Pool 4 might freeze !

Facebook and Everrets resort saying the reactors will both be down at the power plant into January . Any predictions at what time it’ll un fishable by boat ? Anyone got any insight that works at the plant ?

Will make a good ice bite on Pepin

BK posted some intel about it a while back. It’s definitely going to impact accesses like Everts. They keep Pool 2 cut open for a big chunk of the winter. The launch in Alma on Pool 5 is often chainsawed open too. Near Wabasha beneath the lake it rarely freezes solid or even has large chunks, but the shelf ice near shore makes it tough unless you want to cut it out. I’m not sure if Everts plans to fight Mother Nature and keep it cut open as much as possible or let it do its thing.

I don’t foresee it impacting the bite on Pepin for better or worse, rather just more ice towards the head of the lake area. It’s always been an on again off again bite in my experience for ice fishing. It’s much easier to consistently put big numbers in a boat on Pool 4. Those fish that stay in or near the lake seem to wander and spread out a whole lot more. A “good” day ice fishing on Pepin is not even an average day in a boat on Pool 4 during the Fall/Winter/Spring

For those that ice fish Frontenac beach this will be good. Maybe not so good for those with boats above that point though. It’ll depend a lot on the weather and temperatures during the period the reactors are down.

We have no reactor keeping pool 2 open. Pretty common it’s open well into December or even January. That’s if someone puts the effort into opening the ramp.

Will definitely impact the bite. Depending on ice it will be busier than ever.

It will be like the good old days before they allowed the plant to increase the water temp by one or two degrees that they put back into the river. The river would freeze up along the banks out to 15 to 20 feet. Everts might have trouble keeping their ramps open too.

They are refueling one (which happens every year) and the other one had a safety shut down due to an electrical problem. That one can’t be started up until the NRC signs off on it.

The refueling should be done by mid January as in the past.

The big question is when will the NRC give the go ahead to start the second one.

The Harbor Bar Docks are installing bubblers to protect the vessels in their marina.

It doesn’t help with the water being so low (and slow) this year again. 2.24′ as off last night. My river gauge rock was over half exposed yesterday.

Personally, my biggest concern is that people won’t know when they (one or more) come back on line. The people ice fishing the head of the lake where the ice was good yesterday could be the death of them today.

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Brian Klawitter wrote:

Personally, my biggest concern is that people won’t know when they (one or more) come back on line. The people ice fishing the head of the lake where the ice was good yesterday could be the death of them today.

This is a good point Brian. Make sure to check before heading out. Stay safe everyone. It will be interesting.

Ripjiggen wrote:

Will definitely impact the bite. Depending on ice it will be busier than ever.

The last few years it was busier on the ice than ever before in my 25 years fishing Pool 4. My guess is this will push more people to ice fish further up river. Generally Point no Point is as far as people will venture upstream. This could change that.

Even with more ice (potentially), it isn’t going to likely impact where the fish are or are not at a degree or 2 of water temps. The residential lake fish scatter and wander. There are good days at times, but if people think this will magically make ice fishing Pepin like URL they’re going to be disappointed.

If you want numbers of fish and size with more walleyes than saugers, I’d keep the boat batteries charged and hope Everts is willing to run a chainsaw once in a while as needed.

With out the warmer water temps drawing up the shad it might be a totally different bite lake and river…..maybe

This didnt age well haha, did see pepin was locked up today. Was going to launch at Frontenac but saw one guy out there busting ice and decided I better head north . Props to that guy . Picked up a few on plastics . Lack of flow is crazy, water is clear ! No ice !

isu22andy wrote:

This didnt age well haha,

And I’m happy for that!

So far this fall/winter I’ve seen ice along the shore of the Harbor bar once. Not much and when I got back at 4, it was all but busted up.

Water temp was 34 degrees reported at the dam yesterday. Pretty normal for winter on pool 4.

Anyone have any insight if they are coming back on soon ?

FYI…Sounds like they will be discharging a heat load in the next few weeks and have both reactors going by the end of January? Just in time to melt any ice made next few weeks

Lord Love a Duck!!

