December Fishing Reports

Good luck month to the few that are still open water fishing. Hard water anglers smiling soon –

Come the weekend, would be nice to know from someone if the river is open enough to launch and fish. The boat’s not put away yet, and would like to try to get to the Rock at least one more time, and a trip or two to the Big Pond for browns…then she goes away.

Z-man,what about Red Wing? We fished Sunday.It was tough.A couple boats ran way up river and broke up shore ice.The river was therefore clogged with ice flowing down stream.The fish were not scattered through out the channel.They were in tiny spots which were often below the midst of an ice flow.Still,I’d rather fish then sit in front of the tube and waste 3 hours watching football(even while we lead the division).I have never winterized a boat so now I wait for a break in the weather and it’s off to pool#4.

Red Wing’s a bit too far for a two-dayer, so the rock would be nice if doable….otherwise, chasing browns in the harbor is a good option. I’m heading to the Monday night Bears/Vikes game on Dec 20 (free tickets at the 35 yd. line, 12 rows behind Vikes bench ) , and may try to mooch an open seat on Pool 4 for the Saturday or Sunday before the game, if weather looks fishable.
I haven’t stored my boat away from home for years, but have an extra car to put in the garage now…..but there’s always the 12 ft. winter boat to get out if weather breaks a bit in Jan or Feb. The Petenwell dam typically stays open all winterand makes for a real nice cure for cabin fever.

Ed,
Thursday ice in morning and by noon didn’t see no ice. I would say a afternoon outing would be do able. Morning like I know you like to fish might be a little icy. Big front moving in and the weather man said 3 to 4 inch of snow by Saturday

Thanks for the update, Jeff. Looks like slim pickin’s from here on out. The main boat’s going away next weekend, so we’ll see…maybe Newville or another outing on the Big Pond.

Smart move Ed, The mighty Rock is icying up quick, I have fished these condition before and they have never paid off. Time to get your tip ups out around here I think.

Tip-up? what’s that? Come to think of it, I’ve got a few of them in the garage, that have been collecting dust for over 10 years. Each winter, I keep thinking about pulling them out to get back on the ice, but by the time I decide, it’s time to get the boat ready again.

Tipup.naaaaaaaaaaaaa just keep jiggin,with shorter rods but have a dead rod near by to catch the stragglers

Now that you put it that way, Riverbank, it may not be so bad afterall. Besides, I shouldn’t have to re-tie a jig or two at every hole like I sometimes do at every drift.

Spent alot more time on river/kosh this past summer now that i have a rig(thanks to all here that got me pointed in the right direction )and now want to hit kosh alot this winter trying some jigging/deadsticking.heading up to lake of the woods dec 18th and want to try some of the techniques used up there, down here.

Well guys the boat is away. I was going to get out this week somewhere but training took precedent.

May dust off the ice gear this year since the freezer is lacking of lean fish fillets.

Be good all.

D

Was holding out for another week, hoping to get one more time out on open water, but 10-day forecast don’t look good. Might have to re-think the hardwater stuff, and p7ull the ice-gear out of moth balls, too.

Dust em off guys,lets get some IDO’ers on the hard water for some friendly competition/ribbing

I am game for a friendly outing this winter.

D

You could probably twist my arm into it too. would be good to hook up with some familiar faces, and make some new acquainances, too.

Finally got around to downloading some pics from past couple months. Here are a few to remember, while waiting for open water. Boat going into storage tonight.

Man that sheepie fough hard.

You would think with glass water and blue skies I was over dressed in that pic. Not.

Nice pics Ed.

D

That was probably the only sheepie in the whole system, and you caught it….gonna have to call you King of the Goats, I guess. Reminds me of Pool 4 in Sept. 2009, remember? All the eyes took off, and the goats surrounded us everywhere we went.

I like to think about the later trip. That was more fun.

D

So where did all the big ones go this year? Unfortunately I may have the answer. How about the carp nets! Report from trusted first hand source said DNR investigated and found over 2000 big walleyes killed by their unattended nets then they tried to hide it by burying them but were caught. From what I heard none were under 22″. My biggest all fall, a 20. Ouch! Happy Holidays, time to hit the ice!

That’s a crying shame. It’s just a very curious thing that none of the regulars on this site have reported any big fish that I recall. My biggest from memory was a 22 this year, and a couple around 20 if I recall correctly. A buddy of mine lost a 26 ish or so at the net. but that’s it.
Or is everyone being tight-lipped?

While we’ve never caught a lot of fish over 22″,a few were caught in the past.Until this year we made only 5or6 trips to Koshkonong each year.This year with the home water closed or no-waked,my sons and I probably made 50 trips combined and never saw a walleye bigger then 22″.I just caulked it up to location and timing.We did catch more fish in the 15-20″ range.
A couple years back I spent some time watching the netting operation on Carcajeau Point.During the 2+ hours I was there many bins of live fish were placed in bins and driven away.At no time did I see any evidence of the presents of the DNR.One would think they would police such an operation with such an opportunity to take fish worth much more then carp.

That is surprising that there isn’t more supervision being given to the netting operations. I would imagine it has to do with the DNR being spread too thin.

It’s July! What’s going on that’s more important and could be more devastating to the resource?Perhaps making sure everyone has a licence or someone doesn’t take a 14.90″ walleye is more important.What was the outcome of last years fish kill on Puckaway? I looked but found very little.You’d think the DNR would have gotten a wake-up call.

my biggest fish this year on the rock was a 19″ walleye. my buddy did catch 2 24 inchers in the thursday night league but that was the biggest we got all year and we fished it a lot.

Merry Christmas to all

Ho Ho Ho