9-25-2011 Sun
5:30 PM – 6:45 PM
H2O: 60 ˚, 5.15’ rising, 28.8 kcfs, clear
Weather: N8, overcast, 60 ˚, 29.87 falling
Location: Mississippi R. Pool 7
Bagged: Nothing
Partners: none

Comments

I worked again today on the second day of duck season, so I went out after work for a quick hunt. I had about as much luck tonight as I had last night. At least tonight I got a spot and did have a few ducks burn me. Once again tonight the shooting was very sporadic, and I assume the majority of the shooting was the result of shots being fired at wood ducks.

Observations:

The water in the ponds that are connected to the main river is very low.

9-20-2011 Tue

9-20-2011 Mon
8:30 AM – 2:30 PM
H2O: 68 ˚, 5’ rising, 20 kcfs, clear
Weather: (1253) S 14 G 23, clear, 68 ˚, 29.78 falling
Location: Mississippi R. Pool 8 upper end and Black River, North La Crosse
Caught: LMB approx. 8, 10-15”, Pike approx. 6, 20-29”
Partners: unnamed

Comments

My hopes for a good fishing day were high, but the fish did not help me out. The weather went from calm and overcast to rain and then to sunny and very windy. The water temperature has increased a few degrees since Sunday.
The most effective baits of the day were spinner baits and tubes, with some fish caught on crank baits. Again today the fish were relating mostly to rock with a few fish coming off weed edges.

Observations:

The water is very low right now, with plenty of shoreline being exposed. The leaves on the trees are starting to turn with lots of yellow or pale green color being visible. I would expect by the end of next week we should be at peak fall foliage color.

9-18-11 Sun

9-18-2011 Sun
10:40 AM – 5:15 PM
H2O: 60 ˚, 4.95’ rising, 18.3 kcfs, clear
Weather: (1053) SE 6, overcast, 58 ˚, 30.08 falling / (16:53) SE 7, light rain, 59’, 29.98 Falling
Location: Mississippi R. Pool 8 upper end
Caught: LMB (23) 9 – 17”, SMB (2) 9”, Pike (7) 20-31”, Dogfish 20”, sauger 11”
Partners: none

Comments

Today I ventured down to pool eight and fished from the Dresbach Dam to Target Lake. I decided I needed to start fishing this pool again, mainly because I think it is a much more productive pool than pool seven.
I had a pretty good day. The weather was nasty, the fish were mostly small, but I was again impressed with the numbers of fish. Almost all fish were relating to rock structure along the main channel or side channels directly off the main channel. I caught fish on crank baits, spinner baits and senko’s, but the best bait was a medium deep running white crank bait.
The pike that I caught seemed particularly aggressive. The ones I caught on the crank bait engulfed the whole bait, no portion of the bait was exposed which made hook or shall I say bait removal quite challenging. I am rather puzzled as to where the small mouth bass are residing. With the amount of water I covered and the structure I fished you would have thought I would have even been able to snag one!

Observations:

I did not see any fish chasing bait fish today. The water level on pool eight is surprisingly low; it is really good time to scout for spring time fishing spots with so many interesting areas of structure now visible.

9-17-11 Sat

9-17-2011 Sat
6:00 AM – 8:30 AM / 6:00 PM – 7:15 PM
H2O: 58 ˚, 4.93’ steady, 17.6 kcfs, turbid
Weather: (0653) E 7, overcast, 47 ˚, 30.29 steady / (17:53) SE 12, partly cloudy, 65’, 30.16 Falling
Location: Mississippi R. Pool 7
Caught / bagged: Mark – three wood ducks, 6 LMB 12 – 15”, 2 pike 23 & 25”
Partners: Hunting – Jake and Mark Tupper

Comments

I took Mark out for today’s youth duck hunt. The ducks were not plentiful, but he did manage to get his limit of wood ducks. He swatted his first one on the water and I gave him heck for it and told him no more of that. In reality the wood ducks were about the only species of ducks we did see. I also had Fritz along and he was able to retrieve two ducks. I do not know how many more retrieves he has left in him, but he still gets excited over ducks.
The fishing this afternoon was not too bad. I did not get any fish out on the lake, but caught all the fish at the end of the channel. It was quite windy and the water out on the main lake was fairly dirty.

Observations:

There are very few ducks around. This morning during the hunt we only saw wood ducks and very few mallards. While fishing out on the lake this afternoon I did see a couple flocks of blue wing teal with one of those flocks having at least one hundred birds in it.

9-16-11 Fri.

