I really like Caribou’s Breakfast Blend and Caribou Blend.

Another coffee I buy when I can is Highlander Grog from Nelson Bros (Clearwater Travel Plaza). Its a flavored coffee, love it!

I have a Thorne Bros Perch Sweetheart rod that I bought nearly 15 years ago. All my other ice rods since that rod have been Thorne Bros rods.

Nothing against these other guys but Thorne Bros was making high end custom ice rods before ice fishing “took off” so to speak.

I’m sure they do their best building these things but they are in high demand.

I should add that she is still swimming too!!

At some point in my life… I think I was much more brand loyal than I am now. I just want to use the best equipment that will help me catch fish. I was a Marcum guy for many, many years… last year I got a Vex FL-22. I’d also been an Otter guy as well but I looked long and hard at Fish Traps before settling back on an Otter Lodge. Owned a GMC Sierra for 10 years and (gasp!) bought a Ford F-150. Have Humminbirds on my boat now but would strongly consider Lowrance next go around.

As a promoter, you really have to market your products strengths and not bash the competition. Because the competition may be your next marketing partnership.

Ice Team, Clam, Fish Trap, Vex, Jason Mitchell, etc are a great company with great employees and staff members. Same with Marcum & Otter.

Good Luck to you Chris!

Brian –

Carla & I can’t Thank You enough for letting us share the boat with you on Friday night.

Its just funny how things come together sometimes. We planned this trip over a month ago, if not more? Figured Friday before Memorial weekend would give us a likely shot at catching a flathead, rather than flatheading for walleyes which would have been fun too! Then we get a really late spring and the bite hasn’t kicked in yet. Then we are faced with a shortened evening because of the weather. Seams like the odds were against us but the fish had something else on their mind.

Its much easier to sit through the rain when you are getting action. Fish #1 got us through to the next, and then I don’t think we wanted to stop.

Carla is still excited about the night! Was a lot of fun! And I had a lot of fun learning about another part of the river in your neighborhood, as well as watching Carla connect on hookset after hookset! The hookset is make or break time with these fish and she did awesome!

Thanks again Brian!

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When they dropped it to .08 was that part of the raising the legal age to 21 under threat of losing highway funds? Or did it come after that?

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Drinking age going to 21 happened way before dropping the limit to .08.
.08 just happened 5-6 years ago or so??

I live less than a couple miles from that Fleet Farm and am there all the time as well. The fishing dept is well organized now because they just changed over from ice fishing to open water, and put all their new stock out on the shelves. Just wait until September when you are looking for a Rapala HJ-12 in Clown or Firetiger or a Rogue in Lazer Craw and you’ll be thinking differently. Its like they order what they think they’ll need for the summer, put it on the shelf, and then let it run out. Gander is great for this as well too!

For the most part, your best bet is to just crank the inside board in and drag it off the back of the boat. If you have a free rod holder in the back, opposite side of the boat, stick the rod in there once the board is behind the boat.

Bigger fish will often pull the board back and you can swing them around the back of the inside board without cranking the inside board in.

If in doubt, crank it in.

With cranks… you can also reset the outside board by sending it out behind the motor. Freespool the board back until you have enough room for it to make the swing around the back of the inside board.

I left my Lab with my parents one spring when I went out to Lake Erie for a fishing tournament. They took him out to the lake cabin so he could run around and it didn’t take him long to find a dead carp. He brought it back near the cabin, I suppose to show it off, and then he started rolling in it. I called them later that evening to see how things were going and I got an earful! LOL!

I have to be really careful with him around the lake in the spring. Dead fish are his thing… no doubt about it!

I made a similar decision just before Thanksgiving as a part of a 30 day challenge. The challenge was no Mt. Dew, no Red Bull, and I broadened it to no carbonated beverages period. I made it through the 30 day challenge and decided to keep going with it… so today marks Day 71 of no pop, Red Bull, or carbonated beverages.

