Ted Peck Fishing

gates at lock & dam 8 are going back into the water today as River levels continue to drop, creating outstanding fishing opportunities for at least the next several weeks. Water temp was just 61 yesterday.  This will rise rapidly over the next several days, resulting in some outstanding bluegill fishing. of course, hungry pike won’t be far away. Bass and walleye action will also improve drastically with each passing day. The New Albin boat launch should be open again by Wed. afternoon, making access on the west side of the River much easier.

high water will still be a factor at launches on both sides of the River for awhile. At least water is warm enough now where Tevas are a better option than muck boots.

My july guide schedule is starting to fill up, but there are a bunch of openings this month and a pile of fish out there just achin’ to feel your hook!

 

By tomorrow we should be coming down out of minor flood stage with the river continuing to fall through the action stage, into just ‘high water’ by early next week. Fishing will be great once those gates go back in the water up at the Genoa dam!

Over the past several years it seems like the Miss is running higher than it used to, with ‘action’ stage coming 4 days after the Twin Cities gets much more than a sprinkle  Common sense says we haven’t got THAT much rain this spring. Snowmelt hasn’t been part of the grand equation for almost 2 months now.  So WHY is the River staying so high for so long?

Come to find out the Corps of Engineers has raised the normal pool levels north of St. Louis by about a foot, all the way upstream to accommodate barge traffic downstream. So now the ‘normal summer pool’ at Lansing will be 9′ instead of 8′.  This move was made quietly without assessing impact on businesses and folks who live and work on the River and have become used to an 8′ pool OVER DECADES.

Back in the early 1800s, the Miss was essentially the Interstate. Congress mandated the Corps shall maintain a channel for navigation.  This has always been priority #1. Back in the 1950s barge traffic diminished.  Then engineers designed a new kind of propulsion system for the towboats. Now they can push bigger loads than ever before. Barges are displacement vessels. The more you load them, the more water they require. Three years ago, major towboat companies like Ingram and Marquette complained they needed more depth. The quickest, easiest way to achieve this is by holding water back behind the dams. So from now on the Miss will always run that much closer to very high water, and will reach flood stage more quickly.

When Congress came out with their mandate over 150 years ago, there was no such thing as sport fishing or tourism. In 2017 these industries generate financials far beyond what the handful of barge companies make. But the old paradigm still exists.  When high water closes boat ramps, fishing and river use for pursuits other than running barges becomes difficult. This costs many millions of dollars in lost revenue, by thousands of guides, bait shops, restaurants, motels, gas stations, grocery stores…..

Most taxpayers who use the Mississippi River for purposes other than hauling corn and coal aren’t even aware they don’t have a voice in this situation. The Corps of Engineers does its best to blindly follow the congressional mandate. We voters/taxpayers have a voice if we choose to use it.

Of course, the barge companies have deep pockets and are very well connected with politicians, a few of which were probably around 150 years ago when the navigation priority was established. Term limits are the ONLY way we can get the USA back on track. Congress works on keeping themselves in power, not for us. But a normal pool level which is one foot lower and term limits are two things we’re not likely to see in the foreseeable future.

 

 

I have had a fear and distrust of shiny objects since Mom used to chase me around with a spoonful of castor oil. This the primary reason why i lightfoot around cyber stuff with a wary eye and hand on my pistol. Really thought the Chicoms would take down our comm satellites by now or hit us with an EMP. With the Big Dirt Nap drawing closer every day, the odds this will happen grow longer–at least for this old river rat.

I don’t understand Facebook or blogging and still associate ‘Amazon’ as a big river where i would likely feel at home instead of an interweb delivery service for the latest shiny objects. My wife told me you can buy my book Mississippi Musings with the Old Guide on Amazon.com and find a couple lures in which i had some design input on a couple of those dot-com deals you can find on the crowd. I’ve always stayed away from crowds and when forced inside to eat at a restaurant always sit where i can see the door with my back against the wall.

Anyway, she said I should tell you to visit www.vibrationstackle.com where you can find my signature series “Teddy Cat” blade bait, which In-fisherman magazine called ‘the Swiss Army knife of blade baits’ and www.bimboskunk.com where you can find the “Teddy Skunk Perchanator”, a 1/32 oz. jig/fly which just tears up the perch and other panfish. Both these websites have an entire stable full of lures which catch lots of fish besides my baits. You should visit these websites if that shiny object you’re looking at right now is more prevalent in your heirarchy of needs than goin’ fishin’. This is about as long as i can stand to sit at the keyboard of this shiny object. Four out of seven voices in my head say its time to seriously plan the next fishin’ trip, somewhere beyond my beloved Mississippi where the water isn’t so angry now. The other three voices are telling me to get out to the pole barn and hook up the Lund and we’ll figure out where we’re going while on the road. Sounds like a plan. Adios for now…

 

Got back from Florida mid-February to unseasonably warm weather for a couple of weeks, followed by a seasonal March with good fishing for walleyes and perch. April we returned to December weather–with high water. May arrived with water high but dropping. At least until mid-May.  The 8th-18th offered pretty good fishing, with unusual stuff, like the year’s 2nd brown trout (a 23 incher) and feisty gar up to 50.5″ long.  Big walleyes on chatterbaits, everything in the River on an oxbow pattern Rat-l-Trap–including the trout and many gar. We’re now three full weeks into May.  last night we got 1.2″ of rain, which came after o.7″ a week earlier when the May pattern started sliding back towards late November.  On the 17th the air temp was an uncomfortable 86, water temp was 70. Then the big slide with a side dish of rain. Got off the water today the air temp was 52 and the water just 2 degrees warmer…and the water is on the rise into minor flood stage by memorial day.Maybe we’ll see June weather by june.