9-16-2011 Fri
6:00 PM – 9:30 PM
H2O: 63 ˚, 4.91’ steady, 17 kcfs, clear
Weather: S 9, overcast, 55 ˚, 30.29 steady (17:53PM)
Location: Mississippi R. Pool 7
Caught: bluegills and crappies (bait), flat heads 6 & 10 lbs.
Partners: none

Comments

I had an itch to try for flatheads tonight, so I had to scratch it! The river is definitely looking like it is starting to turn to its fall mode. The weeds are dying and thank goodness the flow is where it should be this time of year, low!
To catch bait I went back to a spot where I did not have any trouble last week catching gills and crappies, but it was a different story this week. I was able to get bait alright but the size and quantity was on the downhill slide.
For flatheads I set up in two different spots in Somners. In both spots I was fishing in about twenty to twenty five feet of water, with much deeper water very close. I was able to catch one fish at each spot.

Observations:

None

9-15-11 Thr

9-15-2011 Thr
5:00 PM – 7:45 PM
H2O: 67 ˚, 4.87’ steady, 15.6 kcfs, clear
Weather: calm, clear, 53 ˚, 30.35 steady (18:55PM)
Location: Mississippi R. Black river, North La Crosse
Caught: LMB (lots – somewhere between 10 and 20)
Partners: Ben and Mike (Holmen Techs.)

Comments

We did very well on the bass tonight thanks to the guiding of Ben. All the fish that were caught were LMB, except for Mike who caught a SMB and Ben who caught one pike. Unfortunately we had to give big fish honors to Mike.
Just about all types of baits produced fish, with crank baits being the best. We caught the best and most fish on rocks or very close to rocks, however some fish did come from the weed edges. I had fished this area once a very long time ago, but after our success tonight I will be back

Observations:

We caught a good number of fish tonight, but the average size seems to be smaller than what I catch on pool 7. However we did catch some nice fish, so maybe it is just the time of year and the type of bite.

9-13-11 Tue

9-13-2011 Tue
6:00 PM – 7:20 PM
H2O: 69 ˚, 4.98’ falling, 10.08kcfs, turbid
Weather: NW 10, clear, 64 ˚, 30.00 steady (18:55PM)
Location: Mississippi R. Pool 7, Lake Onalaska
Caught: LMB (6) 12, 14, 15, 2-18, 19”
Partners: None

Comments

It was a quick trip tonight. The main agenda was to see how the fish would respond to the cold front that just blew in. I went back to the spot on the lake where I had done well last week. Well the fish were still there, but they were more buried in the weeds. It was the same as it has been all year on the lake; all the fish were located in one spot and one spot only. The fish I did find were very active; in fact my first three casts resulted in three fish in the boat.

Observations:

The emergent weeds on the lake are definitely starting to die off.

9-8-11 Thr

9-8-2011 Thr
5:30 PM – 9:30 PM
H2O: 5.29’ falling, 26.5 kcfs, 65 ˚, clear
Weather: calm, clear, 68 ˚, 30.19 steady (6:53PM)
Location: Mississippi R. Pool 7
Caught: Bluegills for bait, LMB 14”, SMB – tiny ones
Partners: Ben

Comments

This post is out of order, but at least I did not forget about it entirely. I got out with Ben tonight for some after work fishing. We started out fishing for flat head bait, which went very well. After we had caught enough bait for the night we fished main channel rock areas for bass. We each caught a largemouth bass and a few very small small mouth bass. Ben even caught a bonus rock bass which we hoped would meet its demise at the mouth of a large flat head.
The flat heads were not active tonight. We had one hit which was mediocre at best, and that was it for the night.

Observations:

This is probably the latest in the season where I have fished for flat heads and it is possible they are either schooling up or becoming inactive. I will give it a couple more tries and then put the cat rods away for the season.

9-11-11 Sun

9-11-2011 Sun
10:00 AM – 3:30 PM
H2O: Bear Lake – clear 73 ˚, Dowling Lake – algae bloom, 75 ˚
Weather: W 12, clear, 81 ˚, 29.92 steady (12:55PM)
Location: Bear Lake & Dowling Lake, Moose Junction, WI
Caught: musky 37”, 4 pike 14-25”, LMB 10”
Partners: Scott

Comments:

Today was September the eleventh, exactly ten years to the date when the US was attacked by terrorists. I still remember it as the day that no planes traveled the sky after the attack. The skies were quite ghostly with no jetliners neither breaking the silence nor leaving any telltale vapor trails in the clear sky.
It was the second day of our weekend trip and we were not in such a hurry to get out on the water. We were both pretty sore from our marathon fishing episode of the previous day.
The game plan was to hit a couple of small lakes that were fairly close to the cabin and that supposedly had a population of muskies. Bear Lake was supposed to have a population of muskies but not enough to make it a serious fishery. Dowling Lake on the other hand was heavily stocked and had a sizeable population. Both lakes had unimproved landings with very limited parking.
Our fishing was very good today, I caught a thirty-seven inch musky and Scott caught a thirty-four incher. We were the only fishermen on both the lakes.

