Au Gres river conditions: Slight winter recall

Posted by Greybeard on Apr 21st, 2009 in Fishing, News and weather | Comments Off

We didn’t get more than a few flakes of snow yesterday,  but it rained and blew all day long with a high of about 44 degrees.  Today,  the breeze was lighter (until about 3:30pm),   with clouds and rain in the morning,  a touch of broken sun after noon,  then more clouds and a strong West wind rolling in about 3:30 pm, Hi=49 degrees.  Not ideal fishing weather,  though I did see a few fishermen at the mouths of the Tawas River,  and at the Au Gres.  The Singing Bridge was deserted at 1 pm when I went by.  We’ve got a few more day’s of near winter in the forcast,  then maybe a warm up.  I hope to have the dock installed in the next couple of days,  and at least the 17 ft’er in the water by the weekend.  Walleye season opens Saturday and I have a ton of lures,  that desparately need to be washed. 

Gustanado on the Au Gres River??? !!!!

Posted by Greybeard on Apr 18th, 2009 in News and weather | Comments Off

This afternoon,  around 2:30 or 3:30 pm,  (I didn’t think to look at the clock) , we were struck by something I have never heard off.   Looking it up on the web,  I learned that it might of been  a Gustnado.  (at least that’s the best way I can explain it)

We were sitting on our deck in the sun,  it was 74 degree’s,  sunny,  and just the slightest hint of a breeze.  This had been the weather pattern all day long.    We  heard a surprize gusting wind noise and suddenly a swirling circle of the river about 15 feet in diameter, leaped into the air, up about 30 feet high.   The swirling spout of water quickly moved under the dock in the following picture,  and lifted the 4×10, 160lb platform about six feet upward, then slammed it back down onto the brackets.  At this time we were scrambling for the door to get under cover,  and getting sprayed with river water  and bit’s of reeds.  (this dock is about 250 ft, across the river from where we were)

Where the “gustnado” went from there,  I didn’t notice,  (I was to busy trying to cover my ass),  but the wind blew pretty hard for about 20 seconds,  then we were back to the calm sunny day.  As you can see from the above photo,  the dock came out a little worse for wear.   I’m pretty sure that if our dog,  or our neighbors dogs had been in the path of this thing,  they would have gotten the ride of their life,   and I hate to think of what would have happened if it had traveled over one of the many boats fishing in the river.  There was no warning, what so ever!

In the aftermath of this oddity,   the breeze gradually came up out of the north,  and the temperature dropped about 25 degree’s,   but there were never any clouds.    Strange stuff.

**Following day:  The cooling continued through the night,  and today the high is 46 degree’s,  a 30 degree drop from yesterday.

Au Gres River, mini-report, Walleye mania!

Posted by Greybeard on Apr 16th, 2009 in Fishing | Comments Off

The mouth of the Au Gres River looks a bit like a circus.   Boats everywhere,  crossing lines,  and pulling in nice size Walleye.     All the action is down river of the State launch,   since season doesn’t open in the river proper until April 25th.   Of course,  the Walleye are expected to have left the river by then,  but,  I guess we have to give them a chance to reproduce.   Hopefully,  they’ll still be hungry, when we can get the big boat out in the Bay.   

From what I have seen,  the females have dropped their egg’s and are heading back out to big water.      We got a nice day today,  so I expect the launch area to be packed again.   Happy Fishin’  !  

A Damn Shame

Posted by Greybeard on Apr 14th, 2009 in News and weather | 3 comments

If your looking for the article I wrote about the shamefully poor performance of my pension plan,   I’ve deleted it.

Every since I wrote it,  I’ve been getting lot’s and lot’s of hits on it.  This action has continued since the first day I wrote it in 2009.

Since it wasn’t really that interesting,  and I couldn’t explain the repeated hits,  I dumped it.

Interesting Motorcycle

Posted by Greybeard on Apr 13th, 2009 in Days of Old | Comments Off

First off,  a bit of personal history:  I grew up riding dirt bikes,  and most of that riding was in tightly growing northern Michigan forestlands.    There’s nothing like a tight singletrack though the deep woods.    I also liked cruising back roads (that means dirt,  and often sand or loose gravel).  In my youth I raced a Harley Sportster on  what eventually become moto-cross tracks.   We competed against 650 Triumph’s,  BSA’s,  and an occassional Norton.   Later I tryed road bikes for a while,  but it never held the allure of the woods.  When I traveled the roads,  I often gravitated to the back roads,  and often to two tracks and tighter.

I’ve ocassionally done a bit of shopping looking for a bike that would work for my kind of riding.   Something along the lines of the Harley XR750 TT Scrambler comes to mind, but their pretty much collectors items.   I tried an XL650R Honda,  but it was too top heavy and tall.  My not so fond nick name for it was “the Tank”.     At my somewhat dignified age,  I’ve thought less about that kind of riding.   You just can’t do it with most of today’s offerings.   Today,  I saw the Marines version of a dirt bike,  and learned that a non-diesel version is available to the public.  Now,  this one isn’t a V-twin,   and I’m not really sure how top heavy it is and such,  but with spring on it’s way,   there’s just a  spark of the fever starting to burn.