Drug related or not, flying the flag at half staff is not for entertainers, IMO. Kind of takes away from the meaning of it. I had thought Chris Christie might make a good presidential candidate. Not anymore.

Love the Sandford books, both the prey series and the Virgil Flowers books. Another good author is C.J. Box, a series about Joe Pickett, a Wyoming game warden.

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Union grove is locked up? Great news! With these temps I may make the short drive on monday!

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The boy went out and drilled a couple holes just off shore yesterday, only 2 inches. I was kinda hoping for more. But with last nite’s temps and tonights forecast, I’m still hoping for this weekend. I’ll post on what I find.

I’m hoping to be out on a farm pond by Sunday, in Tama county. Union Grove lake was capped over yesterday afternoon also, so it shouldn’t be long there.

Actually, in mine it’s not loud at all. I think as long as the muzzle is outside, the noise ain’t bad.

That’s definitely nicer than mine. Mine is much more, well,”rustic”, but it gets the job done. What are the dimensions?

I built a 5 x 5 shack about 4 years ago, and love it. It sits on poles about 10′ off the ground, both for visibility and due to the fact it sits on the crick bottom and I don’t want it to float away in a flood. Drop down windows on all four sides, with a swivel boat seat mounted on an old stool to sit on. I carry my buddy heater and 20 lb tank down a week or so before season, so on opening morning I just have to carry in my gun, dinner pail and thermos of coffee in with me. Works great for me, but I’m at the age where I really don’t care that much how many or how big of deer I kill anymore. I like a nice fat doe for the freezer, and I’m content being out there watching everything and being comfortable.

The hell with that! I’ll stick with fishing.

I can never bear to get rid of any old magazines. I keep them in boxes in my shed, and sometimes in the winter when I got nothing else to do, I fire up the wood stove and start reading. Better than watching TV. Actually, I’d like to get some more, I’m always looking for old Fur-Fish-Game magazines.

It won’t be long! They are talking lows down in the 30s for next week. At least when winter rolls around, I’ll have a little more time for fishing. I hope.

Thanks for all the info. I used to fish the Vinton/LaPorte area a bit, but it’s been years. Now, if I can just find some time?

Thanks for the info. I check the levels on rivergage.com, but that doesn’t tell me if I can get upstream in a boat. I’ve just got an old 1648 Monark jon with a 15 on it, so I can get thru some pretty skinny water. I know that once the reading on the Iowa at Tama gets below 9 it’s pretty tough going. If I get the time, I may have to slip up that way and try it. Haven’t fished up that way for a long, long time.

I was in the Cities for a meeting Thurs. morning, and to visit my son in college. Thursday afternoon we took in the sports show. Pretty impressive for a country boy like me.

Last year I started using an old insulated water jug. Got tired of my minnow bucket tipping over on the sled and losing all the water and minnows. Just remember to loosen the lid or open the drinking spout to give them air when you get home.

I haven’t heard anything exciting around here, but think I may try either Pine Lake or Diamond/Hawthorne this weekend. Heard they were catching a few at Pine awhile back. I went to Diamond a couple weeks ago, no luck there, then on to Hawthorne. Only had about 3″ of iffy ice, too little for my fat a$$ to be running around on.

If you’ve got the heavy old style canvas, you mite try those iron-on patches. I put some on my old Hideout this year. I haven’t used it much yet this year, but they seemed to hold real good. Cost about a buck in the fabric section at Wal-mart.

You bet I am. Maybe not all the time, but I always carry it with me. Very seldom you can’t catch something on it. Little ones are better than nothing, and for eating size it can’t be beat. I usually use a snap swivel, and if they swallow it , just hook on a different worm and get it back when you clean them.

Never tried this early, but I agree with trying it around the Pepin harbor. We’ve caught some nice crappies and stripers just trolling in and out around the point by the harbor. Also a little ways above the harbor mite be worth a try.

Graybeard

The general rule is if you want to catch flatheads, use live bait. I’m not sure about whats legal in Minnesota, but here in Iowa a bluegill or bullhead is hard to beat. Chubs will work well also, and crawlers{if the carp will leave them alone.} The livelier the bait the better.

For channels, live or cut bait works real well. Chubs, frogs, crawdads,crawlers all will catch them at one time or another. Cut or sour bait seems to be best early in the year. If you want to catch a bunch of eaters and aren’t worried about real big ones, dip bait is hard to beat when the water warms up.