Michael Best wrote:

<div class=”d4p-bbt-quote-title”>rschmidty wrote:</div>
It’s definitely moved some. About a week ago it was at Indus. Much closer to Birchdale now.

What web sight do you use to get the color shading you have?

Jason Groll posted a video of fishing on open water after launching at Pelland.

I tried posting the link but my posts aren’t actually posting.

You can go to ge.ssec.wisc.edu and then click on Modis Today link on the home page. From there you can click on Minnesota and it will isolate to that sector. I use the following settings: Terra, False Color, 250m and uncheck state borders. Sometimes, I have to choose Aqua to get that days picture. I’m assuming it’s two different satelites and Terra doesn’t always make this pass?

It’s definitely moved some. About a week ago it was at Indus. Much closer to Birchdale now.

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The screenshot attached shows that the river is open to Indus. Would need closer first hand accounts on where open spots are further up river but it’s clearly fully open to Indus.

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Michael Best wrote:

The Royal Dutchman finally made a post on the river conditions.

He said there is open water at mile marker 169. He mentioned open holes at mile marker 166. The open water at mile marker 169 and going east has been open all winter.

Mile marker 167 is pretty close to Indus I believe for context and Birchdale is mile marker 156, so 10-13 miles to go. Once it starts making progress, 2-3 miles a day is fairly typical at first.

blank wrote:

I agree that baitcasters are better suited for sturgeon, but I saw some pictures and video from Darren Troseth who was on the Rainy last weekend and he and his fishing partners were using spinning gear and his rod was completely doubled over. I thought that was interesting considering he’s pretty well versed in fishing for sturgeon and catfish.

Blank – I wouldn’t confuse Baitcasters being “better” with spinning gear being obsolete. If you look at more than just the last video of Darren’s, you will see he uses both.

As long as you have a strong rod, 50+ lb braid and strong spinning real, you won’t have any issues getting in big fish. We get in 50+ inch fish in a couple minutes. The biggest I’ve ever caught was 64 inches and it took maybe 5 minutes at the most.

It comes down to preference as long as you are making those choices above and doesn’t reflect on someone being or not being “well-versed.”

FishBlood&RiverMud wrote:

rschmidty wrote:
I think an important thing to monitor is the lbs of drag for a spinning reel. Just because a reel is big or holds a lot of line, doesn’t mean that it can apply the same amount of power. I have Okuma Avenger ABF 65b reels on my setups and it can apply 33lbs of pressure and it holds a lot of line.

Drag is entirely different than pulling power.

I agree with you, which is why I started my post with my disclaimer about you and BK.

I am more just addressing the point that if you prefer spinning gear which I’m not saying is better, to make sure the point I made was under consideration.

Hard to argue with FBRM or BK as those two have fished and caught more sturgeon than I could hope to.

I am one of those that fish with a spinning reel. I think an important thing to monitor is the lbs of drag for a spinning reel. Just because a reel is big or holds a lot of line, doesn’t mean that it can apply the same amount of power. I have Okuma Avenger ABF 65b reels on my setups and it can apply 33lbs of pressure and it holds a lot of line. For comparisons sake, the Black Max spinning reel size 60 only has 20lbs of pressure. Kastking’s sharky3 5000 series holds the least amount of line of the three I’ve mentioned but has 39lbs of drag pressure. I would try to find one that has at least 30lbs of drag, then in combination with a sturdy rod and 80lb braided line, you can put it to those sturgeon pretty good.

BigWerm wrote:

I know there’s a few of us former MIAC athletes on here, so thought I’d post this. I went to Gustavus, and think this is a terrible look and idea for the conference. Reeks of if you can’t beat em, kick em out.

http://www.startribune.com/miac-rivals-plot-ouster-of-st-thomas/508145182/

I also went to Gustavus from 05-09 and played on BB team. That was the start of their basketball dynasty, but before that they didn’t stand out as dominant in that sport other than having random years of success and they weren’t good in football during my years there. Gustavus was the most consistently top team for basketball from the early 90’s until 2005. UST maybe have some built-in advantages from some of the other MIAC schools but things rarely stay the same and having them in the Conference makes the league more desirable overall and helps the other schools out compete athletes that would maybe go to the UMAC instead.