Observations:

Neither lake had much for structure, except for some emergent vegetation around the edges.

9-10-11 Sat

9-10-2011 Sat
8:30 AM – 8:00 PM
H2O: clear, 73 ˚
Weather: calm, clear, 79 ˚, 30.08 falling (12:55PM)
Location: St. Louis R. Duluth, MN
Caught: tiger musky 27”, 3 pike 22-26”
Partners: Scott

Comments

This weekend was a trip up north to the cabin to do some serious musky fishing. We had hoped to get some fishing in on Friday afternoon, but I was unable to get off of work at noon. That was just the start of our bad luck. When we got to the cabin I could not read the lock combination on the sign and Scott was getting nervous because his boat was blocking one side of the road. He attempted to move it and jack knifed his trailer and broke a taillight on his truck in the process. Once we did get the gate open we had more work in store for us. A past storm had knocked several trees down over the trail to the cabin and it took us about two hours to get the path cleared.
Saturday morning came and it was time to do what we had come to do: catch muskies! The weather was gorgeous! It was clear, calm, and very warm. It turned out to be a good day for fishing, but not such a good day for catching. We fished very hard for twelve hours; probably the most and hardest fishing I have ever done. I caught a few pike and the one small tiger musky, I did not even have any follows. Scott got very excited about the tiger musky; even though it was small he said they are very rare and seldom caught.
Scott did not catch any fish at all. He did have one very exciting moment about an hour before dark. He had one forty plus inch fish completely come out of the water after his top water bait not once but twice and it completely missed the bait on both attempts.

Observations:

The water was quite clear, but there was lots of floating weeds in the form of celery grass everywhere. This made the fishing very difficult, because it was constantly fouling our baits.

9-6-11 Tue

9-6-2011 Tue
5:45 PM – 7:45 PM
H2O: 5.29’ falling, 26.5 kcfs, 65 ˚, clear
Weather: calm, clear, 68 ˚, 30.19 steady (6:53PM)
Location: Mississippi R. Pool 7 lake Onalaska
Caught: LMB (11) 12-18”
Partners: None

Comments

I got back out on the lake tonight to catch some more bass where I had left off last night. I also wanted to do a little exploring for new areas on the lake. The spot where I caught bass last night still produced bass tonight, although I did not see any chasing activity going on.
My exploring of other potential spots was not quite as successful. I did find one weed line that did hold some bass, but it was nothing fantastic.

Observations:

None

9-5-11 Mon

9-5-2011 Mon
5:00 PM – 8:00 PM
H2O: 5.69’ falling, 31.7 kcfs, 68 ˚, clear
Weather: N 5, partly cloudy, 67 ˚, 30.15 falling (5:53PM)
Location: Mississippi R. Pool 7 lake Onalaska and Somners Chute
Caught: LMB (8) 12-18”, pike (2) 25 & 30”, SMB (6) 4 – 12”, walleyes (3) 14”.
Partners: None

Comments

Fishing was pretty dam good tonight! The other day on the way home from work I had seen a fisherman fishing a particular weed line on the lake and it gave me the idea to try it. When I pulled up to the area it was a like a scene from the movie The Birds; There were sea gulls everywhere waiting for a nice minnow dinner. You see gulls will clue you in on where the fish are feeding. The fish chase the minnows and as they are fleeing and skipping across the top of the water the gulls will see this and swarm to get a fish dinner of their own.
I caught all of my LMB and the larger of the two pike at this spot. The bait of the fish’s choice was a spinner bait that had my favorite red and white skirt with a double tailed grub used as a trailer.
I tried two other similar spots on the lake with no fish to show for the effort. My final spot of the night was Somners Chute in search of SMB and walleyes. Well I found both, but neither species that were caught had any size to them. I used a Rapala Shad Rap for the spots here. The Shad Rap is a great bait, but the hooks suck: they are too small and not very strong. I usually change mine out to something bigger and stronger.

Observations:

The little cut through the trees behind the house is so shallow right now that it is almost impassable with the old goat boat!

