River Ice

More ice fishing on the river today.  The cold has let up and it peaked out at 44 degree’s today,  despite that,  there is still about two feet of ice on the river.  It seems that there are still a lot of young Walleye,  but they seem to be getting bigger, 8 and up to 12 inches.  Still nothing legal though.  And there’s still that occasional 10 inch perch.  Still hoping that the fish will be back in the spring.

river ice fishing

Today was a day to dig out,  we shoveled and snow blowered a bunch of packed snow,  that would very likely have turned into hard frozen snow in the coming cold snap.  The high today was around 35 degrees,  so it wasn’t  bad day to move snow.

The neighbors did some river fishing,  and caught a bunch of undersized Walleye,  and a couple of nice Perch.   They tell me that the river ice is over TWO FEET THICK.   After today,  the ice surface was wet,  but with near zero temp’s forcast,  I’m thinking it’ll harden up nicely.

The news of all these small Walleye,  and occasional Perch and SunFish,  sounds like a very good trend.   This summer while the dredging was going on,  it was very rare to catch a fish at all,  much less a keeper.   Hopefully the bigger fish will be back in the river this summer.  And for that matter,  maybe the Walleye will be back in the Bay!

Stopping Asian Carp

Remember my recent post about the closing of the Huron-Manistee Forest to Hunting and Snowmobiling?

How about keeping the Asian Carp out of the Great Lakes!

Senator Debbie Stabenow states that she has been leading the fight in congress to stop the spread of Asian Carp in the Great Lakes.   This is about closing the waterway from the Mississipi River Basins to the Great Lakes.   Likely, the only way to stop the Asian carp from decimating our Great Lakes.
The Army Corp of Engineers is holding public meetings about it on Jan. 7th,  (past) in Traverse City,  and in Ann Arbor in March.  You can learn more at http://glmris.anl.gov and they will be accepting online comments until March 31, 2011.   We all need to speak up on this issue and save the Great Lakes!

LONG LIVE HUNTING AND FISHING IN MICHIGAN!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Baggage from the vacation

It appears that I have some excess baggage from our vacation.  We have a couple of unexplained purchases on our credit card.  Sure enough,  the “card service”  say’s it’s been hacked.   So,  immediately they canceled the card.  Still,  the charges show up on my account,  the day after the card is canceled????

We we’re totally distanced from the Internet,  so it had to have been compromised at one of the physical stores we made a purchase at,  most likely by one of their employee’s.     Seems to me,   we know what was purchased,  and we know where it was purchased.   Can’t we determine where it was shipped and go after the criminal?    No,  I guess not,  the Visa company can’t seem to be bothered with tracking down small criminals.

In the mean time the bogus charges are on my account and I’m responsible for them!  At least until I can obtain and fill out FAUD paperwork.    A new charge card will be sent to me,   but,   I’m not sure I want to enable it.

Depending on how this all works out,  I could wind up being a cash ludite.  A roll of cash in one pocket,  and a gun in the other.   I’m currently pretty disalussioned with “plastic money”.

And on another venue,   we have the Au Gres River dredging operation.    It was supposed to be completely finished by October 15th,   so they would not jeapordize the Crappy spawn.  (they didn’t worry about destroying the Walleye spawn though) .    Well,  it’s now Oct. 20th and the dredger is still busily running up and down the river,  (Crappy be damned).

Both of these issues bring up this thought:

Why do we continually write new laws,  and regulations,   if only a small portion of society is forced to follow them?

Pulled the SportCraft today

We rode down to Bay city in the neighbors boat Friday,  (that’s where they winter it) and today,  I pulled  the SportCraft.   I got it cleaned up pretty good, and tomorrow I’ll drop it off at AuGres Marine for winterizing.   Once I’m back from vacation,   I’ll make a decision about bottom coating,  and get it stashed in the barn.   Right around that time, will probably be right to pull,  powerwash, and stash the other boat too.   It looks a little empty out there on the river now,  with two of the seven boats on our stretch of the river missing.