simply awesome! The other surprise was the acorn squash that was planted called Bush King.  Figuring it would be somewhat manageable I planted 3 hills of it, maybe 4 seeds per hill.  They say acorn squash is ready when the undersides turn from yellow to orange.  The plants were about dead anyway so the harvest began.  When through there were over 60 squash.  Not overly large but a single squash is perfect for 2 people.  Taking one and cutting it in half, scraped the seeds out and replaced it with butter and Brandon's Raspberry Infused Bourbon Maple Syrup, wrapped in foil and cooked on the grill.  Simply amazing!  Okay, this isn't Cooking with Dave but these recipes are too good not to share.  The fishing stories should come next week!!

Wild Marsh Sporting Clay Course

On September 18th, delayed a week again from this covid stuff, we had the Kramer Open.  This is a sporting clays event that Dave Kramer, a friend and one time customer, does to help raise money for a friend of his that passed away at an early age leaving his wife and children to themselves.  I really got started through my friend Tom Emmons, who tragically died in 2012 ( a bad year as I lost a few friends by the time it ended).  Dave still raises money for the children of his friend and I continue to try and make it as a remembrance of my friend Tom.  Also it is a lot of fun as years ago we had a team that would shoot 100 rounds every month for 5 months.  My old neighbor, Roger Weber got me into trap shooting in the mid 80's.  Then I used my old Browning A5 (squareback)   shotgun and did horrible, averaging about 16 clays in 25.  There is something about that gun which just didn't feel right.  It was acquired back in the mid 70's when I traded my old snowmobile for it and a 22 rifle.  The Browning is an original Belgium model with a blonde stock, it's probably worth more now than I paid for the snowmobile.  Still wanting to shoot better and blaming the gun....the obvious solution was to get a different gun.  One day we were in Galyan's store in Minnetonka and they had a great gun selection.  A lot of guys shoot over/under's so I ended up buying a Browning Citori 12 ga, 26 inch barrels, figuring it would be a good upland game gun for grouse and pheasants.  Little did I know that longer barrels 30 inches or so were better for shooting clays.  Never the less this gun did it's job and immediately saw a 5 bird improvement over the A5.  When I started sporting clays that's a whole new experience as the stations are setup to mimic real situations, even throwing the targets so they roll on the ground like a rabbit!  My 26 inch Citori was nice but again I was stuck at around 30/50 on each course, 60/100 for the round.  In the meantime at work a guy who worked there dealt in guns.  It was fun to talk with him and we soon decided that a longer barrel would help me.  A few years later he let me know he could get Browning Citori 525, a gun made specifically for shooting clays, it had a 30 inch barrel, hand removeable chokes that extended another inch, changeable triggers, in a nice case.  He had a guy that was ordering some and  wanted to know if I was interested, as they were $1000 less than what they were selling in the gun shops.  Of course!!! Upon receiving the new over/under my scores jumped up another 8 per 100 and ended my average around 76/100.  It was a big improvement and much more enjoyable to shoot with.  In recent years I only average about 1 event per year, however this year I got 2 rounds in, one as a substitute for a guy in my neighbors league, and the Kramer.  68 was my first shoot and 78 was my score at the Kramer.  We did the Red and Blue courses this year.  It is sort of like golf, 8 stations (Holes) for each course, 6 clays on 7 and 8 on one.  Again because of covid I was on a team who I have never shot with, but it was fun as we rented a golf cart to make our way around the course. Although I did not place with the guys we shot with, I did wind the most in a row, 23 which is not bad seeing's how they were the first 23 clays I shot, my teammates must have thought I was a ringer, but soon my real colors started to show!  Oh well it was fun and a good day to look back at all the good times we had shooting.

Coming back from Frankie's last Thursday there was a fishing garage sale that just had to be visited.  I walked out of there with a couple of deep diving X Raps and a nice smaller Abu Garcia Black Max casting reel.  Making it to Cabela's I got the last 6'6" Berkley Lightning Rod casting rod they had.  Just a side note, these Berkley Lightning rods are quite incredible.  At $35 each you'd never believe that they are so cheap as they feel like a $100 Fenwick.  Anyway after mounting the Black Max reel and filling it with 15# P-Line, it will be a gift for my nephew, Kevin Anderson, as he is flying in from Portland to fish with us this weekend.  I give him crap as he lives right at the tip of the Willamette Valley in Oregon, one of the best places in the world for Pinot Noir wines.  I make him bring me a unique bottle every time he comes home, which he does and the wines have been excellent.  Because trolling shad raps will be the hot ticket this weekend for walleyes, I figured he needed a good trolling rod which this combination will do just perfectly.  Depending on the quality of the Pinot Noir he brings this time, I picked up a couple of great lures for him that maybe he could get as well!!