2013: A Review

I can not believe that 2013 is nearly over and 2014 is less than a day away.  Where did this year go?  At the beginning of this year, I, like many of us, came up with a list of goals that I wanted to accomplish in regards to fishing.  To refresh my memory, here is the list with my results for that goal:

• Find a better balance between family/work/fishing.  
•  While I do my best to keep personal business off of my blog, I found myself single again toward the end of July so as a silver lining I was able to take more time to fish.  Balance achieved.
• Identify three different bass patterns on the Pokegama chain.
• This past summer I had a seasonal spot on Pokegama near Pine City so I was able to spend a lot of weekends trying to figure the lake out.  I didn't accomplish what I had set out to with the time I had there, having only been able to identify a dock pattern and a wood pattern.  All the milfoil that rimmed all of Pokegama made it very difficult to get around and my inexperience with punching heavy cover, or knowing where to start, kept me from making much progress there.
• Work on getting familiar and comfortable using different presentations.  I relied on the swim jig a little too much the past couple years and I think that hindered my success a bit.  
• I did start working on punching during a trip to Chisago and Bald Eagle in late summer and was pretty happy with the results.  I do plan on picking up a rod that is a little better suited to the style at the upcoming Northwest Sportshow.
• Fish five new lakes during ice season.
• During Icefishapalooza, we hit Bone Lake and Chisago.  Chisago was great, Bone lake not so much.  In prepping for Icefishapalooza my Uncle and Father-in-law scouted out Lake Jane which was disappointing to say the least.  With the early ice that we've had this year, I've been getting out the last couple of weekends and have fished a couple of small lakes with a really nice pannie population.  So this goal is complete.
• Find some more shore fishing opportunities in the north metro that haven't been beaten to death by others (that being said, Centerville and Pelltier are out).
• Oh man.  I dropped the ball on this one, bad.  I tried fishing this small spit of water by my place, Golden Lake..  I'm planning to get a kayak this coming season so I will try this one again next year, but I'm skeptical...
• Get the project boat up and running again.  It may not look pretty to begin with, but for right now it only needs to float and run.
• No progress at all - I do have some pretty drastic plans in store though.  More on that to come in the future.

Hopefully your year treated you well and the new year is even better!

Here Comes The Ice

It looks like the ice season is on us already, I know a lot of people have been getting out and popping holes and it isn't even December yet! 

I'm getting excited too, I just got the call from my local shop that my auger is ready to pick up after having the gas tank replaced. I find myself needing to take a quick pause and temper that excitement, though. The average ice thickness I've been hearing is 3" in the cities and 4-5" as you go farther north. That's just not enough for me to be comfortable with yet - thankfully I still have plenty to do before I hit the ice. Northstar Angler posted a few weeks ago about hard water prep, and the article can serve as a nice checklist for making sure that you are prepped and ready to go once the ice is at a thickness that's right for you.

As long as we're on the topic of ice thickness, there has been a chart floating around for a while that shows how much ice forms at different average air temperatures.  Remember, though, it is a rough guide - so take it with a grain of salt.  Some folks need to be told, there are all sorts of factors that affect ice development; water current, snow cover, springs, sand and rock bars, and, of course, air temperature.  Here is the chart:
 

The Minnesota DNR also has a lot of good ice safety information, so while you're chaffing in your seat, give it a quick read.  Who knows, you may pick up a new tip that could save your life - or another person's. 

Of course, in the meantime, you can always find one of those rare MN hot pond gems and get your smallie on!

For Life.

So...  Today I'm being a somewhat typical student.  Which means that I'm procrastinating both my homework and household chores via Facebook.  In the midst of slacking off this morning I ran across a video that Abu Garcia had released recently.

Now, understand, I would rather be outside using my reels than inside watching a video about them.  I'm also a student of business and how they evolve and become the companies and brands that we know today.  The video below details the history of Abu Garcia as a company and I thought it was great, capturing a lot of the passion that most of us anglers feel for our sport.

