It has occurred to me that I have never been to an IDO Sturgeon Excursion. I am in with my son.

I really like the Eagle Street Grill.

Jon Jordan, you wanna be in charge of organizing a poker game?

redneck wrote:

Mike, Lenny and BK— not many of us old timers around from the old ARM events and get togethers. If this works out we should make sure Mr. Holst, Dustin, Gianni, Mr. Koonce, Mr. Man Pretty and the rest of the crew get invites. It would be fun to do some of those then and now pictures. I have one somewhere of my boy shore fishing after fishing about 36 hours straight. I think I have some somewhere of the monsoon and James and Dustin trying to keep the tent up in a rainstorm. Those were some fun times.

Sounds like a plan.

I remember that monsoon. We strapped the tent to out trucks so it wouldn’t blow away in the wind then proceeded to empty the keg. Gosh, that was a great time.

Mike W wrote:

Everts resort. Throw back to fishtheriver.com. For you new guys that is ido before it was ido. Fishing, tubing, boats sinking, monsoons. Thoses where some get togethers.

Heck yeah!!!! I’d be all in for reliving one of those GTGs.
Throw in a gentlemen’s honor fishing tourney and an all night poker game and it has makings of a great weekend.

I like postponing the sign up til next Monday.

26.8

Big fish. 9.7

I agree this won’t stop him. He is making a profit selling his fish to people in Chicago. The wardens need to catch these people. Take away his profit stream then maybe he will stop.

I would think that would be a great rod for pitching blades. For me it would be a little too fast for pitching jigs.

I’ve had good luck in the past Texas rigging ribbon worms and power worms for walleye in heavy cover.

I would wager that the walleye move into the river and stage in the holes and inside corners just outside the current seams.

A Yamaha t8 on my 1775 Pro V tops out about right about 5 MPH

Hey, thanks for the welcome guys. I appreciate it.

Lenny Jamison
Robert Hall

Total. 22.7

BF. 8.7

Then find in that era Chevrolet truck is solid. The weak point on them is the transmission. That truck will have either a 4l60e or a 4l80e trans, depending on whether it is a half ton or three quarter ton model. That is a very failure prone transmission.

Do yourself a favor and Google that trans model before purchasing. You will see many articles pertaining to failure, particularly reverse gear failure.

What tourney is it?

You might want to check the magnets on the flywheel. I have had them come loose resulting in the performance you describe. If they have come loose you can jb weld them back in place.

Give me a four weight flyrod and put me on a stretch of desolate mountain stream and I could die happy. It really wouldn’t even matter if the fish are biting.

I am guessing 18,500.

I can’t see the pic very well on my phone but it looks more like a buffalo to me…. or maybe even a quillback.

Stockholm launch is under water. No good.

Wow. I have not heard of anybody doing that in years. Gotta have a boat with four wheel drive to make that run.

I agree. Implementing a slot system is not a good idea. It encourages the harvest of fish right up to the slot limit, which is the breeding stock.

Question #1: What is the “Wanton Waste” law in the State of Wisconsin?

Answer: As it states in the Wisconsin regulation book- “23.095(1g) General prohibition. No person may damage or attempt to damage any natural resource within the state”. Describing the word Damage. – “Damage” means to commit a physical act that unreasonably destroys, molests, defaces, removes or wastes. This could mean damaging and/or wasting everything from a tree to a black bear as this law is written.

Hmmm, I wonder if dragging small sauger out of the depths knowing that you are killing many of them and just throwing them back over the side of the boat fits?

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As much as I hate to say it, I honestly feel the walleye/saugers season needs to be shut down on pool 4 during the winter/spring.

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Not sure about complete closure. But I think some change is probably needed. From Feb 28 to May 1st go to a Rainey River rule. 2 fish nothing over 20 inches. Protect the big girls.

Easy fix on the scour hole problem. During those same dates, move the “no fishing here to dam” signs down to the second wing dam.

Mr. Holst said it best. The biggest problem pool 4 faces is lost habitat due to sedimentation. If you believe what is predicted to happen, lake Pepin will be a swamp/mash within the next 100 years. There will basically be a dredge channel down the middle of the lake. Game over.

-J.

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Still can’t believe pool 4 doesn’t have a slot. The Iowa pools sure improved when they added a slot.

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Brian K. was telling me as far back as last August of a guide here on IDO pushing Wisconsin congress hard for a slot on pool 4. If I remember correctly the slot he is pushing for is 20-27 with one over 28.

Am I remembering that correctly Brian?

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This study?

Or this one?

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Pug, I don’t think people like clicking on links.

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I think the first link, being nearly 30 years old, may be a bit outdated. many things have changed in this river system since 1984.

The second link is an interesting one. It basically says the numbers are significantly down and seem to still be dropping. It gives some opinions on why this may be. It also says that the DNR has no real clue for sure why it is. Most likely it is a combination of factors.
This link pretty much says that the river system is definitely on a downward trend and, much like they are saying on Mille Lacs, zebras causing clearer water has changed the system to be much better suited for other species and not so suited for sauger.

So, with these factors challenging the current populations, how could anyone say that this ecosystem is stable enough to be not effected by other factors (fishermen)killing many small saugers each day? Why on earth would we, as sportsmen, want to put undue pressure on an already struggling population?

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I am here to tell you it was a lot easier catching fish in red wing 10 years ago compared to now.

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Use a hook, minnow and slip sinker, it’s just as good as 20 years ago many will say.

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These “many” must not have known how to fish 20 years ago.

There have been plenty of studies the last few years documenting the depletion of the walleye/sauger population on pool 4.

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Many big rivers are so healthy and ecologically sound, even over fishing has little to no affect.

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Wow!!!! I am not sure how to even respond to this statement. The very definition of overfishing is harvesting in quantities over the sustainability of a body of water.

Oceans have been depleted of species of fish because of overfishing.

It is no secret that the sauger population on pool 4 has been drastically declining for a few years. That makes this problem even worse. More people are struggling to catch fish so they head to the deep holes and kill a bunch of saugers. This causes the population to decline even further. It is a vicious circle.

Signs would do nothing to help. Everyone knows what they are doing to the fish by pulling them out of deep water. Most just do not care.

Too many people around here just care about how they can exploit this fishery. Whether it be to sell bait/ tackle to the fishermen or guide them or sell advertising on a website or just to catch fish as easily as possible, most just care about what this fishery can do for them. This is evident by how people who have put themselves in charge of sharing info about pool 4 openly promote the fishing of the scour holes regardless of the fish kill. As long as they can get their money it is all good, right?

Most of the folks that are killing all these fish are dong it because it would be too much work for them to actually go out and look for fish, maybe learn a little about the the river system and how the walleye/sauger relate to it. They just want to go online and be spoonfed information while expending as little effort as possible. They just don’t care.
I am afraid there is no good ending to this situation. I am afraid the only possible solution for the sake of the fishery is to shut it down. People just cannot be depended on to do the right thing on their own.

I am not even going to get into the fact that many of the fish taken from the scour hole are illegally snagged.