aside from first ice, this is the BEST time to ice fish, in my opinion!

yes, t-shirts all day long (long sleeved)
lots of open holes in areas that have been fished, and at least if you have to drill, the holes stay open!

fished perch yesterday on cutfoot after a crappie outing with less than desirable results, found them to be quite aggressive in 11 feet of water, that is until the walleyes moved in…but that was fun too!

good reports on bowens flats, first hand.
and I talked to the people at Gosh dam place, they said they had a group that stayed at their hotel over the weekend who went home with 240 perch!

that sounds like a good bite to me.

I’m sure the fine members of that community will step up to help out their neighbor.

egads..

to bad for him. he’s a hard worker.

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Unfortunately losing 800k + pounds to netting isn’t going to help your situation.

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fact!

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According to the DNR, if we took fish over 17″ we would more than double our take – from 52,000 to over 112,000….does that sound reasonable ?

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when I first heard this, I was told one of the reasons for the loosening of the slot was because of a diminishing forage base.
the bigger fish were eating themselves out of house and home.
I’m sure there’s a lot more to it, with the DNR wanting to pat themselves on the back with what a GREAT job they’ve done bringing the walleyes back.
for christs sake, dump a bunch of fry in a pond and close it to fishing for ten years, that was tough.

I’m not sure what kind of a guage it is, but the first year they opened the lake to walleye fishing, we fished out of our boat tied to a tree on the tamarac river. didn’t matter what you threw out there, a walleye bit it. every other one being under the slot and perfect for the frying pan. the second year, you had to catch about fifteen to catch an eater and the catches came much less frequently than the year before.
then last year, we didn’t even catch enough for one fish fry.
all of this was in the river, same time period one year to the next.

this new slot will help a lot, but an increased number alone isn’t going to do much to put more fish in the live well.
I hope it looks attractive enough to get people to make the drive though.

My father was laid to rest yesterday on a beautiful sunny spring like day. he was laid near the grave site of his mother, who was buried some fifty odd years earlier, on a hillside over looking the river in the area that was his childhood home.

Putz had a heck of a going out party. many of his friends and family paid their respects to him and offered hugs to the rest of his family. thank you.

it’s a tough deal letting go of a loved one. I hoped somehow, some way, I’d get to avoid going through that, but in the back of my mind, I knew some day I’d have to say goodbye.

we are doing ok. I mean that. there will be good days and times when a memory will bring a tear of joy to our eyes, as Putz was every where.

each new season will bring with it constant reminders of pops. he enjoyed so many things with us and didn’t want to miss out on anything.

from watching his grandson Sam play pee-wee hockey to smelting in the spring. a summer boat ride on Red lake, or a small crappie hole.

from the soup shoot in the fall and deer hunting in November and then to ice fishing in his new ice castle fish house.

pop was there in between as well, on his cell phone checking in every few days. I’ll never forget his opening line on the phone, always the same…”Yeah!….What’s happenin?”

I hope I can always hear his voice in my head and heart, the way it was, unique, just like the man himself.

thank you all for being part of his life and for taking the time to read this.

thank you to those of you who were with us this last week in person and in prayer.

it’s time to move on now. there’s a lot of spring late ice fishing to do. Putz wouldn’t like seeing me sit around moping.

he’s probably pissed it took this long to get back to the things we love to do.

I have one more house to move off the lake. I will do that tomorrow.

after that, I’m going fishing, so if anybody wants to chase some crappies, give me a ring and see what’s on the menu.

atv’s and portables are a safe bet, while for the next couple days snowmobiles might be ok, I’m thinking trucks will be a go for a couple weeks yet.

it’s time to fish!

Rest in peace pop. you earned it!

I am sorry to announce that my father, Donald Doree – PUTZ, has passed away.

He passed on silently, peacfully in his sleep yesterday, tuesday evening a little after 6:00 p.m. with his family by his side.

We all had a chance to say goodbye and hold his hand. He will be deeply missed by his family and friends.

My pop enjoyed his home away from home, the “putz villa” as he called it. a trailer set up by my brother Dean for my pop, on acouple acres bordering the property we deer hunt on.

Pop allways wanted that cabin in the woods and this worked out perfectly for him.

We enjoyed many weekends there with him. one of our favorite weekends, was the anual “putz soup shoot”

2500 rounds of ammunition blazing away at clay pigeons and a kettle of stew bubbling all day long over the camp fire.

don’t worry Putz, we will carry on the tradition, along with a goal of pissing off the neighbor.

the arrangements will be announced in his obituary in either the st.paul pioneer press or the star tribune.