9-4-11 Sun

9-4-2011 Sun
7:00 PM – 10:30 PM
H2O: 5.97’ falling, 34.1 kcfs, 68 ˚, clear
Weather: N 7, partly cloudy, 59 ˚, 30.11 rising (7:53PM)
Location: Mississippi R. Pool 7 main channel areas
Caught: Bait (bluegills), flat heads 42 & 24 lb. channel cat 8.5 lb.
Partners: None

Comments

Today is the first day of a major cold front that came through at the end of the summer season. The water temperature went from 75 ˚ to 68 ˚ overnight. I went out flat head fishing tonight more out of curiosity than really wanting to go. I wanted to see if the fish would still bite with such a major change in the weather.
Past experience tells me the opposite of what others would have me believe. Almost all fishermen will say the fishing just is not very good after a cold front. But from my past experiences of fishing every day for a year I lean towards the opposite theory. I have had some very spectacular days on the water after a cold front came through.
The first set up spot was next to the main channel with a depth of around twenty feet. There was no visible timber but there was a massive tree that was completely under water and stretched from the surface to the bottom. I gave this spot about an hour and had no action at all.
The next spot had lots of visible wood and a depth of around ten feet. This is the spot that produced the two lunkers. After a wait of only ten minutes the first of two fish was on, and it was back -pedaling as I tried to crank it to the boat. Just as it got to the boat my second pole went hell bent for the drink. Still holding the first pole with the first fish still on, I picked up the second pole and began battling two fish at once. The second fish was no slouch and I knew I had a very good one on.
Now the question is how to land two fish at once. Well the first fish was boat side and fairly exhausted, so I put the pole in one of the holders and let it play with itself, ha, ha! Once I got a glimpse of the second fish I knew I had a giant. After a pretty extended battle and lots of effort to keep the two fish from tangling I had both fish boat side. The next act of the circus atmosphere was getting out my camera and scale, weighing and taking pictures of both and releasing the fish unharmed. It was challenge, but I accomplished a feat that most people would envy to have had the opportunity to do.
The final spot I tried was Somners Chute, fishing at a depth of around twenty feet. I fished this spot for about twenty minutes and boated one nice channel cat that had a fighting attitude. One thing about cannel cats, they are fighters!

Observations:

None

9-3-2011 Sat
7:30 AM – 2:30 PM
H2O: 5.69 rising, 31.7 kcfs, 75 ˚, clear
Weather: calm, rain to sunshine, 73 ˚, 29.86 steady
Location: Mississippi R. Pool 7 (back sloughs and mud lake area)
Caught: many nice crappies (25?), bluegills (10), LMB (12?)
Partners: None

Comments

What better way to kick off the start of a Labor Day weekend and more importantly a three day weekend than to seek out some crappies. I have not really seriously fished for any crappies yet this year but today I figured it was time to sling some light jigs and see what I could come up with.
The weather was not what I would call ideal and comfortable conditions for a fair weathered fisherman, but the fish did not seem to mind. A good rain coat was a definite must for the first couple of hours.
The crappies were quite active today and were holding on wood with adequate depth in the back slough areas. Most spots held from two to six crappies with an occasional good sized gill thrown in the mix. Crappie fishing was pretty good, but not even comparable to what it was like just a few years back.
In the afternoon I tried a little largemouth and smallmouth bass fishing along with some searching for some new crappie spots. I caught some nice largemouth in one particular spot and a few smallmouths along the main channel on some rock banks. The key to finding the largemouth was and continues to be looking for out of the way areas that do not get pounded by every bass fisherman in the area.

Observations

The wild rice is very abundant out from the house, but it is very sparse in the Mud Lake area. The rice is definitely attracting a large following of red wing black birds and increasing numbers of ducks.

8-31-11 Wed

8-31-2011 Wed
7:00 PM – 11:00 PM
H2O: 5.95 falling, 33.9 kcfs, 73 ˚, clear
Weather: calm, fog, 71 ˚, 29.94 falling
Location: Mississippi R. Pool 7
Caught: Bluegills for bait / Scott two flat heads (33 & 13 lbs.) myself one (17 lb.)
Partners: Scott

Comments

Tonight Scott and myself got out for what could possibly be one of our last flat head outings together for the year. I think I have only flat head fished once past the Labor Day weekend. It makes it much harder to go out after work with the days getting shorter and the nights are a little more uncomfortable; the cool air quickly settling in after darkness envelopes the Mississippi river valley.
Bait gathering was once again a snap. The bluegills are very site specific right now, just look for some downed timber with a slight amount of current.
Our first set up spot was an outside edge of a wing dam along the main channel. I have wanted to try a wing dam ever since the rivers flow had ebbed below forty thousand cubic feet per second. After close to an hour and no prowling flats to show for our time and effort it was time to vacate this unproductive spot.
The next two spots were side channels parallel to the main channel with plenty of timber and an adequate amount of moving Mississippi river blood. We ended up with three flats for the night with only one miss in the unfavorable column.

Observations

None