Looking in the Upper Red Lake Rear View Mirror

[kelly-p]

Quote:

3 plow rigs were hooked to the pick up which I believe was Buddy's brothers truck. After some time, Kelly walked towards us and waved me over.

Buddy getting lost in a white is how this one happened. Wearing a suitcoat, no phone, in BJ's truck just going to drag the road quick before he goes to whatever function he was supposed to go to.

With this I gotta get going. The last group of the day is due in 30 minutes.

[cookie129]

10 years ago I had a house made of spray foam. I had moved the house to the lurayne beach cribs. My buddie wayne was up with skip. The first night we got totaly skunked. Wayne had dropped a few of his dads ashes as he does on evry lake he fishes. We were headed out to move the house and wayne was like hey lets just fish it where its at. It wasnt long and I landed the first crappie,Skippy and I caught a couple and wayne could not buy a bite even though the house was only 5 by 8. I then got a large walleye in the mid 20s. I told wayne to take my spot as I wanted to go see how wild bill amd others were doing. When I came back wayne said it was magical as he and Skip had there 30 and were still catching them for fun. This was 2 am. We were standing outside of the shack when we could see this vehicle flying towards lu rayne beach. I commented to wayne and skip that guy is going to hit the pressure ridge. All of a sudden his headlights were in the air as he launched or crashed through the pressure ridge, We got back to the cabin and there was no sign of my guest Chris. Turns out the yaahoo we were laughing at was Chris. When he finally pulled into my driveway his dads trailor looked like it was in a war zone missing parts of the rails,tailgate and almost all his gear was gone. Wayne and I followed his path of destuction gathering auger,propane bottle, heater, rods, fish, parts of his fish house while Chris worked on his dads trailor all day with a massive hangover. Our friend Ole was impressed with how hard chris worked on that trailor that day and they got to talking and now chris goes up to alaska every summer to fish and visit with ole. When we were pointing and laughing I had no idea it was chris .

[hugonian1]

A lot of great stuff here guys.

The old adage, "if it don't kill you it will make you stronger", sure looks like it rings true on Red.

I gotta think if the Labshack could post we would really hear some stories. That house sure sounds like it was the entertainment center during the boom.

Seeing some of these pics really is great also.

[Scupper]

Scupper, those pics bring back memories. How come we could fish outside in minus s temps but now are concerned about staying warm??

Shaky, it's funny how a guy get's to be a certain age and comfort and warmth become priority's...

[Scupper]

That's the one Kelly. Seeing the picture makes it feel like it was yesterday.

Thanks for digging it out and sharing.

[Eric Wettschreck]

2003, my 2 sons first trip to URL. We rented a shack from Kelly.

Things were a bit so I went outside to drill some holes and look around. An hour later I came back into the shack and the 2 boys are just sitting there playing cards, rods sitting on the bunks. I asked, "What the heck, why arn't yous guys fishing?" Real monotone, my oldest son says, "Limit."

Yup, I went outside for aboot an hour and in that time they caught the crappie limit from inside the shack.

Then there was the weekend in a cabin with Surface Tension, Deitz, Paul Waldowski, and Harvey Lee. Drunken auger overhaul was...........interesting.

Couple years later, in another shack me and some fellas rented from Kelly, Jon comes rolling up making the ice crack. I've never seen my buddy Bob run so fast in his life.

Couple years ago, in another shack rented from Kelly and Jon, my wife caught a 42 inch pike while I was outside getting rid of some beer.

Weekends full of 3.2 PBR, 10 pounds of bacon, and plenty of fish. Too many memories of URL to post. It would take up all of HSO's bandwith.

[Random guy]

As so often stated on the ice "You just can't make this stuff up".

[shaky legs2]

Yeah, I started with bunny boots, army field jacket, and flight pants, graduated to gore-tex bibs and jacket that faded to a duct tape jacket from too many muffler burns from the ice auger and now a Frabill ice suit with Sorrel boots. Started with jiggle sticks and a cork with no Vexilar and now have a auto-zoom Vex, Marcum camera, with fancy reel-up poles and the latest lures, but I never caught so many crappies or had so much fun in my life when I looked like a homeless person with hand me down equipment from Doc fishing in portables or outside on the ice. It was pretty simple back then.

[bturck]

You certainly have come a long way shaky. I still have some ice sticks with the spike in the bottom, and two little dowels to wrap the line on. Our depth finder was a heavy cord string taped off at six foot intervals......those were the days on Mille lacs in the 50-60's. had a house those no bunks, slept in lawn chairs, leaning against the wall. Sure we're fun days though, if it hadn't been for my dad I probably never would have gotten into fishing or hunting. He always had time to take us along.....sorry nothing to do with Red, just brought back memories

[shaky legs2]

You will see one of those sticks when you stop in next week. That's Doc :s deadstick.