I can’t tell you exact time, but we are looking at visitation to be from 11:00 a.m. – 12:p.m. on friday, March 13th, at Kessler and Maguire funeral home at 640 west 7th street, followed by a short service, then the proccession to the acadia park cemetary where he will be laid to rest.

there will be a reception following at Axel’s Bonfire restaurant in mendota.

if anybody needs directions feel free to call or watch here. I will update my reports page with any new updates.

Muddy,
the lakes are pretty easy to get around on as of now.
there is some forecast precipitation over the next two days and I hope it doesn’t amount to much.

the fish are just hungry enough to keep our interest, but not eating every thing you drop down on them by any means, but it won’t be long and they will.
maybe this next warm up will reach the fish too!

WHAT THE??!!

ice is good. water…not as much as most lakes. still have snow on top in most areas. very slushy and easy to drive through.
when the water finds its way down in a day or so, and when it refreezes out there, we will have very good conditions on the lake.
good right now, just a bit wet. wear your rubber boots.

Hi Russ!
with two weekends left for inland walleye fishing, we keep pusing farther to find the mother load of eyes. a stingy bite so far has left us with plenty of pictures of trophy fish, and a few eaters mixed in as well.
satisfying, but allways wanting to do better.

the end of walleye season, marks the beginning of crappie season for me.
I will have my houses on crappies for a couple weeks after the 22nd of february.
ice permitting I will be chasing crappies and gills for a month or more afterward. I can hardly wait!

the 1/4 inch of snow we recieved overnight combined with the wind we had, completely filled more than one road today.
I noticed one small road that forgot to bump open, I was able to drive over the top of the drifts with my pickup.
I also noticed that I could almost walk on top of snowy areas that hadn’t been plowed yet.
that’s what this derned wind ‘ll do for ya.
there is water/slush mostly in areas that have been fished. holes drilled allowing the water to come up under the snow.
after we got the roads knocked back today, we noticed quite a bit of water along the edges.

still good roads, still great fishing.
I have one group out right now that put 3 fish on the ice in less than an hour that went over 20 inches.
and a couple smaller.
must be this derned cold weather them bigger walleyes like so much?

reefrat, email sent.

Hi Russ, the slot on Winnie is like most other lakes with a protective slot, being that all fish from 17 – 26 inches in length must be returned to the water un-eaten.

there have been relatively few eaters coming up. a lot more of the slot fish and just over.
I am going to try an area where we did well last season for eaters. with a little luck we will have a fish fry this weekend?

here’s a couple pics from this past weekend

1.andrew’s 27 inch c & r

2.a typical football sized walleye

3.Randy’s 28.5 inch

I’ll post more as I get pics mailed to me by customers

thanks for the report Russ! hows judge judy?
how about the beav?
sure miss you guys out on the lake!

stopped at freds today and he confirmed that Denny’s has a road out now. maybe I’ll give them a call to see how far out they are and what kind of traffic they are allowing out.
that is the first road I have heard of on the big lake so far.
sounds like the pines and highbanks will be waiting a while.
there has been some traffic out on cutfoot and good numbers of crappies along with some nice walleyes taken as well.

the shiner supply may be hard to come by this season.
a poor run of emeralds up north on the river and the spot tails are also few and far between.
good thing the walleyes like the chubs just as well.
I like to have both in my house when fishing walleyes, but the chubs keep WAY better than the shiners do and they are always plentiful. cheaper too!

there is traffic getting out, but mostly sleds, atv’s with chains and other tracked vehicles.

the cold is having some success freezing the slush down, though in conditions like this we always have to watch out for slush pockets and hidden cracks under the snow cover caused by the deep freeze temperatures.

Keep your stick on the ice!

this from our group on upper red a few years back

I pulled my last two houses off today. they were out in front of highbanks. there was still quite a bit of snow on the lake, but the road banks are getting pretty soft.
you can travel most anywhere.

there is a new break that pushed up some time in the last couple days. it runs off of tamarac point to the northwest , but it doesn’t appear that it goes all the way to high banks’ perch bar road. looked like it stopped short, though I didn’tgo check it out. it ran just to the north of my day house by about 70 yards. sure glad it broke there on the far side of my house

I did hear of a real good bite out by zumers bar today. it was in the morning and went pretty good until he was done at 11 with his limit of 9’s and bigger.
no details on the exact location, sorry I just dont know.

i will make another trip up there in a week or so after the ice is melted down to pick up junk left over from the winter.
I know I have a few blocks left out there that I want to recover.
maybe I’ll get lucky and find some goodies