So if you, like me, are slacking off on this rainy Saturday morning...  Take a little time and enjoy:



Oh, and in my defense, I did wash the dishes from breakfast before I watched the video.  So, there is that. 

Happy slacking, fishers!

Pokeagama/Snake Post - And Another For The BP Derby

With the fall semester starting soon, I decided to take my last fishing trip up to the camp for the season last weekend.  Working a compressed work week, I was able to head up Friday morning and was out on the water by noon.  At first I decided to check out a spot near the island in the main lake that was supposed to hold some crappie, something I haven't fished for all year long, but I wasn't able to mark anything on my graph.  The wind had started to pick up a little bit so I decided to move off the main lake and into a protected bay.

Some backstory:  After Memorial Day the milfoil got thick enough that I couldn't get through it with my trolling motor unless there was a boat channel already cleared by a home owner, so I was stuck fishing the outside weed edge for most of the year with mixed and inconsistent results.  At that time, I wasn't very comfortable with punching or pitching into the matted weeds, even though I knew that's where I would have to go.  My best line was in a natural bottle neck for the wind, so unless it was a calm day, the wind would push me too quickly through the weed beds and I lacked the confidence to deal with that.  As a result, this summer will be forever known as the Toothy Critter Summer.

Back to the point.  The milfoil had started to lay down and become passable, allowing me to start fishing the docks that I had wanted to get to all summer.  I started with a swim jig, using the dock to pendulum my bait as far underneath the dock as I could get it, and was rewarded quickly with a short chunk that had clearly been eating well:

I fished a couple more docks in the same line and got the stink eye from one of the home owners.  I put the trolling motor on high and went to a longer dock that I've consistently caught fish off of this summer but the water was down significantly, meaning I got stuck...  I had to raise the outboard completely out of the water, then the wind started to spin me around.  I decided it was enough of that noise and went down to the south end where a couple of creeks feed into the lake.

The weeds were a little more thick here but the wind was cut off, so I was able to work through the area with a Rage Craw.  I didn't pick anything up in the weeds, but there was an old willow tree overhanging the back of the channel and a small laydown next to it.  I pitched my bait along side a few times and then underneath the exposed log, catching a short fish.  I worked my way back toward the channel to the river and missed another dock fish with the swim jig.

I decided that since I hadn't spent much time on the river, to fish it a little more thoroughly.  After all, I would only have one more crack at it on Sunday with a couple of friends since my Saturday would be taken up doing chores.  I targeted the wood near one of my productive backwater areas from earlier in the year with a swim jig.  As it happened with the first dock fish, I didn't have to wait long to be rewarded with this skinny 18"er.  I didn't get a weight on it because the batteries in my scale were close to dead, so I took the length.  This guy brings me up to a four fish bag in BP's Blogger Derby!

Small Water. Big fish.

A good buddy and I decided to hit a small lake, maybe 200 acres, that we had seen on the DNR's website that had a promising net survey, while this was corroborated by an old neighbor of mine that had talked to me about the same lake a couple years back.  It was a hike from the cities, about an hour and half, but based on the survey, we decided it was worth a shot.  If things didn't pan out, I knew a few other lakes we could fish in the area, so it wasn't too big of a worry.

Once we got to the lake, we got his boat out of the trunk (yes, the trunk), and started inflating it.  Turns out those inflatable raft deals aren't too bad, unless you store it in an old golf club bag and the zipper puts holes in it...  Both of us being former Boy Scouts, we had the perfect solution.  Duct tape!  Of course it didn't work, at least not very well or for very long, but it allowed us enough time to get out and do some fishing.  Even if I was a little distracted by the slowly deflating boat gunnel.