[bturck]

If he ever loses it down the hole I can probably cut him a good deal on a replacement. Can't find these at Gander or Mills....

[shaky legs2]

This could be the start of another thread - "Most worthless fishing investment", but I will post it here. Toward the end of the crappie boom, I'm thinking it was around 2006 or 07, everyone was looking for an edge to find the rapidly dwindling schools of the elusive but still catchable crappie. Enter "Structure on a String". For those of you that don't remember what that was/is, it was some fake plastic weeds on a string with a float on top and a weight on the bottom of the string. People were now looking for an edge, i.e. rough ice, transition areas, migration routes, etc., so Doc and I (maybe mostly me ) decided to purchase a bunch of these. We go out on the Hillman Road and find a spot that looks fishy and proceed to punch a bunch of holes and put down our SOS in a V-pattern that leads to our holes, hoping to funnel them to the house. The next morning it's time to go home and it's minus 30 degrees outside. You guessed it - they are all frozen in. We get the chisel but in the process of trying to get them out, some of them are cut off by the chisel right before the float and we had to leave them. If any washed up on LouRayne beach during the annual cleanup, I apologize. Oh, by the way, we didn't catch any crappies that trip. So if anyone wants to buy some, I have a couple of boxes of SOS that you can have at bargain basement prices.

[bturck]

Garage sale time shaky

[hugonian1]

I could write that same post up Shaky.

The only difference for me is I was able to get mine out.

At least you don't have to deal with all of yours anymore.

Everytime I look under the bunk in my house I see a good $100.00 bill laying there.

Us ice fisher peolpe are sure gulible.

[Random guy]

Beach cleanup every year is the same four things in massive quantities.

1) 1 lb propane cylinders

2) Toilet bags

3) Structure on a string

4) Fishouse blocking

During the boom we filled a pick-up truck with just 1 lb. propane cylinders. I also have an entire garage wall of structure on a string I have untangled out of the minnow traps and down rigger cables. I use it to make bear hunting blinds.

[hugonian1]

Well I am glad to hear they are good for somthing.

[shaky legs2]

Oh, I still have most of them

[kelly-p]

Structure on a String also works great if you hook up with a big northern. The northern makes a circle and wraps all of it up with the fishing line. It really slows the northern down but makes it impossible to get the snarled up ball of structure up the hole.

[Scupper]

This could be the start of another thread - "Most worthless fishing investment", but I will post it here. Toward the end of the crappie boom, I'm thinking it was around 2006 or 07, everyone was looking for an edge to find the rapidly dwindling schools of the elusive but still catchable crappie. Enter "Structure on a String". So if anyone wants to buy some, I have a couple of boxes of SOS that you can have at bargain basement prices.

This reminds me---that I have a couple set's of these also, long forgotten in storage somewhere. My kids gave them to me, I think.

Anyhow, we cut maybe 6 or 10 holes next to each other and dropped them down. I remember a big blue float and the black line. After a few hours of hole hopping with little success, the kids decided to set up there portables next to the SOS as they (SOS) had soaked for some time and surely a school of crappies had found them and taken up residence. I walked over to the ice camp and busted the iced up frozen floats. I was jig-gin outside and every so often I would walk around there shacks and step in the SOS holes to loosen them up.

Just after sunset, we got a visit from a warden. Everything was in order. All we had caught was small perch, which were returned to the lake. As the warden bid us good luck and walked away, while shinning his flash light around the backside of the shacks, he noticed the somewhat snowed over frozen in blue floats.

"Sir!,,, are these, ah,,,do these belong to your group?" I replied yes, and tried to explain. He stopped my hurried explanation and suggested that we had a problem of to many lines. I went over and broke the ice free and hoisted one of them up so as to explain what they were. He wasn't buying it. We had to pull everyone of them and upon his curious inspection, he was still perplexed over the legality of what he was seeing.

After some head scratching and many questions from him, and my explanation that it was the latest and greatest at attracting fish, he asked again for my license information. He wrote it down and said that I might be hearing from him as to this matter. Needless to say, I never heard anything...

Whens that sale Shaky Legs2? If I can locate those fake weeds, we could do a package deal for someone.

[shaky legs2]

I'm thinking that this had to be one of the best inventions designed to catch fishermen

I would put it in the class of the Vibra-tail minnow, and the Popile Pocket Fisherman.

