Another year’s week long excursion to Pool 4 has come and gone. This year’s trip included site members Kevin Sime (whiskerkev), Joel Ballweg, and Pat Howard, along with some non-member friends. We also had the pleasure of having Domenick Goodman as our neighbor and had the chance to do some fishing with him as well. We had a good group in camp again this year and managed to put some decent fish in the boat and find more than enough keepers for a couple of fish fries and some fillets for everyone to take home.
This year’s trip was met with cold water temps that rose a little bit each day and finally hit 40 in spots on Saturday. We started the week looking for a day bite that we never really found. A fish here or a fish there but never anything that got me really excited to be out during daylight. We did however find a pretty consistent night bite dragging 3/32 oz BFT Precision heads with Moxies. We had a few colors that were putting fish in the boat, but Chartreuse Orange Core, Chartreuse Pepper, and Pro Blue were the colors that seemed to be the best producers.
Almost everyone in camp this year caught at least one quality fish over 5 pounds. The biggest fish of the week was caught by my buddy Phil Mattson that travels all the way from Portland Oregon just to fish walleye and sauger for a week. His fish went 8 pounds 13 ounces and came on the last night of the trip, allowing him to get his name on our traveling big fish trophy. Phil’s fish came on a Chart Orange core BFT moxie off of shallow sand. Phil and I had formulated a game plan of where we thought we could find some quality fish and this one was right where we said it should be. We thought we could maybe get a couple big girls from there, but only one wanted to play. We did pick up a few 18 to 19 inch fish off that spot as well. Its always nice when you come up with a plan and it works out.
We did catch sporadic fish during the day pulling cranks and vertical jigging hair and meat, but we did most of our damage after dark when the pressure went away and fish could move shallow without a boat buzzing over them. Most of our group concentrated on dragging at night, but a few of the guys did pitch up some nice fish. Here are a couple keepers Pat Howard picked up dragging a Chartreuse Pepper moxie. If memory serves correct, dragging was not something Pat had done much of, but after picking up some nice fish, he decided it was his new favorite technique.
The first few nights we concentrated on rocks, but finished the week on the sand. The last picture is my biggest fish of the week that was an even 6 pounds at 24 inches long.
Even though the bite was not what I would call hot, we managed to scratch out fish every day and had a couple good nights where I would consider the bite to have been above average. The water is coming up fast, but the fishing is picking up. Get out there if you can.
It was great getting a chance to spend the week at Evert’s again and enjoy Dean’s hospitality. As always, Dean is a fantastic host and makes sure his guests have a good vacation. It was nice to get a chance to hop in Dom’s boat a couple times and try some hand lining and just get a break from running the boat. Thanks to everyone in the group for making this year another great trip.
Well done John! Pat told me all about the trip. It sounded like a ton of fun! Great report and thanks for sharing!
Here are four more pictures.
1. Mark Meinholz with his new personal best of 5 pounds 13 ounces.
2. Kevin Sime with a 7 lb 3 oz eye
3. Kevin McGinley with a nice one that I don’t know the weight on.
4. Dewey Schultz with a nice 6 plus pounder.
Nice report John and great pics.
Awesome report John. Way to put in the night time for some good action. Nice looking fish for sure
!
Nice report & pics.
Thanks for sharing. 
Thanks for the invite John I had a blast and yes that was my 1st time dragging with any luck at all. You know the fish are hungry when all you see is the line coming out of their mouths. You have a great group of guys to fish with. I hope to be back again next year
Nice report and pics. Thanks!
It was great to be back on pool 4 fishing with the gang from Madison. Next year Dewey & I hope to be there for the full seven days. Three days of fishing goes by way to fast on waters this good!
As for baits, the BFT Moxi’s are as good as advertised! As we get more & more time with them, it’s becoming quite clear that these are “Must Have” baits for any walleye fishermen.
Thanks again to Dean for all the great service and steering us to good areas to fish! waytogo:
1st photo – official weigh-in time for Dewey. (fish was released)
2nd photo – Dewey with his 5lb 13oz, 23.5″ walleye.
3rd photo – 23 inches, released after photo.
4th photo – 20 inch sauger
5th photo – Dewey’s big fish of the week. 25.5″, 6lbs, 15oz’s. :
Looks like a great time was had by all
Great job men
I was thinking about you guys up there on P4…Wondering how the bite was !!! Looks like you all had a GREAT time !!!
Great job and real nice pix by all !!
Great pics
Thanks for sharing the results of the trip – looks like an awesome outing 
Sounds like it was another great trip and some fun was had. It was good to see you guys again and meet a few more of your group. We’ll see you next year thank you guys
Ah where to begin. First off Walleyes and Saugers shake with fear whenever Joel Ballweg dumps his rig in the water. I’ve never seen anyone that can crack the code of a tough bite like he can. We have a traveling trophy for big fish in our group. This year it was a back and forth affair with a 19 then a 21 then a 23, then a 24 then a 26 and a 27 on the last night to win. Great fun. I stayed out late on the second to last night and put up a mark of 7.3#. Phil managed to finally stick a pig on the last night ruining a 3rd year in a row winning streak for me. I’m glad he did it because it puts stress on me being the best every year. I am fine with second. I can see in my rear view mirror Joel and John who are the only people I really want to beat each year and it is far from easy to do so as they are both very talented river men. I think we could probably find room for Dave if he heals well and is off his softeners for a while. Nobody mentioned above the two fine fish frys we had where we fed 10-15 people each time full to overflowing. Good food and good friends fishing for a week. You can’t beat that.
I was GREAT to meet all of you, glad to see you got into the biggies after I left for work
Hopeully our paths cross again!!
It was good to meet you as well Ben. Too bad you had to work. Would have been fun to watch you stand in the back of Dom’s boat another night catching fish hand over fist.
I waited for those nights all winter, I knew that it was gonna turn on I just had to take one for the team and leave so Murphy could by his law throw the switch the night after I left. Man was it nice to just stand and fish, you know what I mean John
Looks like you guys had a great trip. Those are some nice looking fish for sure!
I think it would be great to have you up there with us Dave!
Looking at some of those pictures of Kevin (Sime), it looks as though he could have used a couple of stool softeners!
I do have to hand it to you on the fish fry’s Kev. They were excellent!
I do have to hand it to you on the fish fry’s Kev. They were excellent!
Potentialy the best I’ve had, Im young but I eat a ton of fish and that stuff was AWSOME!!
You are welcome Ben. Joel, It isn’t my fault picture takers are unable to get good shots of me. Part of that look was knowing some joker was going to knock me off who only fishes for trout and Salmon.
I’ve had a couple people ask me for the fish recipe so here it is
one box of shorelunch cornbread formula. Follow the instructions on the box with the below exception
Add to the cornbread batter 3 tablespoons of the below mixture which I make in bulk and it lasts a long time.
1 cup of cummin coriander powder.
1/3 cup of garlic powder
1 teaspoon of garam marsala (no more strong stuff)
1 teaspoon of chili powder more for hotter (or up to cayenne for hotter still)
salt and pepper
You can pickup the spices at any indian food store or spice house. store the bulk powder in glass jars that seal tight it will last for a year.
My tartar sauce was a big hit too.
1 cup of mayo
1 cup of miracle whip.
2 tablespoons or more of dill pickel relish
juice of one lemon. mix.
Keeps in the fridge for months.
Nice report
. It was good to meet you guys and thanks for the 
.
Nice report guys. Looks like a fun time had by all. I wish I lived closer to P4.
From the sound of it you guys would fit in just fine with
the Yooper crew!
Good friends, good fishin, good FISH FRY!
Thanks for the report!
Awesome report! Nice fish!!