Buying a home in 2005.. My wife and I bought a little shack in St Paul Park for 167K. By 2010 it was worth 87K.. I put about 15,000 into roof, siding and other improvements/updates inside. We sold for 150K in 2018. We did nothing wrong and loved the little house but we got shafted by the environment of the market. Just bought and sold the wrong home at the wrong times. I still believe it worked out good for my family if we exclude the financial side. Was a tough pill to swallow but is what it is.

Scenic, I am going to be cleaning and prepping the inner and outer skin tonight. When I do set the new transom in is it recommended to pour epoxy or another material to bond the new transom to the aluminum?

ganderpike wrote:

Nathan at Aft Tek does a good job with transoms using HDPE. A call to Carstens in Melrose could possibly get you a 5 gallon bucket of vinylester resin and Spaceage composite if you want to DIY

Weedis. Nathans phone # is 320-249-8095. Aft Tek in Clearwater.

I have a 2005 Lund Angler 1700

I did get the transom out last night. Came out in a few pieces but did get one good chunk for templating. The aluminum is in surprisingly good shape. I was surprised. The old transom however was terrible!

bigcrappie wrote:

Do not mess around use Composite, there will be holes drilled into your epoxy covered wood then water will just rot the wood again.

I might go your advise.. Just talked to a guy up in Clearwater that uses HDPE sheets and has a CNC that can cut it to fit for me. I am pulling the old transom sheet tonight. Hoping to get it in one piece. Then can run up there and he can cut it while I am there with them. Cost a bit more but you are right.. Will be the last time I will ever have to do it! Not a fun job.

bigcrappie wrote:

Do not mess around use Composite, there will be holes drilled into your epoxy covered wood then water will just rot the wood again.

I have an old boat and that transom held up for 20 years.. If I can get 5 more years out of my great! I am happy with that to be honest.

I will take a look at composite and cost.. I do hear ya but not terribly worried about it either.

Here is a photo of the belly side where you can see her losing a few eggs yet and the scaling of the belly side. She most likely just finished spawning and was returing to feed.

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blackbay wrote:

It’s spawning stress.

I wondered the same.. I caught it on medium set up fishing for smallmouths. We are open year round CPR if anyone is wondering…

Pretty fast catch and I was lucky. Broke the line in the net. It was mid 30 fish.. I am just holding her out in the photo. We didn’t measure it. Was still losing eggs in the boat so dumped her back in the water pretty quick.

I remember seeing one on uncut angling that looked red. They were hitch hiking for someone to fish with them. A truck had pulled over with a 50 inch pike that was dead. Guessing in a net and looked red if I remember right.. I could be wrong but it looked odd. This one was weird but looked super healthy. It had red in the jaw plate, eye socket and in a scaled pattern on the sides. Was easly 80-90% spawned out.. The belly scales were wringling like you see on a big walleye right off spawn.

I only had two guesses.. Spawn stress or too much time under Methanies pipe draining in the river here… haha. Between the needles, barbie dolls and turd spinner we have options. Big dark rabbit hole to look into there.

Oh, she wasn’t happy to see me.. haha.

Mr. P for the win.. Analogy confirmed here..

That little guy in pool 3 either got caught up in a condome and floatee through the lock or had a taste for cheese… He just went downstream and the others were going up.. That happens. haha…

crawdaddy wrote:

What I don’t understand is people always say on this site is that if the water isn’t high the walleye will have a poor spawn. My question is why??? In any water level there are plenty of shallow gravel areas where the eggs can settle into and hatch.

I am sure a few factors play. Access to spawning area is maybe the biggest factor. Protection from moving river levels might be another. That is my assumption. I do not know much beside what we have seen fishing the river. Walleyes would not have much sucess spawning if they use a main channel gravel bar during rising water. The main channel flow can change in a day or two on these areas and sweeep everything away. Protected areas prevent this from happening and give the newly hatched a safe area to start gowing in. The main channel in spring is no place to be a baby walleye.

Saugers generally spawn in the main channel but walleyes do not. They prefer flooded grass transitions with low to moderate flow and gravel/rocky inlets or feeder creeks. Some of these areas have both.

I know one area in the vermillion river on P3 that loads up with spawning females but we need the water up 4-5 ft for them to use the area. It is a hard rock and sand shoreline with a uneven tall grass edge. When the water is up it becomes a flooded slackwater seam. Not an eddie current. Just a slow slackwater seam and they defiantly use it.

isu22andy wrote:

I thought all the walleyes come back down from 2 to spawn at the pool 4 dam and to rip blades baits as hard as possible all day on spot lock . Also if you see someone dragging jigs and catching fish make sure to spot lock in front of them for best odds .

All jokes aside great info .

Some are still old school anglers and just toss the anchor under your boat when they dont have the spot lock

BrianF wrote:

I’ve read the tracking study, though wonder if there isn’t more spawning going on south of the confluence than the study suggests. Any thoughts or insight on that?

People will challenge me on this but my answer is NO! I believe the majority spawn in the Minnesota river section. There are good #s of fish spawning up by the dam but if I had to guess I would say 85% or better go up the MN river.

The studies we have are very vague and old. I know fish spawn at the ford dam and maybe some areas downstream but vast majority go up the MN river in my opinion.

Walleyes are broadcast spawners. Meaning you need a large # of fish in that area to make the spawn work. Add to it that walleyes do not live long in the Mississippi and conditions change rapidly year to year. This opens up the conversation to “false spawning”. By that I mean an old 9-11 year old female may have used multiple sites to spawn and will have false drops in areas due to age or change in river conditions. Its hard to base a study on egg catch samples in P2 is my point there and I don’t give that specific study much credit.

