back on topic….Nice Fish Jakob!

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How are you guys anchoring in moderately deep to deep water with no current? Say water 15 -40 feet deep. Do you just drop an anchor straight down at both the transom and bow? I would think that would allow a big fish to easily wrap around one or both anchor lines. I’ve only anchor in that deep of water when there’s a current so the boat ends up quite a ways down stream of the anchor and because the anchor line run at an angle away from the boat, the fish don’t seem to wrap the anchor line too much.

Also, are you casting your baits quite a ways away or do you just drop them straight down close to the boat.

Thanks for the help,

Boone.

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If you have enough rope… (typically people use 100ft lengths.) You drop ONLY one first… Bow or Stern makes no difference. Then you motor as far as that rope will let you and drop your other anchor… Pull rope on both so they your basically centered between the two anchors and ropes /-\ This lessons the chance of them circling both ropes at the same time. Some of the guys will put floats on the end of the anchor rope and disconnect…. float and fight the fish and then come back and reconnect and be reanchored in the exact same spot.

It sounds like there might be another tourney in August… with a date soon to be released. There was a full roster of 25 boats with some being turned away.
This last KOTC Invitational 6/10/13 was a tough nut. We didn’t have any fish in the boat with an hour left… then the switch flipped and we got 5 in 45 minutes. We got lucky and managed 5th overall….

kevin…you are correct about the systems not being self sustaining for an extended period of time… Keeping large volumes of bait in small confinements (under 300 gallons) in a warm water enviornment is very challenging. There is no way to have it be hands off completely. If you can minimize the ammonia levels on the front end by quarentining your bait till they purge the majority its less stressful and will minimize the level of toxins as they are converted through the process…. If you are not filtering your water through a large quantity of plants the only way to eliminate your Nitrates at the end of the process is to change out the water….
I’ve been able to sustain larger quantities of healthy bait for 60 plus days with water temps peaking at 93F through out the time period. Thou they did succumb to infection fairly quick (a little over 1.5 weeks) when I stopped feeding them.

That will work, but you might want to consider putting it in its own container, You want to be careful not to disturb the filter material if possible. I could see fish, cleaning or other activities interfering with the current set up.
Moving water is not a critical element. It just cant be isolated for any period of time.
Still looks to be a pretty sweet set up… and they are a blast to tinker with.
One last recommendation.. if you haven’t already done so. invest in a water testing kit so you can monitor your nitrification process. (ph, ammon, nitrite and nitrates.)

Congrats on the new addition!

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Check on channel 16 as all commercial vessels should be monitoring and request a channel to transfer too…they will let you know what channel they want to communicate with you on

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Exactly.

Larry, I wasn’t calling you out!

Just thought it was odd. That’s all. Certainly not doubting your expertise on the river.

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Were okay on this end…. Just trying to keep confusion to a minimum.

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What channel on the marine radio do the barges use?

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On the MN hail them on 16 and request a channel to transfer to. They operate on 78 and 75 usually. The mississippi they prefer lower channels. Every area is different…. Thats why I hail and ask them.

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Makes sense since all vessels with radio are to monitor 16.

It’s odd they would monitor 78 and 75 though.

78 is a non commercial frequency and I had to run out to the garage and check on 75. My marine radio doesn’t have a 75(?)

I got robbed!

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I don’t think you got robbed… it should be on there…. I went and checked mine in the garage after this… they are there… (on mine) from good old Jolly Ann Marine.
I guess I wouldn’t tell anyone to get hung up on this point… Check on channel 16 as all commercial vessels should be monitoring and request a channel to transfer too…they will let you know what channel they want to communicate with you on.

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What channel on the marine radio do the barges use?

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On the MN hail them on 16 and request a channel to transfer to. They operate on 78 and 75 usually. The mississippi they prefer lower channels. Every area is different…. Thats why I hail and ask them.

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Makes sense since all vessels with radio are to monitor 16.

It’s odd they would monitor 78 and 75 though.

78 is a non commercial frequency and I had to run out to the garage and check on 75. My marine radio doesn’t have a 75(?)

I got robbed!

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I’m not the expert….just a licensed captain (with a masters and towing cert like you)

I use the radio on the Minnesota and the Mississippi… they operate on multiple channels for work and for “b…sing” with each other and the work stations… My guess is its a little more informal on the Minnesota since its a tributary to the Miss. Point being… hail them on 16 and find out which channel is the operating channel for the area. Its not the same for all stretches… barge operators do appreciate anyone working with a radio.

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What channel on the marine radio do the barges use?

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On the MN hail them on 16 and request a channel to transfer to. They operate on 78 and 75 usually. The mississippi they prefer lower channels. Every area is different…. Thats why I hail and ask them.

I’m guessing that we saw the same one. I was communicating with him over the radio and gave him a heads up that there was a pleasure craft on the south side of the river up stream. (Might have been you)
He was running singles 4 long… that’s a tough long run on the MN. They try to give space when able… but its tough with some of the tows they carry. A radio is a very handy tool… or be ready to move. You don’t want to shine them as it messes up night vision. Did you guys tough it out in the rain all night?

