Pool 9 has come up a bunch over the past 10 days, with higher water yet to come. As of this morning water is now over the road at Blackhawk Park, just past the Trading Post ramp. Ice just went out on the south end of DeSoto Bay, almost as far north as the houseboats and garage size slabs of ice are easing downstream all over the place.

If water wasn’t coming through the trees it might be worth donning the waders and trying to launch a boat. BUT water is coming through the trees! This is a real game changer.  The incredible perch bite we’ve seen this time of year simply isn’t going to happen. The walleyes typically spawn April 15-20.  A lot of water will come down the river between now and then. We’ll just have to wait and see.

Talk around local watering holes and cafes where old guys foregather is about the record flood of ’65.  I was a freshman in high school then.  Laughed about the chumps sitting in class on beautiful days in early May…until about 15 hours into a 36 hour sandbagging marathon. Our efforts saved the farm between Savanna and Thomson down on pool 13 and a lot of other farms…by just two tiers of sandbags around a drainage ditch pump station protecting all of Stransky’s bottoms.

I didn’t keep a fishing diary back then. But the crappie fishing was the best I’ve ever seen from the deep south to the cool blue north. Minnows a foot beneath big red-and-white Dayton bobbers, fished on 15′ cane poles. The poles had 15′ of heavy braided dacron line which was tied about 18″ behind the lone guide on the pole’s trip..just in case a big un broke the pole!

There are no trips in the guide book until late next week, but trips might very well be cancelled well into April.  Word from the north country is that there is still a good 2′ of snow up there.  it’s all gotta melt and come this way eventually. Cold nights and little rainfall would be the best scenario. God has got a plan.  he just hasn’t revealed it yet.

If you’re a high school kid reading this blog looking for the fish-catching skinny, no dice for the short haul. When something good finally starts to happen here on the River you might want to check this blog.

Hopefully it will be 54 years before you hear old geezers talking about the flood of ’19.  Meanwhile, get out and fish often. 54 years is just a blink of the Great Rainmaker’s eye