BrianF wrote:

I’ve read the tracking study, though wonder if there isn’t more spawning going on south of the confluence than the study suggests. Any thoughts or insight on that?

People will challenge me on this but my answer is NO! I believe the majority spawn in the Minnesota river section. There are good #s of fish spawning up by the dam but if I had to guess I would say 85% or better go up the MN river.

The studies we have are very vague and old. I know fish spawn at the ford dam and maybe some areas downstream but vast majority go up the MN river in my opinion.

Walleyes are broadcast spawners. Meaning you need a large # of fish in that area to make the spawn work. Add to it that walleyes do not live long in the Mississippi and conditions change rapidly year to year. This opens up the converstaion to “false spawning”. By that I mean an old 9-11 year old female may have used multiple sites to spawn and will have false drops in areas due to age or change in river conditions. Its hard to base a study on egg catch samples in P2 is my point there and I dont give that study much credit.

Pool 2 is almost like clockwork. As said, there are factors but the average spawn date for the walleyes lands 4/14-4/17. Give or take a week but this is generally the dates.

Once spawned the big females move FAST! They get out and head back to post spawn locations in 1-2 days.

Generally the only reason they will not spawn by 4/17 is in low water. They need the water up a little to access spawning areas that they use here. If the water is still at low level inside the banks they will hold tight and wait. This happened about 10 years ago and then again in 2021.

They are planning for the future of (legalize it).. Sounds like a great place to grow… haha..

If you are fishing Rainy Lake you can apply for a RABC permit. This is just a remote border access pass.

You will need to go online and fill out applications for yourself and minors. They will ask for your drivers license, birth cert, ect.. Just some supporting documents that can be emailed to them with the application.

This allows you to drive the boat across the border and fish canada. The RABC permit is specific to Rainy Lake and very common. I believe just a state ID and your RABC permit is all you need then.

You still have to follow Canada’s laws and mentioned. No live bait, beer, ect..

Mike Schulz wrote:

put the pike on here!!!

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buckybadger wrote:

Buschman have you ever carved a walleye or have any available for purchase?

I do have a pike/musky carving out of white cedar and could send you photos. No walleyes right now. I do plan to carve one here one day.

ThunderLund78 wrote:

I assume you do commissioned work, though? Or is your yard and house just full of carvings?

I am not running the saws as much as I was a few years ago. I have sold quite a few and need to sometimes.

I have quite a few in the yard and at the house here.. I do sell some but usually is not my intention when I pick what to carve… I just get a bug in my head to carve something and do it.

Thanks for the kind words guys!

I know a good floor guy over here in Cottage Grove. I know quite a few people he has worked for an they all were very happy..

Malicki Flooring LLC 651-955-1183. Talk to Barry.

ThunderLund78 wrote:

Buschman, do you have a website with all of your work?

I do not.. Just a backyard hobby carver. I don’t want to advertise and give the impression I am doing it for a business or anything like that. It would be different if I was doing it for a living but already have a day job and real bad fishing habit that takes up most my time.

I dont want to drown this post with photos but have to put this one on here.. Think this was my favorite carving I have done so far. When I started carving this was my ultimate goal. Took a 9 ft piece of white pine that was 34 inches in diameter. Worked on it for 5 weeks.. This was a couple years ago now

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Here is a super cool one that I carved last summer.. The shark is black walnut and the base is eastern red cedar drift from the Mississippi. I used copper rods for mounting and soaked them in salt/vinagar to get a patina on it. Took more time to carve this than a 6 ft eagle but was worth it.

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Mike Schulz wrote:

<div class=”d4p-bbt-quote-title”>Droptinex2 wrote:</div>
I absolutely love seeing this post! Bushman awesome artistry!
I do some carving, but not with a chain say. Here’s a few pictures

dang that is some awesome carvings too!!! man you guys are good!!

X2.. Good work Droptine!

Here is a cool carving love or hate wolves.. Fits the topic. This dude does amazing work.

https://www.facebook.com/reel/1360291462076261/?s=single_unit&__cft__%5B0%5D=AZUrd9_OKZJUilRQxswtbhBZbJLeihhaFHtPVpkrdV1sxtG_h5GfYAGAE4VMS8PjBZUBfqZwKgP5DFAFu40qUGOjZMdrWB-3xb8KWflkAVDluWvNWBcg_clgsiWEnuYoCFmXGAULAjMH89-vfBU9_hZ6YWeoTZEHsuNDx2_dLN1m9_680KRHGGEeVslXj1IILEHQggdiccdcN4qUVOSVjwQxvEjR5HsOLgE73ZbpniGsx6LOf2tJjtRIbXqHOnc5aug&__tn__=H-R

Matt Moen wrote:

Head to Head was all artificial when they were running those tournaments a few years ago. When they got beat down on pool 2 the guys might’ve wanted live bait but otherwise it didn’t seem to matter to them.

Matt, it was fun watching this one when they had it here on 2.. They did get their butts kicked!! I thought they would have figured out something better than they did. Thats for sure.

JEREMY wrote:

Its to cold to head up to Duluth and look for some now.

Where are you located?

I will say this.. Duluth is not that good of an area to look. Agates were formed in lake superior but most were moved out and deposited south of Duluth. People have found LSA all they through Iowa. Best starting point is Moose Lake and south of there. Even the mpls/st paul metro area is a much better choice that the Duluth area.

Transportation and warehousing here.. I started when I was 18 years old and still here 26 years later. Moving America they say… haha.

Nice finds Marty! I have always wanted to get out west and poke around some day..

Carnaval games!! That game with the bb gun and red star on the paper.. Cost me just as much as your football team and all I have is some white pieces of paper with a speck of red on it! Gets me every year!