I’ve been a coffee drinker so I figured I could just drink a little more coffee and I’d probably be alright. So far so good. The first week was terrible as I really had to change a lot of habits and develop new ones.

And I really think that was the secret was getting out of those old habits. I’d stop by the SA station by my house and get a $4 Red Bull every morning for the ride to work. My trade-off was I got a Keurig coffee machine and starting brewing 1 cup of coffee for my ride to work and that has worked. The coffee machine has paid for itself already. LOL!

I’ve made some other adjustments too… my fast food intake is very limited now and I’ve only drank alcohol 3 times in the last 4-1/2 months.

Its all working as I’m shedding weight pretty well and I’m not even exercising other than walking the dog twice a day for a total of 45 minutes. Just this morning, I’m down 7 pounds from Christmas and I have no idea how much I lost before that as I got myself a scale for Christmas. I’m probably in the 25-30 pound ballpark I bet of total weight loss.

I’ve never been that big into guns… I have my deer rifle and my waterfowl shotgun. Figured they cover most of my outdoor hunting activities.

With that said, I’ve always wanted a Ruger Mini-14 with all the fun accessories as its a cool looking gun. I’ve also never ever had the desire to own an AR-15 but that is definitely changing now. I want one! Handgun ownership with conceal/carry is definitely in my future as well.

Like Cougareye mentioned, the irony is events like this and the ensuing political theatrics is selling more guns and causing folks like me who wouldn’t ordinarily want to own an AR-15 to own one.

I can’t financially afford to rush out and buy one right now but hopefully our government won’t be able to get anything accomplished regarding more gun regulations and I’ll get that opportunity down the road.

Gas stations by my house in New Hope are $2.97-$2.99, drive 6 miles to work in Golden Valley and gas is $3.15-$3.19 or so.

Good to see, the news said gas prices are down 22 straight days in a row now.

My guess its as good as gone.

The FLW used the TV shows, the magazine, the website, tournaments, wrapped boats, etc to get their sponsors as much advertising as they could.

I really do enjoy the magazine but it seams like it wouldn’t have a role in their business plan now.

Historical Walleye Net Catches at Lake Mille Lacs, 1983-2012

Thats a pretty devastating chart. While it appears the net catches are pretty consistent in the 10-15 fish range… the trend line is absolutely going down.

Would be interesting to see bar graphs of total harvest, angler harvest, and netting harvest compared alongside the net catches.

Soft Tonneau cover all the way and my vote is for the Access Cover. I had one on my GMC Sierra for 10 years and it was almost as good as new when I traded the truck.

My new (to me) F-150 came with a soft cover as well… Truxedo low profile. Not a real big fan of the latching mechanism on the Truxedo over the Access Cover. It looks good and its on the truck so I’ll deal with it but would prefer to have an Access Cover.

Whatever you do, do not get a tonneau cover with snaps and removable arched bow supports. I don’t even know if they make them this way anymore but good luck getting that cover snapped back down in the winter if its been rolled up for a few days.

Congrats on the Truck!!

All the fish we caught last night were in pretty decent shape. First fish of the night puked up what appeared to be 3 perch into the boat so he was eating something.

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Dang your dog has grown…but you still look the same!

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Shoot… I thought I was looking better. The dog… he’s almost 120lbs now. Crazy seeing him next to other Labradors… he’s actually twice the size of a lot of them.

How many times will we be able to say its the last day of September and its 80 degrees out? Just crazy!! The walleye trolling sucked for us… result of it being 80 degrees out! Settled for these green things.

Someone sent me this e-mail and it is applicable to this topic.
I’m not fact-checking it but it is funny.

“This old fellow in the big cowboy hat got a standing ovation.

The Sierra Club and the U S. Forest Service were presenting an alternative to the Wyoming ranchers for controlling the coyote population.

It seems that after years of the ranchers using the tried and true method of shooting or trapping the predators, the Sierra Club had a “more humane” solution to this issue.

