Yesterday, my doorbell rang at 8:00 am!  The plans that were made the evening before brought my father to my front door.  A day of fishing with Dad was about to begin!!  We started out by heading to the local bait shop for a variety of grubs that were going to be the attactant for the bluegills and crappies we were chasing.  On lake one, we arrived on the ice about 9:00 am.  The first few holes were nothing worth bragging about.  We had produced a few small guys in the bucket for the start of our future delicious meal.  We kept plugging away and kept drilling more and more holes.  Finally we found an area that consistantly produced fish and at around 11:00 am, we were heading back to my house with 10 crappies and 13 sunfish!!  We ended up with some real dandies also, with plenty of smaller ones to fill the gaps with action!!

We cleaned our harvest and ate a small lunch and were headed out to another lake farther away in search of some monsters that we heard were biting!  On this particular lake, the bite wasn't supposed to start until 4:00 pm.  We arrived around 2:30 pm.  We fished and fished and between the stories and laughs caught just a few little guys as we anxiously waited for the magic hour.  Well soon it was 4:30 and the fish apparently didn't receive the same email that was in my inbox about when to start biting!!  Around 5:00 the screens on our vex's lit up like christmas trees!!  We were catching them as fast as we could get our lines down there....unfortunately they were averaging about 5 inches a piece!!  Not the monsters we were barginning for.  After catching about 50 of these little guys, and just as God started painting the horizon,  i had another routine bite that suddenly pulled about 10 times harder and the aftermath was a nice half pound sunnie on the ice next to me!!  We had about 10 minutes of this fast action with "the big guys" and managed to ice 10 nice crappies to complete out our crappie limit for the day and added about 10 dandy bluegills!! 

Did we have a fishing trip of a lifetime????  When it comes to catching tons of big fish, NO, not at all!!  But when it comes to the laughs, fun times, and just experiencing the outdoors with the best father in the world, it was a day I will never forget!!  It isn't always about the catching when it comes to fishing.  It is more about experiencing Gods amazing creation and spending great times with the best family and friends anyone could ask for!!  Thanks for the fun day Dad and thanks to all my friends for the many fishing and hunting excursions we have been on that you made great!!!

Sorry for not updating that much lately.  I have not been fishing at all this winter.  I have been saving literally every penny.  Fortunately I am getting a roommate this week and will be provided with some rent money so when the ice leaves, I will be back in action!!  Next target...GIANT open water spring walleyes on the Mississippi river!!!

17 inches of ice is what I measured after I skimmed out the last of the ice chips out of the fresh holes I drilled in my newly banked in fish house!  17 INCHES!!!!  Usually there is only 7 when I get it out for the first night of fishing!!  Well a series of unfortunate events kept me from getting it out sooner!!  A blizzard over Christmas kept me plowing and made travel on the lakes almost impossible.  Temperatures so cold after that made it so that my less than average fishhouse would not be able to stay warm enough to keep the holes from freezing over!!  As soon as it was warmer, my personal truck broke down for a few days, followed by the front end of my work truck also going out!!  Finally with not having a job or roommate this winter, I have to pick the days to stay out in the house, because propane is not free these days!!  After all this, yesterday afternoon, I finally got her placed!!  I put it on a nice rocky point that I found last year and never had the time to fish.  I had a good feeling about it, even though I could have tried many spots that have been proven to be good in the past. 

I dropped the first line, a jigging spoon, just as the sun hit the trees.  Before it reached the bottom, a fish showed itself on the vex and flew up and ate it immediately.  9 inch walleye!!  Ha, well at least there were some fish there!!  Over the next 2 hours, we didn't even mark a fish!!  Sean and I were playing a little cribbage when one of the rattle reels started ringing away....probably one of my favorite sounds in the world!!  It took some line and after a short battle, there was a nice eater in the bottom of the jar!!  Not too long later, I was on the phone when the "fish alarm" started ringing again.  This time after a good battle, 4 lines tangled together, and a few high fives, I was taking pictures of Sean holding a fat 6 pound walleye!!!  We released the fish and spent the next 15 minutes untangling lines......worth every minute of it!!

Over the next 3 hours, we caught 2 more that were too small to keep.  After the south wind picked up, the next 8 hours proved that the fish did not like the weather change.  5 fish the first night was more than enough for me!!  I am going to give the spot one more night tonight, and if it doesn't produce, I will move it to the next hot spot tommorrow!!  Until then, Keep Livin' Your Dream!!!

Well I had been a little slow getting on the ice this year!  I happened to be on a great vacation in Nashville, TN when the lakes around here received ice.  I missed out on the really early ice, but there is plenty of time to catch up! 

I came home from Nashville last Wednesday around noon and I made it out on the ice by the next morning right away chasing some bluegills on one of my favorite little early ice honey holes.  Sean and I started marking some fish on our Vex's right away!  The problem was trying to entice these bad boys in to eating our presentation!  We could get a few to think our jigs were a good meal and managed to keep 14 nice keepers between the 2 of us.  What we love most about this little sweet spot is the amount of Largemouth Bass that we catch through the ice!  We each literally caught more bass than bluegills on this trip!  Definitely a good time!!

Early the next morning, Sean, Nate, and I headed back to "Blackstripe" to catch more gills for the frying pan!  We nicknamed it "Blackstripe" because of all the bass in this little gem!  We tried a different spot on the lake and managed to find more gills and less bass!  This day, we managed to keep 24 dandies for a future fish fry!  It was a great time fishing with great friends!! 

Trav, Dusty, Paul, and I chased some walleyes on Saturday and managed quite the bag!  Look at Trav's update for photos!  It was a great day filled with many smiles and laughs!!  I am very blessed with the friends and opportunities that are available to me!! 

I plan to concentrate more on the Walleyes soon and hope to get my fish house out this week!!  I can't wait to post pictures of some giant trophy walleyes soon!!  Until then, Keep Livin' the Dream!!