Scheel has a 7’ Walleye Series rod that works perfectly for this application. It will handle a 3 oz. bouncer. When I’m fishing I usually hold the rod, but my guide clients typically put them in the rod holders. Scheels also has similar rods in their less expensive series that work well too.
If I was exclusively putting them in a rod holder, something a little longer would work. I’ve tried to hold onto a 7’6” or 8’ all day and I found it uncomfortable.
Many NWT and AIM checks were cashed using a nightcrawler this year, but to your point I think minnows were a small contributor.
I’d fish an artificial only tournament. I also signed up for a tournament that has now banned FFS. I used it in that tournament the last 2 years, but we’ll see how it goes.
I know this is an older post, but here is the system I put together for my new to me 2012 Skidoo. I installed the linq brackets so I can take the whole setup off in under 30 seconds. I used 2 oversized milk crates-one fits my Garmin shuttle perfectly and the other I bought an insulated bag from the milk crate manufacturer to put miscellaneous things into. I installed gun rack to hold my ice scoop and livescope pole. The auger rack is a digger auger mount. The rod holder bag is fastened to the back. It worked for my last trip but I am going to look at some other ways to mount it. My goal was to keep it light, the center of mass as low as possible, and as narrow as possible for portages through the woods. I primarily use this for Lake Trout fishing running and gunning and fishing off of my snowmobile.
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I’ve had that exact battery for three years now. It powers my 93sv, black box, and lvs-34 no problem all day in summer or winter.
Wow, that’s a good deal.
This is in Ontario but not far from the MN border. We’ve rented cabins and fished with him several times but now we do it on our own.
https://www.gatewaynorthoutfitters.com
Headed back up there in 2 weeks.
When we fish in Canada we basically fish off our sleds. We boil water on the stove in the morning before we leave put it in a thermos and fill it with homemade suassges hotdogs, kielbasa, etc.
That’s a great idea. We also fish off of our sleds in Canada. On that trip I usually bring a thermos of hot bone broth or soup. I’m going to add the sausage to the mix. Some of the guys bring aluminum foil, butter, and seasoning and will make a fire and cook trout for lunch.
When fishing in a shack, I’ve warmed up premade breakfast burritos before. If someone has the old sunflower heater, we’ll boil water and make brats and hotdogs.
Other than that, I basically make my own trail mix of primary different nuts.
I bought the Norfin Yukons. They are lightweight and warm. The downfall-The second time I wore them involved a walk on a gravel road. That evening I noticed some dents in the foam sole. Upon further inspection, one of those holes went all of the way through. Now they are no longer waterproof. I reached out to Norfin and they responded quickly, but said the boots are made for snow and this was on me for misuse. They gave me some repair ideas and a discount code if I wanted to buy another pair. I’m going to seal the hole and see how it goes.
A second for Jason. He was busy the day we booked but set us up with a friend of his and my wife and I had a blast.
Have Lacrosse boots gotten better with cracking? I bought a pair about 15 years ago and they cracked 2 years later. I patched them up a few times and used them another couple years. My Dryshods cracked in year 5. I perched them with flex seal tape and they are waterproof again.
Good reminder.
Remember to put a carbon monoxide detector in your garage as well. Two of my kids and myself were hospitalized due to carbon monoxide poisoning caused by an ice block in the garage heater vent. My two year old son quit breathing after roughly 5 minutes of exposure and my 4 year old daughter went unconscious after roughly 7-8 minutes. I had no idea anything was wrong until my son went unconscious and I assumed he was having some type of seizure. After calling 911 and doing CPR on my son, I went back to find my daughter passed out in her car seat. We went through treatment and all of us recovered, but nobody should have to go through that.
This guy came through this morning as we were getting ready for work.
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First good backyard buck of the season came through yesterday.
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Area 155 3 miles from Mille Lacs Lake. On a calm day I can hear boats throttling up leaving Liberty Beach access.
If this guy shows up Saturday, that would be great.
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I have the Yeti gloves and they are durable. The problem I have is that they must not breathe as my hands sweat quickly and then my fingers freeze. I had a pair of Cabelas gloves that I wore for years and never had this issue. Unfortunately I left them on the snowmobile trailer and lost them somewhere down the road.