What they were proposing was for the animals to be captured alive. The males would then be castrated and let loose again.

This was ACTUALLY proposed by the Sierra Club and by the U. S. Forest Service.

All of the ranchers thought about this amazing idea for a couple of minutes.

Finally an old fellow wearing a big cowboy hat in the back of the conference room stood up, tipped his hat back and said, “Son, I don’t think you understand our problem here. These coyotes ain’t F’n our sheep; they’re eatin’ ’em!”

The meeting never really got back to order.”

I’ve done 2 of the Living Social deals… one was for Thorne Bros and the other for Capras. No issues at all.

When this stuff (group discounts – Living Social, Groupon, etc) became really popular, I had a co-worker that was getting in on dang near every and any deal he could find. Gotta believe all those “deals” were costing him some pretty serious money.

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They did recover it, whatever was left of it. Was found gutted and stripped in a field and it was torched. Thank god he had/has insurance. His new ride is very nice!

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Must have been too busy over the last week with fishing and work to catch his Facebook post but you are correct. Just a sad situation. Ted Takasaki had owned that boat.

The insurance aspect, I’ve heard a few presentations now from Bob Luellen at Worldwide Marine Insurance at NPAA Conferences and I don’t think I’d have anyone else insure my boat. Robert was insured with them.

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Do people really get away with stealing a boat? Hope you get it all back in one piece. Perhaps the police will find it in a parking lot with the perps asphyxiated in the front of their vehicle.

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One of my friends just had his Ranger 621 w/ Merc Verado stolen out in Green Bay while prefishing for a tournament. Had it into a dealer for servicing and they stole it from the dealer. Still haven’t heard if its been recovered or not.

Amazingly, word spreads like wild fire across Facebook and web forums in short order. There’s a pretty large supportive network of folks out there. I just don’t know if its enough.

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There was some rot in the crotch. (I’ll stop there)

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You have a good eye… I’d concur.

Best Floor Mats I’ve ever had were Catch-Alls. I hate, and I mean HATE, rubber floor mats. Catch-Alls are a rubber backed carpet with a lip around the outside edge. I had some in my Sierra for nearly 10 years. They just left in the garbage can last week as I had to get a new truck.

First thing I did was look for new floor mats and can’t get Catch-Alls for my new(er) F-150. I can get Catch-Its which are pretty similar. Haven’t pulled the trigger yet though.

Seams like the real “invasive” here that the lakeshore owners are trying to control is the general public using their lake.

When is this going to end?

That would be your transmission.

If you can get it up to highway speed, you’ll more than likely notice no overdrive either. Your transmission is more than likely skipping gears as well.

Been there, done that… 1999 GMC Sierra that I got to 250,000 miles.

New(er) Ford F-150 in the driveway as of last Monday.

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Ummm…I didn’t say “damed”.

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Technicalities…

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I think the creek should be damned.

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It already is in a couple places and one large falls.

Anybody ever hear of Minnehaha Creek? Good grief… we don’t need people or boats or birds or aliens to spread these. Minnetonka is connected via Minnehaha Creek to the City Lakes and ultimately the Mississippi River. You’re already affected on both ends. Will just be a matter of time.

The irony is the Minnehaha Creek Watershed District is the biggest PIA when it comes to dealing with development projects in the Cities. Their Creek will be the means that infests all the city lakes.

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I’ve personally seen this happen 3 times in the last two years while I was at ramps. One was a beautiful older 18 ft. Ranger Fisherman on a bunk trailer (early March at Hidden Falls. Iced-up bunks). It took 5 of us to get it back onto the trailer. No need to say anymore. ….That’s got to be a heartbreaker!

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Didn’t happen to be a blue colored Ranger 690, did it? Happened to a friend and myself at Hidden Falls in March. I was backing up the truck and there goes the boat, right off the back onto the ramp. He was muskie fishing late into the fall and this was the first trip out in the spring. The bunks were solid ice. Thats an aweful feeling!