I have an open seat for fishing pool 4 Thursday!

[fisherizzo47]

Hey guys, I have never fished pool 4, but me and a buddy are gonna try fishing the river tomorrow, dark to dark probably. I have my boat ready to go. The weather is looking nice, not much wind. We were kinda looking for someone with pool 4 experience to show us the ropes. We are strictly catch and release fisherman unless it is a monster for the wall, but we have no problem if u wanna keep and eat the river fish. Let me know if you are interested. Thanks, Chris

[Archerysniper]

I won't be able to go but bring some heavy jigs for deep water and current like 3\4 oz. I had my best luck with a small gamagachi orange hook about 20 inches of 6# line swivel and a 1 oz egg sinker

[expl]

You really shouldnt need 3/4 ounce.I have been getting by with 1/4 ounce jigs and at times going with a 3/8 tip with a fathead or some sort of plastic.And please if you fish deeper then 25 feet keep what you catch.no matter the size as long as its legal of course.these fish will die if you throw them back no matter how slow you reel them up from the depths.My best fishing last week was 17-19 feet with a chartruse jig and a fathead,Things may have changed since last Friday was the last time I was there the current may have picked up but no reason a 3/8ounce shouldnt be sufficient,another tip- drag your jigs upstream against the current with your Minn-Kota.Good luck have fun and stay safe i heard there were some ice bergs floating.i was gonna go tomorrow also but was awake all nite plowing snow last nite and im still tired and i slept most of the day.

[mcnasty]

I won't be able to go but bring some heavy jigs for deep water and current like 3\4 oz. I had my best luck with a small gamagachi orange hook about 20 inches of 6# line swivel and a 1 oz egg sinker

your an one-who-thinks-I-am-silly if you fish over 20 ' of water.now I know one person that fish's in the scour hole

[expl]

Scour hole fishing should be banned or keep what you catch no matter the size.ive seen a decent fish now and then but the majority are dinks.Im betting if guys were forced to keep what they catch out of it theyd fish other spots as who wants 12 inch dink saugers,they dont make a big meal.

[Wanderer]

Yeah, last weekend was my first time fishing it and probably the last. We talked to another old river rat down there and he was commenting about the sauger numbers having a noticeable decline over the past few years. Seems he's not the only one who's noticed it.

Gotta think that hole is the nursery of the local population since most of the fish pulled up were saugers. It's THE wintering hole for sure. Fish in a barrel.

You can call me names for fishing it but it didn't take long to figure out the score.

[fisherizzo47]

Just got back from pool 4, it was very slow for us. Fished dark til dark. 4 walleyes (1 26 inch and 3 17-19) and one small sturgeon (15 pounds), all fish were released. Fished came anywhere from 10 to 25 feet of water. So yeah, we fished hard all day. Everywhere from red wing to the dam. Not impressed but I will give it another go when the water warms up a little.

[RumRiverRat]

The water temps are perfect. Best fishing of the year is going on now.

Scour hole fishing is perfectly legal.

Calling someone names because they fish the scour hole is silly.

[outdoors247]

Quote:

Scour hole fishing is perfectly legal.

Legal yes, ethical no. If you keep everything you catch then there isn't a problem. It's the guys that sit there for hours and you can physically see the line of dead Saugers floating downstream. They keep about one out of twenty fish while the other 19 die. When I was down there last weekend there was fish floating everywhere. Sometimes you have to look past the laws and determine what's best for the fishery. Like others have mentioned above, the Sauger population has been trending downward. Most of the fish in "the hole" are Saugers so you do the math. I guess each person has to make there own decisions but you will not catch me fishing "the hole" as there is a lot of water between the dam and the head of the lake that also holds walleye. You just have to get out there and find them.

[fisherizzo47]

How deep is the scour hole? I don't have any interest in catching and killing a bunch of fish. No offense to anyone , but I don't keep anything out of he mississippi. I am from northern Minnesota and travel back there several times a year to get fish to eat. Personally, i wish the mississippi was all catch and release or restricted to 2 fish per person with one over 28 inches. I've been to lakes around the metro and see people keeping limits of 7 inch crappies. There will never be great fishing around the metro because of this. It's fine that they are keeping them, because that is all there is to eat around here! It is sad that we will need more rules and regulations put in place to protect the fish in this state. I know it's a pan fish but if u take cedar lake in new Prague for example, that lake is plum full of houses all year and yet u can easily catch limits of 7 to 8 inch crappies every time out. If u put a 10 in size limit on those fish, the fishing would be great there in a couple years. The water is shallow, so there would be a very low mortality rate when releasing the smaller fish. I am just sick of the dnr messing stuff up. There are simple rules they could but in play, to make thing better now and in the future. Sorry, going off topic. All right back to the river. So someone said the river temperatures are the best for fishing right now. So are most of the fish from pepin heading up the river now? I would graph fish then use an underwater camera and the largest school of walleye was probably around 15 fish. We caught 3 of the 4 walleyes out of the school of fish. We did see one walleye that had to be over 12 pounds east of the bridge in redwing. We threw everything at her, but she didn't move at all.

[expl]

X2!!

[expl]

The scour hole is 60-70 ft deep I think,Ive never really been in it just near it as I wont fish in it.Being able towalk boat to boat and catch dink sauger inst my idea of fishing.As for the fish moving up river from Pepin,yes they leave Pepin and stage in areas to spawn,not every fish in the system heads to the dam to spawn,theres alot of water in between for them.The walleyes have been a bit tite lipped lately especially during the daytime hours but you can still get them,for every ten fish I mark I catch one maybe two,everything has to be just rite with your presentation and you pretty much have to invoke a reaction strike.Once the water warms a bit and gets a bit more dirty the daytime bite should pick up.Rite now is the time for the big girls after dark tho,biggest for me so far is that 24" but I had a bigger one boatside just couldnt quite get her in the net,I usually fish alone so a netman would have been helped there.Dont get to frustrated the river can be tough its allways changing.

[Gordie]

Rite now is the time for the big girls after dark tho,biggest for me so far is that 24" but I had a bigger one boatside just couldnt quite get her in the net,I usually fish alone so a netman would have been helped there.Dont get to frustrated the river can be tough its allways changing.

I beg to differ when the water warms up a bit more is the time for the big girls.

[brian6715]

Scour hole fishing is perfectly legal.

Calling someone names because they fish the scour hole is silly.

So you are okay with the idea that everything you catch dies? You can have 100+ fish days no problem, that would basically be like saying the limit should be raised to 100.

Fishing the scour hole is stupid and wrong, and it shows that you really don't know what you are doing, because there are way better spots.

[brian6715]

I beg to differ when the water warms up a bit more is the time for the big girls.

+1, May and June are the months to crush the big pigs!

[expl]

Do you get the big girls in the scour hole??lol.Ive caught plenty of big ones from now thru the end of April but usually thats about as long as I fish Pool4,as I move on to other waters after that.Ive allready seen numerous big fish caught and released.

[Savage Brewer]

Sorry, I am new to the big river, and dont know exactly what the "scour hole" is.

Is it a spot in the river below a dam where the water digs a hole?

[expl]

Yes it is