That makes me happy even if I did have to spend $560 on bubblers that might not be needed.

Well that is good news, I know quite a few people said it’d be a cold day in hell before Pool 4 froze over or BK gave up SPAM. And sounds like neither of those are coming to fruition anytime soon!

An expense that a commoner such as myself will never have to endure.

Brian Klawitter wrote:

Lord Love a Duck!!

That makes me happy even if I did have to spend $560 on bubblers that might not be needed.

BigWerm wrote:

I know quite a few people said it’d be a cold day in hell before Pool 4 froze over or BK gave up SPAM

I’ve been on pool 4 with -5 air temp and a 20 mph wind. It was frozen. But not so much to keep me off… 30 minutes at a landing breaking ice to launch and do a 180 with boat to plow through the floating sheet in the main channel. Caught a few eyes and that was enough… brr

BTW, never seen so many eagles any other day than that day. Only open water was in the lock area and every eagle for 60 miles was present. Looked like blackbirds in the trees.

I cannot believe it – but there actually is somebody out on Methodist tonight. It was open yesterday morning!! The county better get the new airboat fired up sooner than later. Craziness.

There’s some guys with some bigger nuts out than I got today on the backwaters as well . I was getting through the ice with one hit of the spud one spot , while there was 3-4 inches 5 foot away .

the backwater locals are a different breed and don’t give a shhhhh. Frontenac will be a full send next weekend i imagine.

I’ve been breaking ice around the floating camper for two days…that’s with the bubblers going. Two inches was the best I broke.

It’s locked up from Red Wing past the Last Resort.

I’m sure someone will try to walk from Red Wing to the Harbor Bar but those bubblers will be the death of them.

Of course Xcel will be making a “warm water dump” sometime. Trying to get any info out of them is like asking you guys where your favorite walleye spot is.

It’s locked up tight from red wing to head of the lake, you could walk across the head of the lake if you were feeling lucky. It’s frozen blocks of ice as far down the lake as you can see it’s super weird. Rumor on the block is next week or so for xcel.

eyeguy507 wrote:

the backwater locals are a different breed and don’t give a shhhhh. Frontenac will be a full send next weekend i imagine.

Although there are some absolute idiots, there are also some people who have fished the river for decades who are cautious.

I’ll go out on a limb and guess the first wheeler through won’t be from the guys that were some of the first out, checking ice as they go with spud bars but rather the person that waits until they see a few shacks out and just heads right out without doing their own checks.

I poked around on the ice for a few hours over the weekend in a few spots. The first spot I checked was a relatively deep hole with a bit of current that is a fairly reliable crappie spot. It had 3″ of rock solid ice in the thinnest spots I found. I ended up keeping 6 of them that were 11-12″ then moved on. Later I checked the local marina and found about 3.5-4″ of ice (didn’t fish it). My final stop was up on Pepin just to check ice (didn’t take gear with me) and I found a solid 3.5″ out maybe 300 yards and then got to an area where my spud bar went through on the second blow. This spot was NOT the Methodist/Frontenac or Maiden Rock area. I’d say those areas likely have a bit more current than the area I was poking around at.

People need to be using a spud bar and should be next weekend still too. Just because you see someone out on a slough, marina ice, or even Lake Pepin, don’t assume anything or that the person walked in a straight line to arrive at their destination.

From the NRC:

Good morning, start up is proprietary information so companies don’t usually provide those details. However, you can try contacting the plant using their website to find a call line or their contact us page. They may have a customer service line or a media line.

Best of luck.
***
All I can get out of Xcel is they want to raise our rates again.

40 degrees and rain is in the forecast for the middle of next week here along Pool 4.

If that coincides with a startup at the plant again, that channel ice up river from the lake will be whisked away in a hurry.

buckybadger wrote:

40 degrees and rain is in the forecast for the middle of next week here along Pool 4.

I just posted this in another thread. Winter is over as of next week.

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Cant play on the ice and cant play on the river in the boat ! Its like torture .