What a Fall season!

I don't want the boat to go to storage!!!

Well, we have our first snow in the forecast and I'm sitting here wondering where the heck my fall went.  Last thing I knew, I was in the Due North/Rapid Marine Lund chasing big summer bass!  Okay, let's get to the updates.  First, we started the grouse season up in Canada with my good friend Harald Lohn.  Harald runs Kabeelo fly-out lodge.   On the way up, quite a sight.  Anyone who travels to Lac Seul , Ear Falls and Red Lake knows the Village Corners.  Quite a big fire there after Labour Day.  Bummer.  That was always our gas and ice cream stop.  Word is they'll be rebuilt for the 2011 fishing season. 

The Village Corners!!!

Okay,back to Kabeelo. I've always gone up there to fish, but turns out Kabeelo's got some of the best grouse hunting I've EVER seen.  Holy smokes we found a lot of birds and we weren't even hunting with dogs.  We just walked trails and found limits of ruffed grouse (and yes, the walleyes were biting too!).  

A BEAUTIFUL fan....

From Canada, we snuck down and over to Hayward, Wisconsin where we chased muskies on the fly.  Yep, it can be done!  All I'll show you, for now, are the flies.

Musky Flies

You get some idea of their size when you see 'em next to a Rapala.  Watch for that story to air in Due North Outdoors sometime in 2011!   I had a week down in Tennessee shooting for one of our national shows, "Destination Polaris" and then got back home just in time for the Minnesota Pheasant Opener.  We had a slow weekend, mainly due to the amount of corn that still stood.  Oh well.  Now the hunting only gets better.  Meantime,  I spent three days on the road last week slowly bringing my open water fishing season to an end.  This trip was all play, no work!   Friday, Mark Perkins and I hit Mille Lacs Lake in search of a big fall musky.  All we found was a dead-calm lake and air temps near 60 degrees.  We never saw a fish.  I think the tulibees are still staging, and not up yet. 

54 x 26 Wow!

Buddy Travis Frank had great luck out there on Tuesday.  He's my musky mentor these days!    Saturday I snuck over to Brainerd and chased walleyes on Gull Lake with Dad.   Heck, we had more fun listening to all the deer hunters banging away in the woods than we did hooking wallies and pike.  Sunday,  I got up early and "road tripped"  south to a favorite lake of buddy Wayne Smith.  Together, we chased smallies and wallies and listened to the Vikes mount a seemingly unsurmountable comeback against the Arizona Cardinals.   Only  thing better than the game?  The fishing!

 About our average size....

 We caught plenty of smallies and even a walleye worth snappin' a shot of!  

A Nice Fall Walleye!

Up next?  Several pheasant trips and maybe one last largemouth fishing trip, if the weather allows.  I'll keep you posted!  Meantime, watch for the Due North/Rapid Marine boat to go on sale at Rapid Marine.  Someone's going to get an incredible deal on an AWESOME 2010 rig!

Put It On The Board!

Aaron Achtenberg, one of our talented photojournalists, once put it best.  Being from North Dakota, he exclaimed out in a windy pheasant field, "I hate the wind." "I just get tired of all the darn wind..."   I never really paid much attention to his words, until this past weekend....

Thursday,  fishing buddy Wayne Smith and  I headed up to Walker, the Due North Lund from Rapid Marine in tow. 

Arriving at Tournament Headquarters

  We were heading to Leech Lake to fish Muskies Inc.'s annual Frank Schneider Jr. tournament.  I believe it's the biggest musky event in North America.  This year, 507 anglers participated.   Up there, we met up with fishing partners Chad Cedarstrand and Al Blomker.   

Another Block Head....

Okay, back to the wind thing... For THREE days, the wind howled. I'm not talking a late summer breeze, but a full blown gale.   Friday's blow beat us to a pulp.  We wrestled honest four footers on Leech.  At one point, we had a foot of water in the floor of the boat.  The bilge ran much of the day.  Wayne moved three fish in the first hour, then we didn't see much the rest of the day.  Saturday, we moved over to Cass Lake where, once again, the wind beat us up.  We moved fish, but never had one hook up.  By Saturday night, we were ready to pack up!  Sunday, we had wind again, but it laid down a bit in the morning, giving us a window to fish a few rock piles on Leech.   15 Minutes into our casting, Wayne yelled out, "I got it!"  I looked back to see his rod doubled over.   I dropped my rig, grabbed the net and scooped up his fish a few moments later.  

