Pool 4, Tuesday w/pix

OK… I promised pix on my fishing trip with Dustin.. so I guess I have to deliver!… We started out early… how early you ask? well… a pix is worth a thousand words… so they say….

it wasnt long and we got into a fish or 2 or more… pitching jigs….. Jeff here seems happy to pull the first fish….

and you have been hearing about lots of incidental crappies being caught down on pool 4…. you can believe it.. we pulled in fair numbers of them… like the one Dust is holding….

after the pitching bite died we went to the dam to enjoy some of the awesome fishing we heard about….. but the word on the fishing was out and we were not exactly alone… pretty much everywhere you looked it was the same ol story……

but all was not lost…. with Dustins skill at weaving around boats we were soon in business and picked up a number of nice saugers like this one here…..

but with all the heavy pressure it was not long before the fishing declined along with the size of the fish…. until…..

oh your having trouble seeing it? ok….

anyway.. it was a great day… we did end up catching plenty of fish… when the pattern would change then Dustin changed with it… and kept us going…. so it was a happy boat at the end of the day…….

ohhh… what was working? well I dont have pix for that… but darn near everything worked at some time or other… no pattern existed for long… if you tallied Numbers.. then it was probably ringworms… but superdoos were also in the mix, as were kalins and hair jigs…. even blade baits… though nothing decent chomped the blades… they still provided some action when things slowed down…..

and oh yea… saw lots of flatheads pulling people around that day!… they were really ona bite…

In Summary, pitching jigs during twilight was effective, vertical jigging the dam was also good until around 11:30 by which time the pressure of 50″ boats and the bright sun combined to really shut them down….. still I suppose we caught close to 40 fish 15″ or longer… the largest was 23″… Dustin has the pic of that… cuz Ive just not figured out how to hold a fish and take a pic at the same time!…

Great pics RiverEyes!
Looks like you had a great time
Who’s gonna be on the water on Friday?

Tuesday was a good bite for my boat as well. Early we went north while the Stewart boat went south. The bite was VERY good early on and died about 8 AM which I’m confident can be attributed to the absolute lack of cloud cover and bright sunshine. We had a bunch of nice fish early, all walleyes, on shallow rock on K-Grubs. Firecracker was the best followed by pearl blue S&P or smoke. We went in and took a break from about 8 AM – 9:30 AM to warm up, have a bite to eat then went back out until 11:30 AM. It took about a pass and a half up to the dam to find the better fish but we really got into some nice walleye and sauger on super doos, I’m really not sure color mattered AT ALL as we caught fish on catalpa, grape pearl shad AND chartreuse pepper. Our last 4 fish were all over 19″ including a 21.25″ sauger and a bonus 25″ walleye that scarfed a “doo out of the dirt” as it was literally being unattended and drug across the bottom when the fish hit.

All in all it was a very good morning. One curious thing that we found was that we caught almost all of our good fish on the doos by raising them up over a foot off the bottom and SLOWLY lowering them down. The hit would come about 2″ before it would touch bottom and the strikes were not too terribly aggressive but in the end that doesn’t matter much now does it?!

I forgot to add that we caught the walleyes early in 3′ – 5′ of water and the fish we caught vertical jigging were in 19′ – 22′ of water.

On another note… did anyone see that large lund tyee absolutely SMOKE the second wingie about 10:30 AM on Tuesday?! I bring this up not to make fun or light of the situation. It wasn’t 10 minutes after they got off the dam and they had to leave with bilge pumps going full-tilt. My guess is they split the hull or knocked a number of rivets loose as the water looked to be coming in faster than it could be pumped out. I feel for the guys that were involved and urge the new-comers to the river to BE CAREFUL. There’s really not that many hazards to worry about but you can’t race through unfamiliar areas either.

actually believe it or not.. they were the first of a total of THREE boats we observed hit the wing dams… 2 on the 2nd.. and 1 on the first…. you just cant run up the Mn side of the river once you get above the Y….. the last of 3 wing dams is CLEAR out of the water… and the other 2 are not too far down…..

and thanx James for filling in some details for us…..

Qreat pix rivereyes! I always enjoy your posts,you have a real nack with that camera….Big B. I will be on the river fri.sat sun.with some friends from down your way..stop and chat with us,,,white lund 90 johnson…red tracker with iowa tags we have a cook out on one of the beaches round noon every day stop over and will swap lies..good luck to all this weekend….watch the wingies

dekaja, Thanks for the offer I’m not sure about Fri. now I may have to be here for a contractor on Fri. AM. I’ll look ya up if I make it ……..B

Was up on Pool 4 on Tuesday also with PaulV, we had to have a late start and didn’t get on the water prob til arould 10:30am I thought there were at least 80 boats or more, since we missed the early am bite, I thought things were a little slow. we tried ringworms and superdoos, and had hits but the fish weren’t eating them, so we missed many, used blade baits and had good success with those. looked like folks with minnows were getting some descent fish, more in numbers and some were also nice size. I did catch a 24 1/2 inch Channel Kittie on a blade bait, which ate it and was hooked right in the front of the mouth, I knew it was a cat right after I hooked it. (picture included)(I hope) our final pass was above the vermilion and used blades and had alot of action, mostly saugers, did not see a walleye all day, had to leave by 4pm as we had to get back to a club meeting.
I was going to go wed or thurs, but am glad I took Veterans Day off and got out into to great day, especially after the snow on wed. I’ll be back. Jack.

Howdy all!!

I will be down there tomorow! Wooo Hooo! Look for a Ranger 619 with Yamaha and say hello!

Cory Frantzick

What color Ranger you in Cory? I need to meet the RushCityRanger! <– (I’ve always thought that was a catchy handle… lol )

Great pics guys! All this really makes me want to get out on the water! Man do I feel stuck in this office.

Tell me about it! I may have to trade James some more shirts so I have a reason to get out.

I barely get to see the light of day anymore….

Where is the Vermillion? Above or below the bridge? I looked at a map and could not see it. Thanks.

The vermillion is the trib that enters the Mississippi River immediately below the Lock and Dam #3, on the MN side of the river.

Hey James!
I have a Silver and Maroon rRanger that has http://www.AtHomeOnTheLake.com on the side! I will keep an eye out for ya! Great site!

Cory Frantzick

Silver and maroon… got it. The lettering will help a ton too. See ya’ on the water!

Quick question for ya!

How do I get my smiling face next to my name???

Piece of cake. Simply send any photo you want used to [email protected] and we’ll get it taken care of for you.

Just a quick kudo for James and Dustin.

We saw you guys up by the dam on Monday and you two were very friendly and polite in answering questions regarding water depth as well as information on Mille Lacs. Not to often you run into guys with your fishing knowledge willing to share ‘accurate’ information.

I’ll be booking one of these guys soon for a guided trip with my son!

Turk.

It’s hard not to be polite to another smiling face and Dustin and I really enjoy getting to meet as many new people as possible.

See ya’ on the water and maybe even in a boat someday soon!

Holy Buckets!

That was fast!!!

Say…Where do you guys normally grab a bit to eat when you want to take a break? One of the guys I am going with tomorow wants to stop for breakfast, but I want to be on the river by sunup! Any suggestions??

Cory Frantzick