We took a quick look at our surroundings and the entire lake was lined with reeds and cattails and I thought "my kinda lake".  Given the cloudless, post-cold front conditions we were fishing in, we agreed to head to the north end of the lake where there was still a little shade on the water and a variety of cover.  My buddy setup with a live bait rig and I was setup with a Northstar Custom Baits Swim Jig.

I made a few casts and got a small pike to take my jig, shredding the trailer in the process.  I replaced it with a little brighter of a blue swim grub and cast again, this time I caught a small bass.  But the guy chocked it and got the hook set in the tongue.  He wasn't bleeding when I got the bait out and he nearly jumped back into the boat when I let him go so I figure he'll be ok.

We tracked down the shoreline some and put the anchor down again and then the boat started rotating on the line due to the wind giving me no shoreline cover to throw to.  I knew that we were still inside the weedline so I made a lazy cast parallel to the shoreline and let my jig sink.  I picked it up and started to reel and it was fish on!  This guy came pretty close to my personal best of 3.5lbs, but not quite, he was only 3.3lbs.

I caught a couple more smaller 2lbs fish before getting bit off by a pike, a little before this, my friend had enough of his live bait rig and I let him tie on my spare swim jig of that color so I had to upsize my bait to the Flip n Swim to keep the same color, except with the bluegill colored trailer.  Boy was that a good decision.

We were getting to the point that the deflating gunnel wasn't going to keep us floating for much longer so we agreed on a "couple more" casts before heading back.  I had repeated the same cast that had netted me the fish pictured above, letting the jig sink on slack line, except shortly after the jig hit bottom, the line started peeling across the water.  I reeled up the slack and leaned back.  After what felt like ten minutes but I'm sure was only one, along with about 10lbs of weeds, I pulled this 4.2lber in.

Needless to say, I am pretty excited about getting back out here.  Soon.

BassTEK Tungsten Jigs Reviewed

Earlier this year, BassTEK Tungsten Jigs, a new local company opened up shop.  What makes these jigs different from most others on the market are that they are made from (as the name indicates) tungsten, an alloy that is nearly twice the density of lead.  That density translates into a smaller profile and more sensitivity for the user.

Currently, BassTEK offers mainly flippin' jigs and some soft plastic stick baits.  Though my area of focus with this entry will be on the jigs.

3/8oz skirted jig and a 3/8oz unskirted jig.

I made my initial order in March and received my package that same week.  My first impression was good, I liked that everything was labeled (not all companies do that).  I ordered one of the 3/8oz. skirted jigs and a pack each of the 3/8oz, 1/2oz, and 3/4oz unskirted jigs with the intent to make up a few of my own skirts.  Needless to say, I ended up picking up a pack of some green pumpkin/watermelon skirts at Fleet Farm until I have time to get some of my own made up.  Anyway, first impression was good overall with the only constructive feedback being the barb trailer keeper, concern being that the trailer may slip past the barb and down the hook.  I've had better luck with a wire keeper that some other manufacturers use, but on the other hand, that is on a swim jig - different jig meant for different uses.

3/8oz unskirted BassTEK jig.

I took these out with me and played with them while I was on vacation over bass opener and was highly impressed with how sensitive they really are compared to conventional lead jigs.  I was able to throw this into many of the laydowns in the area and could feel the jig as I crawled it over the limbs.  I also took these to a small river where I've been able to catch smallies near the boat launch.  The water was higher than normal with all the rain we've been getting so I had trouble finding the rock patch off the end of the ramp where I normally catch them but once I found it I knew.  While I didn't catch anything off that spot, I found that, upstream a bit, they were holding tight to shoreline cover, this one hit it on the first drop.

Pig in training.  Check out BassTEK's Facebook page for examples of the fish these baits can catch.

The jigs come through grass well, too.  That is always something I'm concerned about with jigs but it hasn't been an issue with these.  I spent a little time at a small lake near my house and flipped it into and through some matted veggies and while there were some weeds that would hang around the jig eye, it was about equal with what I'm used to with my swim jigs.  Oh, and that barb trailer keeper?  Never had an issue with it in any of those three scenarios.

