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Headin over fishin around Tower again last night. Turkeys in the same area tonight as in August.   By the by brought home 4 nice 15"-17" walleyes, slip bobbers and minnows, 6' of water. Who say's the fish abandon the weeds in the fall. LOL Nice healthy fish, should make a great lunch.  Nobody else on the lake, I guess the lightning scared-em off.   Jim

No doubt about it.  I went during turkey spring season A too and there was noticeably more hunters out, especially on Sat/Sun.  I think the combination of no lottery and the pandmeic had people cooped up.  Plus it was relatively decent weather for season A, and it has not been the last couple years with April snow.  I exclusively hunt private land for turkeys but when I was leaving and driving down the county roads, I spotted 3 blinds on field edges on neighboring properties.  While I don't have to worry about people setting up 10 yards from me, the added pressure in an area certainly makes it harder.   Sometimes having multiple groups of duck hunters on a big marsh can be beneficial.  They'll send ducks your way and vice versa.  But setting up that close is ridiculous.  I can see more problems like this occurring the rest of this hunting season, especially for deer and especially on public land.  It could potentially be a recipe for disaster too if you have a couple of hot heads that lose their cool.  Adding firearms into the equation only magnifies the problem.   I hope a lot of these "newbies" and infrequent outdoors people that are only out there fishing, camping, and hunting this year because of the pandemic go back to their old lives when this is over.  The less people I encounter on the lakes, rivers, and in the fields and woods, the better.

Yup - the fall colors have peaked and will be gone very soon. My maple dropped all of its leaves since Sunday. The birch are still holding on but losing them slowly.   I hope to add a fishing report after this weekend. Nice work MarkB

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I purposely avoided duck opener because of possible crowds. The number of hunters in the field for Turkey A season was ridiculous. Literally 2,3, or 4 cars in WMA parking lots where i've rarely seen 1. So that was my indicator that some big change has occurred and to start planning accordingly. If I were a public land deer hunting i'd brace myself for a different experience than usual this year, especially if the weather is nice. I guess while aggravating to me in a selfish sort of way it is getting people outdoors. I just hope people like the ones Monstermoose encountered are few and far between. .

Not to change point of this topic but if you do not have a drill and are looking for that light weight set up take a look at the Strikemaster V24 New this year.  It comes with a Lite Flite auger and is coming in at 350 for 6 inch and 399 for 8 inch augers.  The weight savings compared to the V40 is amazing and if you look at holes/battery and the cost of the battery it's cheaper and more productive than the Milwaukee/DeWalt batteries.  I have a few friends that when they started looking at the cost of a good drill and a lite flite this option is same to cheaper option for them.  I've seen way too many drills fail in thick ice for trusting one 100% of my season.  Its not for everyone but for those that are looking it is a very nice option that is new this year for people.

I was at the parking lot at 5 am and walked in. 8 minutes to shooting time here comes the same wonderful guys from the year before with 5 more people. They walked with in 10 yards and I said are you close enough. His response was I can hunt where I want. All in blaze orange some with 22 rifles some with shotguns. They shot at ducks with the 22 and some low powered shotgun shells. I called the local CO. A friend of mine heard a call for back up from the local CO on the scanner as he was seizing guns, cars, decoys, and more. That made me smile. 

Great to have you post again Mark. It sounds like a fantastic trip back to Vermilion. Take care!

That sucks.  Been there done that, even before COVID.

I figured there would be too but didn’t allow for it in our arrival time at the lake.  Consecutive nights with only 3 hrs sleep had me moving slower than I would’ve normally been.  Plus we paddled.  Everyone else motored.  We were about 20-30 minutes behind the rush and literally watched the lake fill up with other hunters.   As we were paddling for our 3rd spot I told my buddy “Welcome to COVID hunting”.