 47 1/4 on the board.   Nice job Wayne! 

A Beauty!

We snapped a couple quick pictures and his first "gal" swam away, an awfully chagrined look on her face.    While that would be our only fish of the tournament, it put Wayne in 24th place out of 507 anglers.  Not bad for his first fish!   

 I'm off to Canada this week for a three-story shoot up at Kabeelo Lodge.  I'm dreaming of a pike the size of Wayne's musky.  I'll keep you posted...

Fishing Has No Boundaries!

Fishing Has No Boundaries Friends!

I've got a challenge for each of you.   Find time in the next year to take a day out of your schedule and antee up to take someone new fishing.   Trust me, sharing your passion may be as big a kick as hooking a trophy!    This past weekend, I zipped up to Brainerd's 8th annual Fishing Has No Boundaries event.  Essentially, the non-profit program helps get people with different disabilities out for a day of fishing.  The good folks at Camp Confidence host the annual event and put on quite the party.  The anglers are people who might not always get the chance to fish, but have the same passion as you and me.   This is year number three for me.  My fishing buddies Saturday were Troy Hunstad and Jimmy Francis.

Troy and Jimmy with their catch!

  Troy hails from Monticello and Jimmy calls Brainerd home.  We headed out on a very windy Saturday morning on Gull Lake with four dozen minnows and a tub of nightcrawlers.   The guys wanted to do a little bass fishing, so that's just what we did.  Both Troy and Jimmy snapped a pile of largemouth right away in the morning.  They found fish in 10-20 feet of water tucked in tight to the weeds.  

Troy with a nice Largemouth...

Troy stuck to a jig/minnow and jig/crawler set up.   Jimmy switched up, catching his fish on minnows and plastic worms.   Troy eventually won the "big fish" award with a roughly 2 1/2 pounder.  Jimmy got the "most fish" award, although both guys caught more fish than we could count.   In fact, we ran out of live bait just after the noon hour.  Not a bad day of fishing!   

Bass number ten for Jimmy

We kept a few of our smaller fish so the guys could take a few fillets home for a fish fry.   If you've never been a part of one of these events, you're truly missing out.  Here's a snapshot from the 2009 event.  2010 was even more of a success!  Thanks to the volunteers at Camp Confidence for an absolutely awesome event!  See you in 2011.  Who knows, maybe we'll have a few new boat captains next year too!   http://www.brainerdlakesfhnb.org/

Cheers!

Lake of the Woods!

Well, I've been on my hands and knees scrubbing out the 2010 Due North Outdoors Lund from Rapid Marine.  That is normally a good thing.  Heck, nothing better than a bunch of fish goo smelling up the carpet AND it's a good sign the fish were biting...  

Sunset on the Mighty Lake...

Last week, I headed up to Lake of the Woods to meet a bunch of fishing buddies. My trip started a day late with the long, lonely ride out from Sioux Narrows, Ontario.  I zipped out roughly 40 miles in a bit of cold and stormy weather, following the sunset west towards Wiley Point.   Think of the ride out as a bit of white-knuckled driving through rock-infested water, rain in my face.  Thank goodness for the Humminbird GPS!

The Route In...

After the adventurous trip in (no rocks hit!), I pulled into the lodge right at dark and met up with the rest of our fishing party. Our goal on the trip was to find Lake of the Woods' biggest walleyes.  Doing so during the dog days of summer can be a littly tricky.  Good thing we had Gary and Chris Morgal along from Northland Tackle.   Turns out Northland jigs tipped with minnows worked like a charm on just about every hump and reef we could find.   Our other weapon of choice?  #5 and #6 Northland blades rigged with crawlers.   Yes, we had a lot of fun on the trip and there are simply too many fish tales to include in this report so, I thought I'd simplify and hand out a few online awards instead.

Biggest Lake Trout Award goes to????

Jason and Jake McCarthy

Yep, Jason and Jake McCarthy (Of Minnesota's famed McCarthy Auto fame) nabbed this 12 pounder.  Nice fish!

Biggest Walleye Award goes to????

