Tuesday, April 22, 2008

A Lotta Stuff (Ice Progress, GOMH Report, Closed Bass Season)

"GET ME TO THE LAKE"- The MNDNR has recorded 9 more lakes ice-free today and yesterday. I was hoping the ice would be out in my area lakes by today, but that was not to be. I checked Bulldog, Rock, Long, and Platte/Sullivan.

Bulldog-The public access had an acre and a half of open water.

Rock-Had some places where the ice had pulled away from shore, and it looked like there was a huge (15 feet wide) open crack just out from the Public Access running SE for at least 100 yards.

Long- The ice seemed to pull away from shore about 10 yards on the North and West sides.

Platte/Sullivan- Ice was pulling away from shore on the North Side of Platte. At the Grumpy Old Man Hole (GOMH), there was an astonishing amount of open water on the Platte Side. It was open to the small island and half of Channel Inn Bay. On the Sullivan side, it looked like the entire widened area of the Platte River Outlet (PRO) was wide open.

It will be at least 2 days before ice is off any of the area lakes.

Fishing Report- I brought a couple of rods and gave the GOMH a shot. When I first started fishing, a strong S wind blew 15-25mph straight in, and the water was flowing at a steady clip back into Platte Lake. I don't think I have ever caught fish when that is happening. The current of water moving from Platte into Sullivan is the big draw of fish at the GOMH. I fished both sides of the GOMH and got nothing but drifting weeds. No Grumpy Old Men sightings. With all that open water, fish could move into the GOMH anytime.

Cyberfish and Bake hit Pool 4&5 on Saturday and Pool 2 on Sunday for a little multi-species action.

Josh Douglas is prefishing the St. Jude Bass Classic on Pools 4&5...

Rite of Spring: It happens annually right about the time the ice goes out; The self-righteous self-appointed guardians of sportsmanship ethics, law, and largemouth bass go ballistic at FishingMinnesota.com about others they perceive as intentionally fishing for bass in the closed season. There was a new wrinkle this year in that the closed-season cops complained about people fishing for walleye in a river. Apparently, the "violation" occurred on a river containing nice crappies. So that makes yet another case where the violators would be indistinguishable from people that are fishing legally. A jig and a minnow or twister tail grub will catch just as many walleyes as crappies.

The FishingMinnesota.com bass forum got in on the action last Sunday with the thread: Does Turn In Poachers Work?. The BP (as in Bowfin Pro) is referenced in the 13th post in a not-so-unusual plot twist. Much to my delight, a well-reasoned defense of the BP is given in post #25 by Ricqik. Yes, I do intentionally fish for Dogfish, and tomorrow I plan to blog about fishing for Dogfish. We learn in one post that the BP should be labeled a "sociopath." (Does that make me a Bonafide Path?)

One person comes up with a bright idea for enforcing the most ludicrous fish regulation in the book:

If they (DNR) would let some of us volunteer to ticket these people, they would not have to cover so much of the area. Plus i think it would keep more people honest, seeings how no one would know if you have a ticket book in your pocket.

That's just what we need, more citations for an infraction that does absolutely no harm to the resource and for which enforcement is merely a notion in the eye of the beholder. Meanwhile, as usual, the closed-season cops are silent about admonishing people who are actually doing some harm to the resource. You know, the people fishing for panfish just can't resist the temptation to keep the bass they catch because they think they will never get caught. Or what about the people that catch a dogfish in the spring while fishing for panfish from shore and throw the doggy up on the bank to die? I witnessed an infraction of wanton waste twice last spring, in the case linked, I got the Dogfish back into the water while it was still alive.

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