Pricing for these jigs is very competitive (or better in many cases) with other tungsten jigs on the market (1 per):  $4.99 for the 3/8, $5.50 for 1/2oz, and $6.99 for 3/4oz.  Although, you can cut those costs significantly by purchasing the packs of unskirted jigs and making some of your own skirts, something that I am likely to do so I can have my bluegill colors.

The real question is:  Are these jigs worth the cost compared to traditional lead jigs?  That depends on you, if you derive income from your fishing, then the answer is a simple risk/reward scenario:  Yes.  If you are like me, some dude that loves to fish:  Maybe.  Personally, I like whatever advantage I can get, so for me it is a yes.

The fact that they are a local company takes any kind of hesitation out of the equation.

Bass Opener - 2013 P. 2

To start my third day out, I skipped the lake completely and headed back to the backwater areas I had fished previously.  The water was getting closer to that 60 degree mark so I was sure I'd see some fish starting to move in shortly.  I ended up catching only pike in my first stop working the area with the same spinnerbait as previous.

I revisited the area where I had caught the fish pictured in my last post and missed a few hits on a NSCB Flip n Swim Black series in the laydowns going in.  I switched back to the spinnerbait and that ended up getting bit off by a pike.  At that point I decided to down size my baits a little bit, swapping the Black series for a regular Flip n Swim jig and tying on a Basstek 1/2oz Flippin Jig on the other and had little luck with either bait.

I made a move downstream and into another backwater, though this one had a lot of current running through it.  The entire area was flooded so it made getting around a little interesting, I found a little pocket of slack water with some isolated flooded trees and started pitching.  I only had one bite in the area on the Flip n Swim:

He weighed at 3lbs 5oz and is my first (and only) qualifying fish for BP's Minnesocold derby.  I stayed working this little backwater area until the text messages regarding breakfast became a little more assertive.

I did revisit this spot later in the week and caught only pike. 

Over all, I had a lot of trouble figuring this system out, never really putting together a consistent pattern, and I think a lot of it had to do with the flooding in the river.  Everything looked fishy and I got caught up in that mentality that "there should be a fish in that bush" or "next to that tree" or.....  Couple that with the unfamiliarity of fishing a pre-spawn phase and this guy got lost, even when I got out into deeper water working some of the points leading up to some flats - the action was subdued.

Hopefully my next trip out will prove more productive as the fish will be in a phase I'm a bit more experienced with - and I've got some new toys to help catch them too.

I'll talk about those in my next post.

Bass Opener - 2013 P. 1

What a long winter.  Prior to this past weekend, the last time I wet a line in open water was Thanksgiving Day of last year - and that is way too long for this guy to go.  Definitely my fault, but, it was for good reason.  However, school is now out and bass fishing season is in, opening week has come to an end and here is my report:

052513

I dropped the boat in on Friday when we got to the lake and cruised around a little bit to check things out and noticed right away that the water temp was 55-56 degrees, which would put most fish in a prespawn mode. 

My Dad and I went out on Saturday morning and I decided to fish some flooded timber on the way out to the main lake as the canal and flats area where my boat is moored would should be one of the areas they will be spawning.  I worked the area over with a 1/2oz Northstar Custom Baits Flip n Swim Black series jig and felt a thump but was too late on the hookset and too far past that spot to try another pitch so I told Dad where to throw, no bite. 

We went into the river briefly and I was thinking about heading up the Snake and into some of the backwaters but decided not to with as swift as the current was and a logjam in the middle of the bridge.  We spent most of Saturday eliminating water.  Dad got one crappie and I got skunked.

052613

I went out solo and noticed that the water temp had risen a couple of degrees.  I fished the same flooded timber as I had the day before with the same results - if nothing else, it helped knock the rust off my pitching technique.  I decided to skip the rest of the water that Dad and I fished on Saturday and ventured downstream and into some backwaters and probed the area with the same Flip n Swim jig I had tied Saturday and a Northstar Custom Baits spinnerbait in New Gill color.