It is fitting and proper that my ashes will be scattered on the Immortal Mississippi when the Great Rainmaker calls me home. After a lifetime on this water i have learned that her inner secrets will remain hidden until I see the Creator face to face.  Until then I can only go to the River like any other living creature, relating to ambient conditions while trying to fit into the grand scheme of things.

Essentially, I’m just one more toothy predator–lacking scales and fishing from an aluminum platform which tries to kiss the River without being too intrusive. I learned the concept of ‘pre-fishing’ is a waste of time many years ago. Better to come to the River, plug in and let conditions take you where experience says the fish will be. If the first hunch comes up empty, you reconfigure and proceed.

Over the past couple of weeks I’ve found considerable success in backwater areas where there is at least 2′ of visibility. Spots like this are tougher to find when the River is in flood stage–like it will be again in about 3 days–because areas which loaded from downstream pushing clearer water to the upper end now have water actively flowing through the trees, bringing color and current which have an adverse impact on fish behavior. All this means is that you need to look a little harder to find the fish in an ecosystem which grows exponentially with every inch of River rise.

Over the past few days I’ve seen smallmouth come out of weeds and wood and caught walleyes up to 27″ in less than 3 f.o.w. on chatterbaits. This flies in the face of conventional wisdom.  But conventional wisdom does not apply on the Immortal River.  The Miss makes the rules, which are absolute and understood only by the Miss.

Sometimes the fish just don’t want to bite–or even strike at passing ‘trigger’ baits, simply because the River says they don’t have to. I understand this but have trouble conveying it to some folks who simply haven’t reached this point of intimacy with the Immortal River. I believe trying to bring others to this point of understanding is the most important work I can do as a fishing guide. As this happen, fish get caught. But fish are just a bonus. It is growth as a fisherman which clients will have for the rest of their days.

Back to ashes. Our time here is known only to the Creator. This fact becomes increasingly lucid with each passing day spent out there on some of God’s very best work. Thursday afternoon my old friend Jesse and new friend James were flying down the River in Jesse’s water rocket Ranger boat. James lives in Alabama, where he is editor of Bassmaster magazine. Until Wednesday he had not been on the Immortal River north of Memphis. We were winding through a side channel known locally as ‘dead man’s cut’. When we were almost at a major side-channel called Minnesota slough we saw a boat at an unusual place for a boat under these conditions and slowed down. In the boat were two sullen fisherman and a local law enforcement officer. Floating face down in the weeds just a couple feet from the boat was a body.

The LEO said more help was assembling at Visager’s landing, several twists, turns and islands from the tragedy. We went back to the boat ramp and led a boat carrying a body bag to the scene.

The Mississippi is as unforgiving as it is Grand. All mistakes must be paid for immediately. Sometimes in full. I found out later that the body used to hold the life of a 29-year-old man who went in 18 miles upstream, 10 days before. The River brought him through the dam at Genoa where gates were wide open because the River is at ‘action stage’ past the first major running slough on the west side of the River above Twin Island, two the second running slough which snakes past Goose lake and into Minnesota slough, where it came to rest less than 100 yards from the confluence.

Why did the body take this path? The course is known only to the River. Someday my ashes may wind up in this exact same spot. Or not. The River is truly a force of nature which is forever changing. Encountering a body is always troubling. I have seen many in a career as a professional firefighter and several more on the River and elsewhere. The corpse is just a corpse. The soul has departed. A human soul is not like the River’s soul–though both are living creatures.

Life is the journey we humans take which is a perpetual study in trying to figure things out. tight lines.

 

 

 

 

just when the River was approaching near normalcy, it is on the way up again–into the action stage, and tickling the minor flood designation.  Water in the trees is the new normal. Water in the trees is no big deal. When it starts flowing through the trees fishing can get ‘tough’. Yesterday and later today I’m sharing the boat with my ol’ pal Jesse Simpkins from St. Croix rods and new pal, James Hall, editor of Bassmaster magazine. hot baits yesterday were oxbow pattern Rat-L-Trap and Custom Carter’s Shaker chatterbait from Choo Choo lures. Most walleye fishermen have yet to discover the chatterbait as a high water weapon on the Miss.  It is my go-to bait when the ‘eyes are in the weeds–which is exactly where they are once water warms to about 70 degrees, because this is where they can find food and not fight current. Chatterbaits are pretty much weedless, with vibration triggering reflex strikes on walleyes which grow to substantial dimensions without eating anything which even comes close to looking like a chatterbait!