[bturck]

Popile pocket fisherman.....!!!!!! Oh no don't tell me they don't work, I just bought 3 of em from a guy going door to door. He said they were the hottest dead stick on the market....geez maybe if i hurry he might still be in the neighborhood. He even threw in a set of steak knives and a 12 " fillet knife.

[Whopper Stopper]

Structure on a String, good times good times. Yep I have some fond memories of one of the greatest fisher people grabbers of all times. The only thing better than owning 24 feet of these fish catching marvels, was being the proud owner of 48 feet. Shortly after it hit the market my father in law and myself acquired SOS and wasted no time heading to the lake to cut some holes. The day we sunk our new guaranteed automatic fish fry, it was -5 with a good stiff north wind. At the time we were just so excited about hitting the ice that all we grabbed was our poles and a couple of buckets. We would be far too busy to monkey with a portable

We cut a few holes and soon had our brand new weapon sunk and attracting fish. Well, one thing led to another and we soon figured out somebody forgot to tell us something. As far as we could tell other than snagging it, nothing was happening. Eventually the weather got so nasty we decided to call it a day. We pulled the stuff up the best we could and basically stuffed a couple big balls into the buckets and headed for home. We dumped them by the side of the house and went in to thaw by the wood stove. The night turned into a blizzard and travel was none existent. We spent the night toasting the Gods and planning our next adventure.

The next morning the storm had broke , and the temperature dropped. We were snowed in tight so the first order of business was blowing the driveway and small yard out. I took a turn on the old walk behind and when I got cold the father in law took over. I remember sitting at the front table drinking some hot coffee when all of a sudden all _ _ _ _ broke loose. Yep, as he was blowing the walk just a little bit wider he hit the drifted over, mostly frozen, SOS. The blower came to a halfhearted screeching halt. The shear pin eventually broke, but the SOS was jammed in the blower tighter than a oversized cork in a bottle of cheap wine.

We hauled the blower into the kitchen and for two hours dug away like a couple of crazed surgeons. The auger was bound up and it was a mess. It didn’t take long and we over looked the new purchase and just started whacking away.

We never did use the SOS again. Eventually it found its way to a landfill. But the one thing that came of it is any time the hooch starts flowing and the reminiscing begins. The talk always comes back to…………………Remember the SOS ?

WS

[shaky legs2]

LOL! It reminds me of the time one of my friends was blowing a path to his backyard deck and snagged the extension cord that was hooked to the XMas lights on a tree. He said it looked likr a bunch of shooting stars falling out of the sky.

[hugonian1]

A couple of topics that have not been touched on but am curios about.

What is the origin and history of the IBOT's?

Also, I remember much being posted years ago about the "triangle". What was that all about?

[shaky legs2]

We'll let Ken handle that one since he started it all.

[SrBrits]

A couple of topics that have not been touched on but am curios about.

What is the origin and history of the IBOT's?

Also, I remember much being posted years ago about the "triangle". What was that all about?

i was wondering the same thing, IBOTS, triangle, brotherhood, and of course, what about the ring leader of the ibots, JIGGLESTICK, my god, if jiggle starts tapping out stories about the ibots and all thier fun, this thread will go well over 100 pages. labs kick started this group, but he had some great pals to keep the fun going. heck, i think i remember that the ibots answered Kelly-P's challenge on the crappie cribs, and collected enough money from the group to sponsor 8 or 9 cribs for URL, oh what fun.

[Scott M]

Beach cleanup every year is the same four things in massive quantities.

1) 1 lb propane cylinders

2) Toilet bags

3) Structure on a string

4) Fishouse blocking

During the boom we filled a pick-up truck with just 1 lb. propane cylinders. I also have an entire garage wall of structure on a string I have untangled out of the minnow traps and down rigger cables. I use it to make bear hunting blinds.

Oh man, SOS, that makes me smile.

[Stan7600]

A look in the rearview mirror has to include the picture in your mind of Kelly & Patsy fishing out of the truck looking for the next days' hotspot. They sure were mobile at primetime! Stan C.

[LABS4ME]

The Shooks Shake... Need to shake both coming and going to insure good luck...

Levitating augers... The triangle

Buddy ruining a nice BBQ for a group when he moved a house...

Sohawk driving across the lake with his pickup on fire...

[SrBrits]

toasting the crappie gods, heading in to the temple for meetings, lead suits, what about the dreaded ten count for the new wanna be ibots,and all the clamping that went on, and not just on the septum. people were coming from many states just to clamp and join the fun, the fishing was just a bonus.