I fished my way down the flooded side of the slough and didn’t get anything.  No bites, no taps, no bumps or thumps.  At this point, I was getting fairly discouraged. I started working my way down the opposite shoreline with the spinnerbait and a quarter of the way down the line my bait darted violently to the side and then went quiet again.  Then it hit like a ton a bricks and my line started moving back and forth quickly.  It was a pike, but, at least it was a fish.  There was life in this water after all!  I started lifting him in the boat and the hook came out.  Easy release, no pike smell on my hands, and no human smell on the pike.  It was a win-win.

I had a couple more hits going down the bank but no hook ups.  I decided to idle into another backwater.  This one had a lot more wood so I decided to fish the side with the current, figuring that any bass would be hanging out in the timber and grass patches waiting for an easy meal.  I had several hits in this area on the spinnerbait, some bass and some pike but they almost always came off.  I had no stingers or anything that would make a useful trailer hook along, so I tied on a regular Flip n Swim in New Gill with a single grub for a trailer.  I had a few missed hits on that and then, finally, a solid hook up.  He was sitting right at the base of a fallen tree.  Not huge, but, it's a start.

This is getting pretty long so I'm going to wrap this first post for up now.  I'll detail the rest of the week in my next post.

The Ice Post

Exactly one week from now I will be getting ready to throw my first open water casts this year.  Sadly, by this time last year, I'd already bagged my first bass for the year.  This weather, I tell ya!

I was thinking, now that the semester is finally over, I'd better get the update on my ice season typed and posted before my open water season gets underway.

I managed to make some headway on my goals for this year - I hit the ice on Jane, Bone, and Chisago.  Two new lakes left to go so if things lock up quickly this coming winter, I should knock this one off my goals list for 2013.  I plan on fishing Turtle near my home, which I never did make the time to try this winter.  As for my fifth lake, I'm not sure yet.  Big Marine, Coon, and Kroon are all on my list so we'll see how things go when the time rolls around.

On to the fishing.

Lake Jane:

In January, I hit Lake Jane out by Lake Elmo with my uncle and father in law.  We decided to set up just off the main hole in about 16'.  We saw some marks on the flasher, but with the exception of two very small pike, we didn't see the action we were looking for.  Which is ok, we didn't really know what to expect anyway as none of us had fished there before.

Bone Lake:

Toward the end of January, I decided to scout Bone Lake near Scandia with a good friend of mine.  When we got there, we still weren't sure how the ice was due to the warm(ish) winter so we decided to park at the launch and walk out, and take it from me, it's a heck of a walk from the ramp to get anywhere on that lake!

First we tried around the point on the north end of the lake and came up with (very) small perch so we moved deeper and started to get into some small bluegill - but nothing solid.  We didn't manage to get into the crappie until the next trip we took out. 

At that point, we knew that the ice was 20" in most places so we drove out.  Every time I drive out on the ice, I feel like it's my first time.  Absolutely nerve-wrecking.  I decided to skip the spots that we had tried before altogether and setup near a break from shallow water to the main basin.  I don't know how many crappie we caught, but I do know that they were only biting on light colored jigs and were moving up and down that break.  There wasn't any size to them to speak of, but we had fun.  I did bring my father in law out at the end of February when the guys from Missouri came up and the action was pretty much the same thing.