I think it would be a mistake to boot them out.

My notes since I’ve been going up sturgeon fishing.

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I was just at Beanies on Sept 22nd. They don’t have the bait shop anymore and noone was there when we launched, just a pay drop box. $10 from 10/1 on.

$500 gives you a lot of options. I’m like you where I fish early season and late for sturgeon so we run into fairly cold weather but I don’t ice fish.

If you were ice fishing hard core and a lot I’m guessing what you choose might matter but for mostly temps near freezing or warmer, anything will work.

I have frabil i2s and they have been just fine. For those days near freezing, a base layer, flannel lined jeans, bibs,sweatshirt and coat are plenty warm.

I’ve seen similar posts like this but geared more towards ice fishing. If you search you should be able to find a lot of good opinions. I’ve always seen striker predator bibs and coat mentioned a lot. The combo should keep you under $450.

Awesome catch. Definitely a channel cat. We only have channels and flatheads in MN. That would be a very nice/big channel regardless of the river you are on. 5-10lbs are pretty common. I would almost equate 5-10lbers to 1.5-3.5lb bass and the one you caught as 5lb plus bass. Every lake has a 5lber but some have more than others and you won’t catch one everytime you go out.

If you want to catch channels that size fairly regularly, you need to fish the Red River. If you fish the northern reaches of the Red near the lockport dam, you can catch that size very regularly but it’s a unique place.

Northwoods Angling has two episodes on YouTube where they are fishing that damn and they have double and triple headers of fish that size.

Inland man waters it’s 6/14 including the st. Croix.

For large mouth, I wonder if a lake like that is partially too cold if it’s really deep and being up north?

I’ve always found some of the best bass lakes to produce size are shallower west of metro lakes that aren’t very big and have a lot of vegetation.

Also, similar to Pike management I wonder if too many fish causes poor size structure.

Thanks for the replies. I fully charged and double checked that cables were screwed on tight. One seemed loose.

So far so good after testing it.

Dave Karp wrote:

My only concern is, does vinyl get hot under the sun all day?
I don’t see anyone mention it, so maybe it doesn’t.
Bare feet fishing!

The floor will get hotter than carpet but I’ve had no issues with slippage. I fish into late November and early April up on the Rainy River and it can get pretty cold.

Way easier to clean. If you are fishing the river for cats and sturgeon where you are using a lot of live bait or cutbait and putting the fish on the floor has to happen, vinyl is a must.

If you are only fishing lakes for bass, panfish, walleyes, etc…it’s not as big of need.

I do wish I had snap in carpet flooring for the summer with the kids.

1) Lindners Angling Edge
2) Northwoods Angling (YouTube)
3) Catfish and Carp (YouTube)
4) Uncut Angling (YouTube
5) Keyes Outdoors

IDO would be in the top 5 for sure if they did more open water shows as I like the info and style the present but I don’t ice fish.

jonesry09 wrote:

Anybody thats heading up next week have any worry about what those nighttime lows are going to do to the motors?

I guess I’m not too concerned. We are heading up on Wednesday. Night time lows will be in the mid to upper teens. As long as you drain the water out when leaving the ramp, it should be fine. If we had lows near zero or below zero, I would be more concerned.

I would agree NoFish that with sturgeon especially you need both. I’ve seen friends have a heavy strong enough rod but a week reel that doesn’t allow the rod to do its job. I think length of the rod can also factor in. Usually a longer rod will allow you to control the fish a little more.