 A 30 Incher!

I see a pattern.... and I don't like it! Jason and Jake had the hot hand this trip!

Biggest Pike Award???

Jake's Pike!

See what I mean?  Geez, the McCarthy's had an awfully good fishing trip.  Jake's only miss?  A giant musky.  I'm sure he'll get it next year.  Okay, plenty of other awards to hand out...

Prettiest Walleye Award goes to????

A Perfect Walleye!

Brett Paul caught this 25 inch beauty.  I believe that was about his tenth fish that day in the 24-26 inch range... 

Biggest Smallmouth Bass????

A Monster!

That chunky fish about pulled off Brett's arms!  PS:  He had a great netman on that catch....

The 2010 Blind Squirrel Award Goes To???

Scott Fransen (of Ron Schara Productions fame)

Okay, so this award is presented a bit tongue and cheek.  I believe that was fish #173 for Scott on his third day of fishing.  He caught more darn walleyes than all the rest of us combined...

Best Fish Pose???

Ron Schara With Another Trophy!These darn Lake of the Woods walleyes are awfully frisky.  Ron had quite the time holding onto this energetic 23 incher!

Best Shore Lunch???

A Wiley Point Shore Lunch Spread

Our guides Will and Scott put on a lunch like this each day, first cleaning fish, then making sure we walked away from the campfire with full bellies.  And to think, we were back on the water for the afternoon bite each day, although most of us had a tough time staying awake after such big meals!

Best New Bait Testers Award goes to???

 Chris and Gary Morgal of Northland Tackle

I had to keep all pictures of Chris and Gary Morgal to generic shots out of the boat.  Yes, each time I wanted to snap a photo of them,  seems they were testing new (and secret) baits for Northland!  Let's just say they all seemed to work quite well.   Watch for new products in 2011!

Best Photograph of the Trip???

3 generations of McCarthys with Ron

There were a ton of great shots from our three days up north, but  this shot had to be the best.  Wally, Jason and Jake McCarthy during a lunch stop.  How much fun to have three generations on the water!  Thanks to all for a great trip up north!  I guess it's about time to start planning the 2011 event...

Wyomin' Is Callin'...

What a week in the great state of Wyoming!  We were out there shooting for one of our national programs, Destination Polaris.   Our week started with a video camera that broke down on us on the third shot into the trip.  We ended up driving all the way south of Denver to find a rental.  Made for a very long first night and kind of a dirty feeling swapping an expensive hd camera with a stranger in the parking lot of Orange Julius.

   

Schultzie thinkin',  "Where's our darn camera?"

We rode ATVs up to about 11,200 feet in the Snowy Range with area fishing guide Michael "Hack" Patterson.  What a whoot to spend a few days with him!   Look at the mountain wildflowers in FULL bloom! Mule's Ear everywhere!  Anyone remember what the blue flower is?

  

We fished some pretty small water.  Three weights worked well in the wind.  More brook trout on tiny bwos than you could count.

  

I think our biggest was right around 10 inches.

 ?__   

Too bad we found ourselves ducking out of afternoon storms each day.  We actually ran into several pretty bad storms and found ourselves ducking for shelter away from severe lightning and hail.  Temps would drop from the mid 70s down to the low 40s.  Bad hypo weather....

?__ Hiding Out!

?__ The view from under our rock ledge and tree....

 __The aftermath...

 __Home for the first few days was Centennial, Wyoming's historic hotel.  Lots of small water close by.  The smoked salmon and feta omelette rocks. Days three and four we moved across the range to Saratoga where we fished the North Platte and its tributaries. 

  __Even though the river was up and a bit milky, we still had plenty of luck catching nice brown trout under the "guidance" of local fishing guide and our friend,  Michael "Hack" Patterson.

  __ 

  __ 

Lots of cool stuff to see on this trip.
Highlights included coming upon an old trapper's cabin at 11,500.

  __ 

  __ 

Also ran into (well, not quite, but you know what I mean) a big bull moose. Quite intimidating staring down that big guy.  Fortunately, he wasn't too interested in us.  He was too busy chompin' on the alders..

 

This week I'm off to Wiley Point up on Lake of the Woods to chase a few walleyes and smallies.
I hope this hot weather hasn't shut down the fish!