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Trying to have a little nookie in a catfish boat.

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just what kind of “Catfish Adventures” are you offering?

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Down Boy!!!! Don’t be getting all riled up and excited…

Nice!!!!!

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But back to hog hunting, only 2 mn flats for me in august so far. Probably 30 hours of hard fishing.

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You gave up on P2 at the perfect time…. The channel bite has tapered a hair and the flats are on the pick up.

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Yes big difference.

Kind of like comparing the 50lbers we catch here to that scrumptious bait in your avatar.

…and yes 50lbs is a big fish in MN.

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I’ll second that.

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What kind of homo sits on his boat by himself with no clothes on? Come on dude.

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What kind of guy slows down and gets a closer look? Yeah, I saw you.

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And yet your sitting back analyzing this entire scenario in much the same way as with the old “cliff park, Black Dog” road thread awhile back.
Smelt it dealt it…comes to mind.

Nice… did you get any measurements?

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They can’t tell where the receiver is unless you plug in a land line to it and even then they aren’t going to waste any time trying to figure that out. Doubtful you have landline at the cabin or even at home so its a moot point.

Everybody does it and it’s nothing to worry about at all.

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Its getting harder for them to track, they will usually catch up to you in other ways. They frown heavily on putting equipment from the same account at multiple locations, when there is a possibility getting you to start a second account. (more revenue for them)

1st. Keep a copy of the receiver and card number at your main residence. In the event you are audited, it does happen.

2nd. Try not to leave the receiver unplugged from a dish and power source for any extended period of time. They take updates periodically. If they miss an critical update or a few, the receiver programming will shut it down and you will need to call in to reactivate. If this does happen… say you were doing a remodel and had stuff unplugged for a while.
3rd. You need to call it in. Make sure you have it at your house, plugged in to take the necessary update they send.

Pier is right for the most part. You shouldn’t have to sweat it… small things to keep in mind in the event things don’t go exactly as planned.

Nice!!! WTG Dad!

Wow! Cool ending… Karma Credit.. Gotta love it.

Roads to Lyndale and Cedar are closed 1/4 mile from the launch. Hope they start opening them up soon.

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Larry – What kind of salt are you adding and how much do you add? That seems like a fairly easy thing to do and I might give that a go when the tank water temps start getting high.

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Steve… I usually use aquarium salt… I’ve used Kosher in a pinch, I like to add it any time I do any sort of water change.
I made the mistake one time of putting water softner salt in with out reading the ingredients…. It was not very fish friendly.
Rock salt if it had no additives probably works fine.
Ralph what kind were you adding?

A couple things that I keep in mind that seem to help with the fuzz or infection.
When you get a batch of fresh bait, you want to do your best to keep them from getting over exposure to high levels of ammonia. It seems, if they get an over exposure, it greatly reduces the effectiveness of their immune system. Allowing for infections to set in and spread quickly as water temps rise.

You can minimize over exposure by frequent water changes for the first 72 hours, If your able and willing, you treat the water with a conditioner and add salt, during this process. The fish are giving off the highest amounts ammonia the first few days as they purge.
There are chemicals available that can help lower ammonia levels as well, I’ve tried them. I think they help, but I can’t say I’ve seen definitive results in using them.

Since I’ve started putting salt into the treated water. The infection rate has gone down so much I rarely see infection, even as water temps get close to 80.

One last thing to keep in mind also. Is try not to over handle the bait, leave it alone as much as you can.

Sorry guys… I was in a rush out the door… plus I misread part of the post… Over the years lots of us have seen stuff that makes us scratch our heads…
Being bait is probably one of the top discussion items on the forums… we want to make sure that were going by the books.
as stated above. Thanks Jakob.

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Someone please correct me if I’m wrong here… It’s illegal to catch gills on the river to use as bait right? I’ve noticed it being done a few times over the years and was under the impression that it was against the regs. I looked it up at one point but can’t remember now. I could have sworn it said no bluegills for bait period anywhere in MN.

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back to catfishing school for you son…

Yes… I also have experience with it.

Your attempting to create a warm water high volume bait tank, with minimal maintenance. (infrequent water changes)

In your calculations you are correct for correlating the volume of water…to filter size….but it doesn’t take into the consideration of how much bait you are keeping at certain water temps. I’m not a biologist, chemist or engineer… so I’m not able to provide a formula to calculate what you need… but I can tell you that it probably will be more that what you would initially figure.

Its a lot of work….Lot of trial and error and it takes time to get the Bio-Filter properly cycle.

Bait shops keep water cool to slow down metabolism and they turn the bait over.. hopefully fairly frequently.. Charcoal filters work to remove smell and clear the water but they don’t serve as a Bio-Filter.

Steve. D probably has one of the easier set ups to work with, but does require water changes to reduce, ammonia and Nitrites and maybe nitrates, all of which are toxic to fish.

Josh brings up more valid points… nutrients = nitrates which being in the nitrogen family is excellent for feeding plants… that being the last step in the Nitrification cycle.. its the least harmful of the 3 to fish.. but still toxic in escalating quantities.

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Sweet rod

Does the fish have to come with the dumb look on the face or could I smile

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