Most sturgeon guys I know use circle hooks. For a couple reasons, it reduces the chances of gut hooking a fish that is still making a comeback, they bite so light so it increases the chance they may hook themselves. Having a sensitive tip that isn’t too fast is important for detecting the bites and setting a circle hook but there are a lot of options out there that don’t bend all the way through.

I have the frabil 8445. I had a cheaper frabil net that was similar in size but didn’t have the power yok. My buddy was landing my fish and lifted it in without grabbing the hoop like BK suggested and it snapped. The 8445 it built stronger than my previous version so it should mitigate that risk but I’ll second BK that all big fish should be brought in by grabbing the hoop. My original net was like $70 and the current one is closer to $130.

FishBlood&RiverMud wrote:

<div class=”d4p-bbt-quote-title”>rschmidty wrote:</div>
The Rippin lips MH also works great.

Not big enough for sturgeon.

I get that the rod you posted would fit that bill for being strong enough and certainly stronger than the MH rippin lips but do you have other suggestions that maybe is more versatile. The reason I suggested it was to answer versatility but still capable part of the question. Certainly there are better “Sturgeon” specific rods and the one you suggested seems to fit that bill.

I have had no problem getting a 60 inch fish into the boat in under 5 minutes with the MH rippin lips. To me what is equally important is the reel and lbs of drag that can be applied. The reels I use have 33lbs of drag and it allows you to put more pressure on the fish to get them in sooner reducing the stress put on the fish from fighting them too long.

I’ve also heard good things about the okuma battle cat. I just got one late last fall but haven’t had the chance to use it yet. Dtro on YouTube has one that he’s used for both cats and sturgeon.

The ugly stik tiger rods are pretty good for cats and sturgeon. Really soft tip and plenty of backbone. They run any where from $65-75.

The Rippin lips MH also works great. They can be found on amazon for $39.99. The casting style are one piece and spinning is two piece.

I have both and have had no problem bringing in big fish.

We easily have a foot in Rosemount and still snowing.

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Check that, just measured and we are at 9.

Got to be at 6 inches already here in Rosemount.

Joe Scegura wrote:

The bungee wouldn’t be a bad idea if they came up with a system on the end so you didn’t have to tie a knot in your rope!! That just seems silly to me.

Who referenced tieing a not in the rope? I said “tie off”. The system I have is a the bungee connected to a boat cleat, therefore you are “tieing” your anchor rope around the cleat like you would do if the cleat is on the boat.

I’ll add that it’s a similar system to what FBRM(on this site) uses. He posted it in a sturgeon thread a couple of years ago so I thought I would try it and it has definitely made a difference.

Red Eye wrote:

Can we get a picture or a discripion of your bungee/shock absorber system?

My boat’s in storage and my anchor system is with it but I’ve attached a basic drawing. Forgive my lack of artistic abilities.

Essentially, I bought an airhead boat dock bungee. The 4ft version that stretches to 5.5ft. I then bought a 6ft tow rope, 4 carabiners, block of 2×4 piece of wood and a boat cleat. I drilled the boat cleat into the piece of wood and then clipped the bungee and tow rope to it.

When it’s windy, I’ll attach the both the bungee and tow rope(there in case the bungee breaks) to the eyelet under the hull. I then tie off my anchor rope to the boat cleat on the wood and throw it out. I make sure there is enough anchor line slack from the bungee cleat to tie off to a cleat on the actual boat in case the system ever failed completely. That way I don’t lose my anchor.

Again, I don’t use it on calm days, but it also helps if I’m fishing an area that has a lot of boat traffic. It lessens the amount my anchor loses hold when a big wake wave comes by.

http://www.cabelas.com/product/Airhead-reg-Bungee-Dock-Lines/700496.uts?slotId=0

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I have a 25lb richter anchor with a few feet of chain between the rope and anchor. Also, on windy days I have a home made bungee system I attach to the boat and anchor line to absorb the bigger waves better. Similar size boat to yours and no issues staying in one spot.