I Thought I Would Go Fishing Again...

Well the reports have been few and far between on my end lately, and for that I apologize.  I simply haven't been out there living the dream like I normally do.  Yesterday I got a bug up my butt so to speak, and I decided that I would jig myself up some grub, otherwise known as Walleyes.  Hennen and I loaded up my gear and we ran out to Tonka to meet up with Petey and his 4-wheeler.  Being the great guy that he is, I called him up and he came to shore to haul us out to our destination.  We basically set up on 2 different ends of a favorite muskie spot of mine and hoped for the best.  The eye's were schooled up pretty tightly, and when they came in as darkness was approaching, it was pretty fast and furious for Hennen and I.  At times, we had 5 - 6 eyes under our house chasing our baits at the same time.  An occasional tip-up flag of ours went off, but the frozen spools caused them to turn very tough and resulted in missed fish.  Our window of time on the ice gave us some great action and another picture of a mitt-full of eyes.  Petey was about 150 yards away and enjoyed much of the same action, however he was fishing alone, and had some fish get tangled on him which caused his "jar" of keepers to be slightly less.  Either way, he had lots of action, and when you are chasing metro area eyes, that is really what it's about.  The ice on the part of the lake that we were fishing ranged from 4-8 inches.  It is still varying in depth a quite a bit due to the snow cover in spots, however it seems to be plenty good for foot travel and 4-wheelers.  Thank you again Petey and Hennen for another enjoyable night on the ice.

As we approach the great Holiday season of Christmas and New Years, I want to wish you all a safe and wonderful time.  It gives us a great chance to spend quality time with the ones we care most about, and if there is time after that, then we can jump back in the great outdoors.  After all, the ones closest to us make our passions enjoyable to pursue.  Until Next Time Y'all, Have a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!

Trophy Encounters & .Com Team Up...

Enough messin around already...  Petey (.com) and I have been puttsing around on a few different areas lately exchanging stories about how we have been forced to fish areas that we don't want to due to the ice, and not catching the fish that we are use to for early ice.  So, yesterday we said enough of that wasting time,  Lets go where we can catch em'.  We loaded up the gear and headed to the walleye rich waters of Tonka in search of enough ice to fish.  I have to chuckle here cuz I am again going to catch grief from my mother (and several other mothers who will read this).  Lets just say that we used 4 wheels to get where we were going, and Petey has kahoonas the size of an elephant.  It was kinda freaky, but once we were there, we were there, and we set up shop for the hour that we had allotted ourselves to fish for that evening.  The action was pretty fast paced and intense for our short window of time, but it was worth every second of it.  I landed my first, yes, FIRST, eye of the season, but it was a dandy 24 incher.  Soon after, Bails and Petey got in on the mix, and since we were the only idiots that far out on the lake, we were hooting back and forth at each other with the standard, "Fish On" that is typically when Petey and I fish together.  It was kinda funny, cuz we yelled "fish on" about 4 times to Petey, and although he yelled back "nice work," it wasn't until after he finally yelled "Fish On," that he admitted that he was getting quite jealous of our chatter.  Petey, Petey, Petey....Like you weren't going to catch one sooner or later!  All of our tactics seemed to work as the fish were smacking the jigs.  I used a forage minnow tipped with a fathead, Bails used a Swedish Pimple with a fathead, and Petey had the old darting Rapala bouncing around.  All the baits seemed to work fine, cuz the fish were simply in the mood to eat.  Todays fish fry is gonna be tasty!!  Well, we now have our first story about knockin down some early season eyes on the ice, and I'm sure it's only gonna get better from here as more spots become accessible.  All of our eyes ranged from 16 to 24 inches, and about that ice.....3.5 inches seemed to hold us a mile from shore.  Oh, and Petey....You Are NUTS!  Until next time Y'all, Keep on Livin That Dream!

A Look Back At The 2007 Season. Thank You Everybody!

