Tom Donaldson of Dresbach Mn and his father took the day off yesterday to make the 1.5 hour drive to Pool 4 of the Mississippi River near Red Wing for some quality father son time fishing. Now most people this time of year have their portable fish house, auger, Marcum and St Croix ice rods in the back of their vehicles. These two didn't have ice on their minds, they were pulling their boat filled with everything a person needs for spring time fishing to the landing at Everts Fishing Resort in Hagar City. The goal was 12 walleye or saugers for a late evening dinner with the family back in Dresbach.
They stopped into the bait shop to talk with Dean Marshal the manager. Dean always has the pulse of the river. The hot plastics were all laying on the counter. Plastics seem to work the best this time of year and not too many complain when they are threading on a Paddletails instead of dipping their hands in the bait bucket for a cold minnow. Dean said the Oystershell, Stewart Pro Blue, Fire Cracker and the newly released Everts Brand paddletails called BK Semi Pro Electric Blue were the go to colors lately.
When asked how the bites been, Dean's reply was "stupid good". Tom felt that was a good sign!
The two found themselves motoring up towards the dam around 11:00am. Tom said this is a great time of year to be fishing this area. Everyone is thinking ice fishing and we have the whole river to ourselves!
What about the bite Tom? I asked.
"It was more like Stupid Crazy! We could fish with two rods but both Dad and I put one rod away. We would drop a line down then find out we had a fish on before we could drop the other line. It was too hard fishing with two lines! Most of our fish were coming from 18 to 25 feet of water vertial jigging down stream. Then we would "drag" with 5/16 H20 Precision Jig Heads and Ringworms up stream and have just as much fun. It really was a stupid crazy bite! Ok Tom, translate stupid crazy for me. "We fished for about 2 hours. Easily, without stretching it had 40+ fish in the boat. We took home 12 saugers in the 16 inch range with 2 of them being very close to 18 inches".
End of December, snowing, most people thinking of ice fishing and Tom and his Dad have the whole river to themselves with Stupid Crazy fish.
That's just Stupid Crazy!
Briank@in-depthoutdoors.com