You Leave My Old Fashion Alone!!!

Pictured here is Brew eyeing up my Old Fashion. Evidently he has a heavy head already because he's resting it on the window ledge.

Don't you think for a minute that he got a taste of it either. Actually he has a habit of resting his head in the window ledge to look out the window.

Mona's Bass Attack

Mona caught and released this Smallmouth Bass while we were fishing around Hippo Rock while at the Flowage.




The Locals are urging people that do catch "Legal Sized Bass" (during the open season) on the Flowage to harvest them. They claim the Bass are harming the Walleye population on that body of water.

I've posted some Bass Recipes on a different site that I manage that were in a WDNR News Release I received. Here is a short excerpt:

"SPOONER - Catch-and-release has caught on so big in the bass fishing world that Wisconsin anglers are only keeping about 5 percent of what they catch.

They kept only 550,000 of the 10 million small mouth and largemouth bass they caught in 2006, according to a mail survey of anglers. In contrast, Wisconsin anglers in the same year kept about 30 percent of the walleye they caught, or 2.2 million of 7 million caught.

In some places in northern Wisconsin, bass are very abundant and can make a tasty meal. Fisheries managers are encouraging harvest on these waters to keep the numbers in balance and to improve bass growth rates. As always, larger bass are less common and anglers should consider releasing them."

Click Here for Bass Recipes

They (the Locals) are saying the same thing about Northern Pike in the Chip. We caught a number of them with the largest one around 21 inches or so. Surely no trophy but a lot of fun to catch.

Where is the Chippewa Flowage anyway?

View Larger Map

Chippewa Flowage Vacation

Well, this years' Chippewa Flowage Vacation has come and gone already. We left on May 23 and came back home on May 30th. The weather was a bit cool for the time of the year but we were fortunate that it only rained part of two days.

Fishing for panfish was good, we got two or three meals that we brought home for the freezer. Northern and Bass were a little slow and not even a sign of a Musky. We got one Walleye that Mona caught by accident as they say - even a blind chicken gets a kernel of corn once in a while. We didn't fish as hard and as long as we have in previous years, it was just great to be away from the phone and the everyday routine for a change.

We both enjoy getting outdoors and watching the wildlife. Between the two of us, we took over 2 and a half hours of video and about 600 photos between 3 cameras. We haven't had much time to sort through them yet but John did pick this one out. This is one of a series of pictures that John took of this Blue Huron as it walked along the shoreline by our cabin and jumped in our boat. John said the only thing that was going through his mind besides trying to save the moment with the camera is that he hoped it didn't take a dump while it was in our boat.

Once we sort through them we'll try to post a few more. One other thing that throws a wrench in the plans is that my good computer is in the shop up on the hoist getting repaired. This is the third time in a little over a month.

You can click on the photo to enlarge it.

Summer's Around the Corner... they say

It's been a long haul, but it appears (at least when you look at the calendar) that summer's just around the corner. This is a first for us since owning the land here where we are now that the garden is all in except for a few Watermelon plants we're looking for and a few more cabbage plants. The rest is in the ground. One year the garden was so wet that we didn't get it in until the 4th of July.

The last week has been like stuffing 8 hours of work a day into a 3 hour time span each day trying to get ready to go up north to the Hayward area for a week. I've been assured by Diane at the Chippewa Pines that I do not need to take my Ice Auger along to drill holes in the ice to fish, however, the fishing is about 2 weeks behind what it normally is when we go up there.

Keep tuned and if we're lucky we'll get some stuff up here relating to one of our most important weeks of the year if you care to share.

Happy Memorial Day and don't forget the meaning behind the Holiday - It's not all about grilling out with the family and friends and having a few drinks.

Opening of Our Fishing Season... May 3, 2009

This is the first time we've been fishing since October, 2008. A very long dry spell. Normally throughout the Winter we get out at least one time to try for some panfish.

Here Mona is taking the hook out of a Largemouth Bass that I had just netted for her. It was caught on my favorite Spinnerbait. When Fleet Farm gets the baits in I normally buy between 5 and 10 at a time. It seems to me that either Fleet is ordering a different model of that version or Northland Baits changed the way they make them. They seem to me to be made cheaper now and they don't provide the action I like.

As with all of the Bass we catch - this was a Catch and Release legal sized one caught on Shawano Lake. I'll try to catch 'em when he grows up more (Ha Ha). Actually, she caught three that day and I only had one miss.

Weekend Ride

Last Saturday Mona and I decided to go for a ride since the weather was supposed to be up around the 50's and we both got Spring Fever. We went to Calument County where we went to High Cliff Park, Calument County Park,  Stockbridge (where the Post Office had already closed for the day), Quiney, Kloten, Chilton, Marytown, Pipe and more.

Above is a photo of Mona walking through the Cemetery at the Church in Marytown, WI. Note all of the windmills in the background. They are all new since the last time I was out there a few years ago.

Pictured are more of the windmills in the area. The high voltage wires run right through the area.

After checking out the Boat Launch at the County Park I saw this deer in the woods near the edge of the road. Mona saw a second deer nearby that I didn't see right away but I really didn't have time to sit there and look since this one was getting ready to walk away from the camera.