Mille Lacs can be good all season, but in my mind the best way to catch numbers of Walleyes is fishing the sundown bite the first few weeks of the season. A good one two punch is a bobber and a leech on one line and pitching a jig/minnow with the other. Adjust if the fish show a preference.
My last time out was 5 days ago. We fished the West side and found Smallmouth on the rocks in 10-18 feet.
Cool. Are there shoulders?
As others have stated, you can play the wind and move around the lake. Don’t rule out the North end if you have North winds. There is good structure up there as well.
There is a good bite on sucker minnows that time of year as well.
We had a good day Friday on the West side trolling crankbaits in 15-20’. There is sand grass floating in the water so we intentionally fished a smaller stretch that was cleaner and cleaned our baits often. We had 5 in the old 21-23” slot and one in the current 18-20”.
It’s a large area roughly halfway between Long Point and Garden Island. I believe it gets its name because that is where “Lake of the Woods” is written on the map.
See you at the Warrior Shootout next Saturday?
It looks like we have a number of Veterans on IDO. Thank you for your service.
I’m an insurance agent and I mainly work with health insurance benefits. I encourage every Veteran that I meet to talk to their County Veteran Service Officer to see what benefits they have available.
If you are a Veteran on Medicare and are entitled to VA Health benefits, you should look into a Medicare Advantage plan. They do not interfere with your VA benefits, most plans will help pay for a portion of your Medicare premium, and many have extra benefits that are not offered to everyone through the VA. If you have any questions about these plans, feel free to send me a private message. Advice is always free and I’d be happy to steer you in the right direction. These plans do fit the needs of probably 90% of the Veteran I meet, but there are some circumstances where they don’t.
We used that tool often growing up and yes it works. For deep hooked fish I use a forceps and go through the gill, but this tool works very similar.
I will do my best to describe. This tool works best for when the fish has swallowed the hook but you can see the hook by pulling slightly on the line. With the fish in the net over the side of the boat or on the floor of the boat, pull the line tight with your left hand. Hold the tool like you would hold a pistol in your right hand and pull the tool back toward you along the line so the wire guard on the front grabs the line. Now the line should run up and down inside the gap on the front of the tool. Run the tool down the line and into the fishes mouth. Keep the line tight in your left hand. Ideally you will be pulling the head of the fish up off of the floor. Now point the tool straight into the fishes mouth and as far down the line as you can into the throat. Pull the trigger. You may have to do it a few times. The fishes head should fall back into the net or onto the floor and the hook should pop out and hook onto the tool. Now you can simply wiggle the hook free from the tool.
I hope that makes sense. It might sound pretty inhumane but it is effective at removing hooks and giving the fish the best chance to survive. Obviously the quicker and less handling the better.
The tool used in the video is different than the original tool in question. Do not follow that video.
We used that tool often growing up and yes it works. For deep hooked fish I use a forceps and go through the gill, but this tool works very similar.
I will do my best to describe. This tool works best for when the fish has swallowed the hook but you can see the hook by pulling slightly on the line. With the fish in the net over the side of the boat or on the floor of the boat, pull the line tight with your left hand. Hold the tool like you would hold a pistol in your right hand and pull the tool back toward you along the line so the wire guard on the front grabs the line. Now the line should run up and down inside the gap on the front of the tool. Run the tool down the line and into the fishes mouth. Keep the line tight in your left hand. Ideally you will be pulling the head of the fish up off of the floor. Now point the tool straight into the fishes mouth and as far down the line as you can into the throat. Pull the trigger. You may have to do it a few times. The fishes head should fall back into the net or onto the floor and the hook should pop out and hook onto the tool. Now you can simply wiggle the hook free from the tool.
I hope that makes sense. It might sound pretty inhumane but it is effective at removing hooks and giving the fish the best chance to survive. Obviously the quicker and less handling the better.
I have a Skeeter 2060 and bought the yellow harness pictured above. It tangles with my kicker so is worthless for my setup. I’m open to other suggestions.
I’ve run 3 boats with Ulterras and overall they have worked great. There has only been one issue I couldn’t resolve with watching a YouTube video and making a quick fix. The issue I couldn’t resolve was a result of one of my 3 batteries going bad, so not an issue with the Ulterra. There are many great resources on YouTube.
I’ve had the same thing happen a few times and I follow this procedure to fix it.
We have a fox den in the backyard so they don’t last long.
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