It was just too nice of a night to not be out on the water!
I had a last minute cancelation yesterday and decided to catch a few channels myself at the P4 dam area. With the water temps in the high 50’s, I was thinking about dropping some cut sucker in the holes to see if I could get a nibble…from a flathead…but I was in one of those lazy moods and anchored up close to the second wing dam.
Just finished setting up my second rod and my Boss #3 rod bent over pumping. Fish On! 
Kissed and released my first of many channels of the evening. Since the battery was dead in my digital, I didn’t bother weighing her on the spring scale.
What a beautiful evening to be fishing..and listening to the forecast…I figured it might be my last for a few days.
As darkness fell the amazing “carpet” of shad reappeared as it has in the past. It sounds like it’s hailing out with the occasional splash of a big fish nailing them on the surface. There is a bumper crop of them on P4 again this year!
In between bites, I was cleaning things up in the boat..sorta getting ready for winter storage after Moore’s Bait and Tackle Sturgeon Contest this Saturday on the St Croix River. I was watching the line and the rod tips bouncing once in a while from some type of smaller fish trying to tear off a piece of shad, when my back rod bent slightly and bounce in this bent position. I picked up the rod and the 2/0 Gamakatzu circle hook did it’s job for me…Fish ON! …and she felt pretty darn good! So good in fact that I lost control of this fish and…well…you know the feeling of the line brushing through a snag??? Or maybe an anchor rope?? I had tired her out somewhat..so I loosened the drag and lock the rod in the rod holder…then started to pull up the back anchor…I was in a slight hurry as I knew she would be resting and want to go to town again shortly.
Drats! The the fish made at least 6 turns around the rope! To make things worse, they were tightly embedded. I freed the rope from the cleat thinking it would be easier to pull the rope through the loops than to try and pull the 16 lbs anchor through…I could tell by the tugs she was starting to get impatient with me…what to do??? A few weeeks ago I thought I should have a knife in the boat that could cut the anchor rope in the case of emergency…this wasn’t exactly what I was thinking when I got it, but with it’s serrated edges, it cut through the rope faster than I could say HOLD ON FISHY! With the fish now fully recovered it was like fighting a fresh fish…rod bend down into the water and basicly just haveing it’s way with me! As I was netting her…I notice my other rod bowing and pumping. 
No chance to rest for me!
The first fish ended up being a “little” 48″ sturgeon and the second one was a 7+ lbs channel cat…again, these channels look like they swollowed a water balloon whole just stuffed with a bazillion shad! The channel cats down here at Everet’s are just pigs!
While I was resting from my double…and if you think I’m exagerating…you’ve never caught a sturgeon before 
a boat pulled up and anchored with in shouting distance. I was dark so we really couldn’t see each other. Here it turns out to be Boone and his friend John from IDA. They ended up sliding over to my boat and tying up kinda making a mini floatilla if you will.
Boone set his back anchor out and I had my front one out…I was happy as my back anchor rope was held together with a uni to uni knot…and I’m not sure if that’s the knot to us on 1/4 inch rope!
It was pretty neat…now I didn’t have to talk to myself anymore!
Boone was set up for big channels with his new rod/reel combo that he bought from Ryan at Sportsmans Warehouse in Woodbury…but John on the other hand…well, John either needs to see Bob Moore or make a trip to Sportsmans Warehouse. Sorry to use you for an example John, but it ended up being a good learning experiance for you and I hope others might learn from this post. 
The good thing was that when I offered John one of my extra rods he said “that might be a good idea” when he comparied them to his walleye trolling rod. 
Both Boone and John got into some good fish. I’m thinking when Boone was holding a sturgeon for a photo he got a little flustered as he took off his cateye lights and tossed them…or at least tried to toss them into his boat. I wonder how long those batteries last in 
30 feet of water. Oopsy!
It seemed like the channel cat bite had ended because the sturgeon were on the prowl and that’s all we landed with the one exception of a very small 3 lber. It was 10:15 and I said that I was going to give’er 15 minutes and then head in…just settled into another good conversation with the guys and noticed a little tap tap with the rod slightly bend…my back still had a little ache in it…so John took over the duties for me…Thanks again John, I only had to take two Advil this morning!
John figured it was a sturgeon but kind of a little guy…until…like many larger fish do…it got close to the boat. I was watching the line going where ever the heck it wanted to…and the rod bent to the water… Everything was going smoothly…until…
John moved to the back corner of my boat and the fish started heading under both boats…and got caught in the anchor of Boone’s boat. Boone sprang into action and the fish was free…but still seemed to be hung up on something…the line had tangled on one of the motors! John was now down on his knees holding on to the rod with both hands as tight as he could. The look on his face was of “what fun” and “HELP”! at the same time! He couldn’t let go of the rod to adjust the drag… as I was moving in to lighten up the drag for him…off to the left somewhere there was an explosive splash, much like the sound of a muskie hitting a bait right next to the boat. Boone yelled “he hit the kicker motor”! With that I heard a twanggg…and I thought the 80 pound Power Pro was cut or broken by the motor…but after taking up some slack…it was FISH ON! Boone figured it was time to bring in the other rods (very good idea I might add..as one rod had another smaller sturgeon on it). The only thing that was out now was the front anchor rope…and sure ’nuff…that’s where this big boy was heading…Boone leaped…no…flew to the front of my boat to pull up the anchor…I believe this little guy made it around the anchor once but with coordination between John and Boone the anchor came up without too much trouble. With all obstructions out of the way…we could focus on bringing this guy in. He came to the top once to get a look at us and must not have liked what he saw…There is NOTHING like the look on an anglers face when a sturgeon decides that he’s heading straight down 30 feet. The Power Pro makes such a cool noise as we all stood there watching the drag slipping and 30 feet or better of the line running out the guides with no way to stop it.
Throughout John would say “he’s coming up!”…then in a moment…he would counter…”he’s going down!” 
I laugh only because that’s what everyone says including myself…the more times a persons says it the bigger the fish.
We did get her in the boat eventually. According to my GPS the two boats were only pulled up stream about 30 feet.
Once in the boat we taped her at
57 inches long
21.5 inch girth
and spring scaled her at
39 lbs
She also had a MN DNR tag on her and the info has been sent in. I’ll post it here when I hear back from them.
With a couple pictures to make his fish story real…she was release as were all the fish.
Beautiful weather, I got to know two new (to me) IDA members and the bonus fish!
That just doesn’t happen everyday! 
