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All is well in Bugtussle. One son shot a big tom turkey (1 1/2" spurs!). Food plots in. Most of my honey do list done. Time to go to Canada fishing. Ontario, here we come.

My boys will be driving in less than a year too. They want a truck. I convinced them to pool their money and buy one vehicle, which saves me money for the insurance. I think I might pat myself on the back for that move.

I hope everyone is well and enjoying summer!

Heading to Lac Seul, B-man ?

Tournament I fished this weekend was rough. We weighed our 6 fish but no big ones. We were around 20th place out of 80. Not horrible but not as good as we had hoped. We'll get em next time though 🙂

yep. it was another great trip!

Awesome !!

Fishing has been amazing !

Fishing Canada is for Canadians and US guys that can't fish.

We've been stacking the walleyes in the boat like cord wood. It's been a great season so far. Fathers Day weekend was by far the best walleye fishing I've had in a long, long time. My son and I boated way over 150 walleyes in 2 days fishing and a good pile of perch and random pike. We picked a lake that we've never been to and let 'er buck. I doubt we'll see that fishing craziness again on a well known lake. It was silly.

Fished a Cabela's NWT tourney in SD a few weeks back and had a blast. One of the chickenbucker's fished it as well. I'll let him tell that story if he wants to. That won't be my last one of those either.

We have been pretty busy with the HS fishing team too. My daughter is in the hunt for the state tourney so far, finishing 5th in her first Conference qualifier of the season, held last week.

Two kids graduated HS a few weeks back and we've been extra busy with all that and the grad party crap. Soooo glad that's over...whew! They'll be off to school in the fall.

My son and I are fishing the MTT Walleye trail as a team. It's a riot. We haven't won any events but have been holding our own against some damn good fishermen, and even a few touring pro's. None of the lakes are "home waters" to us, so we have to put our time in. But....we're in 33rd in points out of 105 teams. That keeps us in the running to fish for a boat in the Championship in September. and you know how I feel about boats.

Awesome field report Tom!

I was the lucky chickenbucker that got to meet up with Tom and fish the NWT tournament out here. It was kinda crazy how it all worked out. Over a year ago I met up with Tom when he was fishing one of these close to home so we met up for dinner and hatched a plan to do it this year. Fast forward to this spring I get a text saying entries are open and to get mine in ASAP. A few weeks ago Tom tells me he got in and asked if I got the email too. I look and don't see one, so I call the tournament folks to find out for sure. I talk to a lady and she looks me up, saying that not only did I not get in but I'm so far down on the list there's no way I'll be in with cancellations, bummer and I guess I'll try next year.
The evening before the tournament I get a call from one of the organizers asking if I've gotten to the rules meeting yet. Dumbfounded I ask him for what, he tells me the tournament. Took a second to process but I told him what was told to me weeks ago and he said nope I'm in if I can make it. Quick call to Tom confirms I can share a room and 50 minutes later I'm headed to the river and meet up with Tom. Long story short I had an absolute blast, well worth the entry fee to fish with two pros over 2 days. Luckily I matched up with some good fishermen and was able to place high enough to win my entry back plus a little bit. It was a blast hanging out and sharing stories after each day. I'm definitely going to do this again, thanks Tom for the invite and reminder! Happy 4th to everyone!

Great stuff, Tom & Ryan !!

Fishing has been crazy good, here too.

Doug & I fished for less than 2 hours, to limit out, yesterday !

We had our 8 in the boat, in under an hour, but used the next 45 minutes to upgrade some of the smaller ones.

One of the best walleye bites I have experienced, without it being spring.







Every fish, smashed the bait !

Great stories guys.

Ryan,

I heard the boat resto is moving along, some.

A little bird told me that... ~grin~

Yeah I had to call in reinforcements. Life happened, imagine that 🙂

We have had a good year fishing so far. This is a heckova walleye bite for some reason this year. Strange bug hatches at different times.

It's been a really busy spring/summer. We had 2 kids graduate HS, and we've been fishing like crazy. A little tubing and just farting around in the boat too.

A little crappie fishing before walleye opener to break in the boat.




Some prefishing before the first MTT. None of these are under 21". Unfortunately, none of them are over 24" .
We've ended up in the middle of the pack so far in all of the tourneys except on, where we completely blew it.






A little summer fun too. I think this was Memorial Day

A little family fun time.







Daughter had a little mishap on the way to pick up her dog.


Little prefishing for a tourney on Fathers Day weekend, which happened to be his birthday and mine.
These are all over 21" and under 24" again...except the ones in the livewell. 18"-23" have to go back. I was surprised at the cleaning shack how many people kept one of 23" to eat.



These next 2 were strange fish. They were long, I think one was 21 and one was 23. We weighed the 21" fish and it was barely over 2 pounds. Very skinny.



The rest of prefishing was fantastic. Soooo many fish. We caught walleyes at every place we tried. No matter the tactic we were catching them. Jigs, Lind-rigs, slip bobbers, plastics mostly but also with some leeches.

I take it back, we did keep one over 23" because it was a bleeding bastard.



Coming in for the evening


Oh yeah, we started a little guide business. Nothing too crazy but We've had a few people out.



This one was a cooperate event fundraiser. This was his first bass. He's from CO, and normally trout fishes. I'm taking him and his dad out again tomorrow for bass and maybe walleye.


Two personal bests for this guy in one trip.
19.5" Smallie


23.25" Walleye



The new ride all shined up. Finally got the kicker on it yesterday. Mercury had some crazy inventory stuff going on, but 3 months is excessive to get a kicker delivered.

Congratulations on, well, everything you posted !!

Fishing with family & having fun together, is what makes it so, so good !

*** Sweet ride, too.

Thanks!

Took some guys out Saturday morning. They started out 40 min late. Older dude complained I didn’t have minnows for walleye.

Said we’re going to use plastics and Rapala. “Huh, I heard you need live bait for walleye.”

Tom: “try this” (give him jig and paddle tail”
Old guy: “harrumphs, what is this thing?”

Tom: moves boat 30 feet…
Old guy: “hey! I got one”

🤣🤣

What's the plans for hunting season boys?

We didn't draw any SD tags this season. With 3 of the kids at college this fall, I think I'm going to break out the bow for the first time in like 6-7 years. My wife and step daughter have really liked shooting bows so we're going to start here this weekend possibly.

Great post T

Did not draw for bear - year 13 lol.

Will deer hunt in November as usual with my son and dad. Best week of the year hands down.

Will grouse hunt weekends with my son - we have no dog so it's mostly walking lol. But we cut off 40 acres last year, cutting off another 40 this year and the hope is to do more on the last 40 of the 120 next year etc. Keep rotating and making it good for the birds. Next year the boy's getting married so understanding what life's like when you're 24/married and building a career - this might be the last REALLY good year of time to hunt together before life starts making it hard for him.

I still have to put together my Kibler too.

I'm getting older too - way less bloodlust so for me it's about being at camp, not about killin. I expect to spend more time up there overall.

I'm at the same spot. We used to eat 2-3 deer a year. Kids moving out and off to school, we're down to 1. I don't need to kill anything. Don't get me wrong, I'm still looking to shoot a nice buck.

Exactly but that buck needs to walk out at the right time to catch me in the mood lol. More than one buck has walked over the last couple of years because "I just don't feel like cleaning one right now"