Icefishapalooza:

I'm not sure if I've mentioned it before, but every year a group of guys come up from Missouri to ice fish.  Old Navy buddies of my uncle's.  We usually fish for three days.  The first day we decided to give White Bear Lake another shot.  We have a bad history on this lake.  Just plain bad.  We drove out from Bellaire and weren't really sure where to go and since my uncle was running late I got to choose the spot.  Now, they don't like to move around at all so I decided to try and find the most likely place I could.  I opted for a small, steady point breaking into deeper water.  We popped our holes, got setup, and dropped our baits in.  The fish weren't huge, but the action was steady.  I was using a Bro's Bloodworm and Gill Pills, any natural looking color would work as there really wasn't a stand out.  I did have one nice pike that broke off at the hole when I tried to perform a move that I can only  described as an ice flip.  The lesson for the day:  4lbs mono ≠ 40lbs braid.  No idea how big it really was and the speculation only makes me want to kick myself that much harder.

For day two, we opted to head out to Kroon Lake near Chisago.  We had another 8" of snow to deal with overnight and when we stopped at Frankie's to figure out what was what, one of the guys we walked to got stuck in one of the drifts on Kroon and no one had plowed yet so we decided to fish Chisago instead as there was a plowed road that Frankie's maintains.  On our way to the spot that Frankie's had suggested we started seeing thin ice signs and opted not to go any further as at that point we had lost the road.  I chose a spot just off the main basin where a little point came out, we set up on one of the inside turns.

Wow.  As it turned out, that decision made up for three seasons of bad fishing, right there.  We were catching a mixed bag of bluegill and crappie and they were good sized too, almost all of them came from vertical jigs but I did manage several with the red Bro's Bloodworm.  They were moving back and forth between the shallow and deep water because we would catch them in our house and then my father in law would get into them in his, so you knew when you could get up and stretch a little. 

At one point, after releasing a bluegill, I saw a mark on my graph that was hovering just outside my zoom range so I dropped my bait down and watched the mark charge, felt the thunk, and set the hook.  My drag immediately started to peel off my reel and I had the attention of everyone in the house.  With everyone reminding me, I remembered what happened the day before and resolved to stay calm and let him tire himself out.  By the time he gave up, I was able to ease him through the hole and this was the result:

He had a pretty gnarly cut in his upper lip and I'm guessing that he was caught on a tip up at some point.  He wasn't a giant but it was fun to redeem myself for the one that I lost the day before.  Here's a pic of one of the crappie that we caught from that day as well (as measured with whatever we had on hand at the time):

We did find a tape measure and it came in at a little over 10", again, not a giant but these guys kept us busy all day and we all had a true sense of "do we have to??" when it came time to pack up and go home.

Needless to say, we spent day three on Chisago as well.  The weather was a little brighter than it was on day two so we didn't catch nearly as many crappie, but the bluegill were still willing participants in Icefishapalooza!

That's my ice season in a nutshell, for now, it's time to finish gearing up for bass opener next weekend as spending Memorial Day week at the lake is always my favorite vacation! 

2013. Moving Forward.

It is a new year and I hope that yours has been good so far.  I'm skipping the year-in-review post this year because, frankly,  there really isn't a lot to review.  I was out for a few trips but not enough to really make any headway in my experiences.  Two notable exceptions are the trip I took to Canada and my last open water trip (in the boat) of the year.  Otherwise I had many other things happening that elbowed fishing to the back burner.

This year should be a little bit different.  Having a seasonal camp spot again should help with getting out a little more often this year, so considering that, here are my goals for this year.

• Find a better balance between family/work/fishing. 
• Identify three different bass patterns on the Pokegama chain.
• Work on getting familiar and comfortable using different presentations.  I relied on the swim jig a little too much the past couple years and I think that hindered my success a bit. 
• Fish five new lakes during ice season.
• Find some more shore fishing opportunities in the north metro that haven't been beaten to death by others (that being said, Centerville and Pelltier are out).
• Get the project boat up and running again.  It may not look pretty to begin with, but for right now it only needs to float and run.

 Only time can tell how things will turn out, and finding new shore fishing locales will be a challenge, but I think all of these are certainly possible. 

The nice thing is my first ice trip should be next weekend, so I'll have a start on checking one off the list!