Once again we find ourselves itching like crazy to hit that frozen ice that is starting to take form across much of the state.  While I am excited along with the rest of you, I want to take a little time out to look back at the great months that I shared with so many of you throughout the open water season.  There were so many huge fish caught, and great laughs shared that I don't really know where to start.  I have taken hundreds of pictures yet again this season, and as I look through them, I remember each and every one of them like it was yesterday.  For me, it is always great to be in the outdoor world, however as I look at all of those pictures, I kinda chuckle at the friends I have made and the memories that won't ever be taken from me.  After all, isn't that what it's about. 

The early season started with numerous trips to area lakes and rivers and some days it seemed that we could fill bath tubs full of walleyes.  Other days were not as spectacular, but they always gave us some laughs and taught me a few more details about what I was doing wrong.  As the season progressed, I found a new style of fishing which left me sitting on a river in the middle of the night chasing prehistoric Flathead Catfish.  That was sweet too!  I had some trips up to the big pond that always seemed to coincide with a hurricane, and still we landed a few dandies. 

As the summer progressed I shared an uncountable number of days on the water with great people from all over the country.  For the most part, we landed that trophy of a lifetime nearly every time on the water.  Some days the muskies seemed to come into the boat like it was their job.  The largest number in my boat for one day this season was 8 fish, and streaks of boating fish each time were carried through more than one week at times.  Each time on the water I continued to learn a new thing or two to help keep the fish coming in the boat, and the results were great.  I had this "musky mojo" thing at an all time high, and the rewards were sweet.  People of every age landed fish with me this season, and each one of them were great in their own way.  The greatest reward for me being a guide is that I get to see that smile on a persons face when they land that fish of a lifetime, and it keeps me coming back day after day. 

As the season progressed into late fall, I found myself fishing much further into the year than I had ever done before. I can't even explain how great those rewards were, as I found myself in newspaper articles and chatter throughout the state for catching some "freak of nature" giant fish on the big pond.  I learned a lot in spring, summer and fall that will surely keep me progressing as a fisherman and your fishing guide.  I would like to thank each and every one of you that helped to make it such a great year, but I don't think I have enough space on this website to do so.  You know who you are, and I thank you.

It's a sad day that I will be putting the boat and the gear away, however it would be weird to see a guy jigging over the side of his boat through an ice hole, so I have no choice.  The stories are in no way going to slow down, and Trophy Encounters will continue to be a place to ask questions and hear some of the latest and greatest from not only myself, but by all the others that are telling me their stories to share.  I hope to have something new on this site every day to check out, so make sure you look at this page, and the page called "Its Their Story" to keep on finding new information.

It has been a great run yet again, and I look forward to seeing all of you again on the water in the very near future.  Now its time to get the other equipment ready.  Who wants to go Ice Feeeeshin???  Thanks again everybody, and as always, Keep On Livin That Dream!

Mille Lacs.....Oh Lord....And Jacks Largest Yet!

This Morning Jack and His son Tom jumped in the boat for some fun.  This is Jack's 3rd season of fishing with me, and while he has caught a couple of nice ones in the past, this morning he caught his largest yet at 46 inches.  This was far from the only chance we had today, and as we kept track it got confusing towards the end.  Jack and Tom will be joining me for two more mornings this week, so hopefully the totals keep increasing and Jack hauls in an even larger one for us to take a picture with.  The tally for today is somewhere around 15 sightings, and 1 in the boat.  A great time for the ski's, but we're hoping to up the average the next couple times out.  As you can see from this picture, Jack had his video camera with, so hopefully the movies will continue to be made.  Eventually I'll get them on here for everybody to see, but I still can't quite figure it out.  Although he obviously didn't tape his own battle, there were quite a few laughs after the net had been placed in the water, and should be a good one to watch.  Thanks boys, see ya soon!