Fished with LeRoy, Joel and Jacob Saturday morning. The guys caught a very nice mixed bag of SMB, walleyes, northerns, LMB and WB–about 35 fish in a half-day trip. The River is beginning to fall nicely.  Action should get better and better for at least the next week or so…but 35 fish in 4 hrs. ain’t bad! This trip was 3 generations of very nice folks. Grandpa LeRoy and his son Jacob are accomplished bowhunters who have both harvested bucks substantially larger than the 174 which hangs over my fireplace. When looking for fish for these guys on Friday i only caught a few small bass and one channel cat over several hours. The wind was blowing pretty stiff out of the NW, so I’m thinking the slow bite was barometer related. 24 hours later, they had doubles on at least twice and a triple once in the same spots with the same presentation. As the saying goes, the Lord works in mysterious ways. LeRoy has been working for the Lord for over 40 years as a full-time pastor, so I was quite–and pleasantly surprised when I dropped them back at their vehicle and Pastor LeRoy pulled a case of Canadian Whiskey out of the trunk and gave it to me.  Earlier while fishing LeRoy commented on good whiskey, echoing advice his father had given him” good whiskey should tell you you’ve had a drink, but you shouldn’t drink enough to get stupid”. When he gave me the hooch he suggested I put just one ice cube in a glass, then pour in the entire bottle! Of course, this whiskey story is like a lot of fishing stories—the bottles were only 80ml each–the kind you get on an airplane. Just got home from honoring my mother-in-law on this Mother’s Day. The cube is about half-melted, the sun is getting low in the western sky and I’m gonna savor some good whiskey, stopping far short of getting stupid. Here’s looking at you LeRoy!

Went out fun fishing with Whipsaw jack this morning.Caught a variety of species, most on oxbow pattern Rat-L-Trap. Just got a new Okuma Komodo SS baitcast reel. Very, very smooth. Water temp is now a solid 60. Visibility is excellent, although River remains high. Supposed to fall all next week, which should result in even better fishing! NOAA tells me they may add “recreational action stage” to their flow chart. This would be about 625.2′ when the New Albin ramp closes due to high water.

Today I had Jack & Joe out in the boat–the other half of the 4 man crew(Shawn & Rory Two-Gar who fished yesterday) Neither Jack nor Joe had ever caught a toothy gar either. So we started where we ended up yesterday. On the 4th cast Joe tied into a mongo sheep about 15 lbs which provided quite a tussle. The guys then caught a sauger and a white bass, then Joe hooked into a gar about the same size as Rory Two Gar did the day before. A couple minutes after this gar was whupped, a monster gar-woofled Jack’s owbow pattern Rat-L-Trap, and the fight was on. Fish was far too big to net. jack finally got it along side the boat, Joe held me by the belt and I bear hug/wrestled it aboard: all 50.5″ of it. They hooked probably a dozen more, boating half of them and destroying two ‘Traps in the process. We only had about an hour left in the trip.  the guys wanted to go to the spot where Rory and Shawn did so well the day before. They were hooked up about every five minutes on nice walleyes, short walleyes, pike, white bass, SMB…and one more gar. Then Joe let go a cast which he said was ‘caught in the wind’. Lure ended up about 10 feet up in a tree. From this point forward Joe will be forever known as “Fishes For Eagles”. There is more to fishing than catching fish. It’s also about building relationships. We got back to the boat ramp with guts sore from laughing and hands sore from catching a pile of fish. Every day on the Immortal River is its own reward. For the past few days the bounty and rewards have been greater than great. The hammock is calling my name.  Belly is full of fried chicken, morels and fresh wild asparagus. think I’ll go listen to a cardinal and oriole lullaby.

Fished today with Rory & Shawn.  Dick Neefe took out their buddies jack & Joe. Jack had a card game for this crew. Every time you catch a fish, you draw a card–then make the best poker hand out of your cards. Rory & Shawn had 8 walleyes, 11, SMB, 5 WB, two sheep, 2 LMB, 2 pike and 3 gar..so plenty of cards to build a hand. Both guys caught their first gar ever. The day was about over when Rory hooked his first gar–a scrappy 36 incher. About four casts later he set into a BIG fish. Turned out to be a 45″ gar hooked in the tail. The battle was joined. Normally I’m pretty good with the net, but missed twice cuz I didn’t factor in a foot long beak. Meanwhile, Shawn hooks into a 31″ pike. Told Rory to hang on. He would have to wait for the net. Got the pike in and out of the net then started chasing the big gar with the MinnKota. The fish, Rory and me were all wearing out.  had to net the fish in the middle usually a major fox paws. But folding the critter was the only way to get it in the net. He plans on getting the gar mounted.  pretty cool lookin’ critter. and after a 20 minute fight, certainly good for a lifetime of stories!