Pulling The Boat? No!!
It hit me last evening that the open water season, at least in my neck of the woods, is almost over. Pulling the boat seems like an inevitability. Two nights back I listened to the flute-like call of migrating tundra swans as several flocks passed by in the middle of the night, rewarding me for a bit of sleeplessness. I told Karen the next morning that some nasty weather must be headed our way as swans are usually among the latest of waterfowl to leave, and given the number of birds from the previous evening it appeared they knew something we didn’t something we didn’t.
We had a blast of cold air blow through last night. It was pushing that nasty precipitation known as snow, too. After nearly 50 years of living through Minnesota winters I have come to recognize when the end of the open water season here has truly come and while temps in the 50s are forecasted for Saturday, it’s only a matter of days before we’ll awake to find lakes here locked tight in shimmering ice.
Until then I refuse to winterize my boat. This is one of the best times to catch giant fish, particularly muskies, and I have plans to get out next week to a new favorite lake about two hours from home. There’s also a surprisingly good largemouth bite going, shallower than expected, and slow-rolling a spinnerbait is producing good numbers of fish.—Steve