Loge, Kemke and Myself spent Saturday evening and Sunday morning up on the big pond (Mille Lacs).  Our quest was simple, have a great time, relax and catch a 60 pounder.  Well, we did have a great time, the weather made it nearly impossible to relax, and we didn't catch a 60 pounder.  All in all, the great time made the trip worth it.  Friday night we chased the ski's around from dark until about 3:00 AM.  Around 10:00 we really got ourselves into a pod of them, and some giants at that.  It was kinda funny cuz Kemke heard the explosion of one, and honestly wanted nothing to do with it.  Loge and I just laughed.  Loge hooked up shortly after we started seeing the giants, and the beast of a ski found its way into the air and shook the hooks.  Arghhh the Mille Lacs Ski's can be elusive.  He claims he caught it, but obviously he didn't.  We spent the rest of the night laughing at having a good time with the rats nests that they kept getting into.  Like a couple of first timers on the water.   Sunday morning greeted us with 30 mph winds making fishing impossible and breaking my trolling motor in the process.  It was a frustrating couple of hours of battling the totally unnecessary waves,  Why do they have to get that big anyway???  Anybody have an extra trolling motor to spare???  We did catch a couple of Willies before we left which kept the boat from leaving with the skunk still in it.  A fun time, with many laughs, and curse words.  Oh Well, I guess that's what happens when you live the dream!

The Adventures of Guru and Bob....

Yesterday I was the fortunate soul to spend the day on Mille Lacs with two awesome fisherman named Guru and Bob.  As you can see from the picture, our quest to get this Kentucky born man a few walleyes was well accomplished.  He is holding one of the doubles that we had with both walleyes being in the 26-27 inch range.  In fact that was the very large majority of our catch for the day.  We probably caught over 20 walleyes throughout our day on the water that were over the 25 inch mark.  I think our average had to be 26 inches, but we failed to top the 28 inch mark.  A few times we thought we had done it, but 27 and 3/4 was all we could get.  Absolutely insane when you look at August and think about fishing for walleyes.  It just isn't suppose to be that way....or is it.  The pattern that we used was simply the same pattern that I found while on a muskie fishing trip with my fishin buddy Dusty about 7 years back.  It's crazy, but the hotter it gets, the bigger the fish seem to be and larger the schools.  Simply great walleye fishing wherever you go.   

I would say that it was a relaxing time of catching very above average walleyes, but it was far from it.  There was not one single point during that outing that the 3 of us felt that we could comfortably stand up without being thrown out of the boat.  The wind yet again was howling with force.  The only difference this time was that we put all sanity behind us and went to where the fish were anyway.  I managed to get my spike stuck in a large enough boulder and let out enough rope that the boat was able to ride over the 4 - 5 - 6 - whatever size those giant waves were, and keep us over the right spot.  Anchoring was the only option this time, because there was no chance of keeping us in position with the trolling motor.  The schools are definitely in certain spots that are typically no more than 15 - 20 feet large.  And for those of you who know about the "love Rock," yes it was kicking them out again, only now the name might just be called "BobRock!"  Once Bob got dialed in on the sunken giant boulder, there was no stopping him.

It was funny because Bob braced himself up against the back seat and didn't move from his position the entire time.  He simply would set the hook, battle his fish from his perch, I would net it, unhook it, release it, hand him a leech, and he would do it all over again.  This sounds like a lot of work, but it couldn't have been any more enjoyable, or done any other way.  We could have taken several nice photos, but it just wasn't worth keeping the fish out of the water that long and risking going overboard.  Unfortunately the wind meant that Guru would be doing more watching than fishing, due to his current hip situation, but he still claims that he was having more fun watching us monkeys run around the boat catching fish than he would have if he were fishing.  We were kinda limited to moving from spot to spot, and only fished two Willie holes and one Smallie spot for the day.  Granted, they were my two favorite spots, and the action was continuous.  We caught two Smallies that were both respectable fish, and called it a great day just after lunch time.

As you can see from some of the pictures we took, the waves were quite intense!  It is really hard to capture this wave action on still photos, but these are a couple of the examples.  They sure don't grow them like that around the cities!

Update on 2007-08-03 17:12 by Travis Frank

I am waiting on more pictures to show up for this beastly 54 incher from this mornings guide trip.  You just have to check back soon to see the monster from this morning!  Until then, here is a taste!