North Platte WU
Newsletter Editors
on the Oct. 2004 newsletter is 8923
7 p.m., Thursday, Oct. 7,
Game & Fish Building
Look for your lucky winning number in the newsletter. Each newsletter will be numbered and a winning number will be posted on our web site. The lucky winner will receive fabulous prizes or guided fishing trips. If successful we will continue having a drawing each month. Stay tuned. At last months meeting it was motioned and passed to write a letter to the Wyoming Fish and Game requesting that they consider eliminating fishing tournaments at Glendo during the period of June 16 to July 2 each year to give the recreational fisherman two weekends of fishing without tournament pressure. This months meeting will have Billy Brenton and John Green demonstrating trolling techniques with crankbaits and planner boards. Front row seats still available.
As most of you are aware, our reservoirs contain many rock piles and humps that are extremely hazardous to the boater. These hazards should be marked somehow but are not.
Yesterday, I started taking GPS readings of some of the rock piles in Pathfinder. I would ask that other folks do the same as they encounter them. Some time later, we can compile these locations and publish them for our club members.
Most of us have fishfinders that will allow us to plug in coordinates and save them as way points or event markers. These will identify the locations and warn us of the hazard(s) when we are running the plotter as we are cruising down a given lake. One problem we have is the constantly changing water levels. Therefore, I suggest we lump the hazards into two categories ("high water levels" and "low water levels"). In this way, we wouldn't have to avoid hazards that are only present during low water level periods.
It doesn't matter what format you take the locations in because I have access to a program that will convert Lat/Long degrees, minutes, seconds into Lat/Long degrees, minutes, decimal seconds or UTM, etc. When we publish the locations, we will do so in all formats that your GPS may be set to. So please, take just a few minutes to stop fishing and mark these hazards.
Note: I wish to emphasize, that we need to mark the locations of the many (lower-unit removers) at Seminoe. I believe we can get locations on Pathfinder, Alcova, Glendo, Boysen, Grey Rocks, and Keyhole relatively easy, and without much effort. -- Bruce Parker
It was reported here last month that Bruce Brugger boated and released an 11.4 lb walleye at Alcova. It appears that was incorrect as the truth of the matter was Bruce was merely a spectator in the boat. The better fisherman that day was Marty Hall who caught the piggie.
If fishing Glendo or Boysen this month you might try vertical jigging with Hopkins, Kastmaster, Krocodile, or similar spoons. Try 3/8-oz. lures in the shallow (25ft?) or 3/4oz lures in the deeper (40ft?) waters. Silver would be a good color to start with and perch color may be productive. Try Boysen near the dam. Boysen is near full pool and should have good fishing over the next several weeks.
Boysen walleyes usually start relating back to structure in the fall. Jig twister tails in your normal hot spots especially along the cobble shores on the east side. Slowly drag a lindy rig with minnow or jig with a minnow in 25 to 45 feet of water on flats and gradual slopes in the Freemont Bay, Muddy Creek Bay and the Sand Messa Cannal areas for sauger.
Sometimes hooking a minnow upside down with dramatically increase its activity as it tries to right itself.
Goldeneye: Wyoming Game & Fish sampled Goldeneye 2 weeks ago and the results will be published early next year. The biggest walleye netted was a tick shy of 16". They did mention they stocked 28,000 walleye again this year. Also was mentioned that summer time anglers have met with some success. Might be worth a try although they are very fat and may not be very hungry.
Ever have one of those fishing days when the fish were hard to find? And if you did find them, you couldn't get them to bite on anything in the boat. Well those days may soon be over my friend, with the new fishing system developed by Biosonix systems (www.biosonix.com). For mere pounds of pennies a day you can have the fish coming to you while you sit in the shade and sip on a mint julep. After a nice rest you then simple lower a line over the side and the fish may very well fight each other to see who gets caught first.
The basic concept is simplicity itself. It is a fish calling system using the sounds of recorded baitfish in all their various activities.. You start with the real sounds of a school of shad baitfish as they awake at the beginning of the day. After a short amount of time, you then switch to the sounds of this same school during their normal working day all the while slowly increasing the volume. Later switch to the more intense sounds of the shad during what might be imagined to be their happy hour at an progressively louder volume. There are six sounds available with the last two called "Distressed Bait" and "Shiner Feed". There are 20 volume settings. You can go through all six stages in an hour or so. Crawdad sounds are also available. If the predator fish are within hearing distance, and sound carries a great distance underwater, they will start to move towards your location. As fish sounds are made more active and the volume increased the fish swim faster to you as to not lose out on a free lunch. When the Biosonix box is kicked into high gear, with the sounds of baitfish being munched by predators being broadcast at high decibels, we can only assume what goes through predator's mind who is racing towards these sounds as he is licking his lips.
During an extensive testing process, that included hundreds of tests, it is said that catches increased in 96% of the samples using the sound system. Many more sounds may be available to download on the internet in the future. All this for only $1195.
It is my personal opinion that a couple simple mods may make the units even more effective. I wonder what would happen if a person were to drop a half dozen 12 inch woofers down to 20 ft, hooked them to four 500w amps and at the last min, cranked it up to 30 with some rap music or similar mind bending sounds. I think they may float to the surface for an easy selection. Your mileage may vary.
1 John Marohn and Mitch Horning with a total point score of 568
2 Charles Black and Dave Evenden with a total point score of 562
3 John Bennet and Ted Cadman with a total point score of 559
For complete results go to http://www.walleyecentral.com/wwc.shtml
Food Source Lures (http://www.fslures.com/), has given us another option to consider. They have recently introduced a line of softbait lures that are made out of materials that are FDA approved as edible. All lures are 100% protein, biodegradable and non polluting There is no plastic in these lures and the line includes curlytail grubs, soft stick baits, finesse-style worms, catfish plugs, and others.. So if the fish don't like them, make a sandwich. Recipes to follow.
The Billings Gazette reported this month (http://www.walleyesunlimited.com/news/news.html#1) that the Montana State fish hatchery has had a great deal of success producing a variety of sterile walleyes. Sterile walleyes could be introduced into waters where strict control of the fish population is desired. It could have many uses in Wyoming waters, perhaps Alcova and Pathfinder, and others.. Lets hope Wyoming Game and Fish follows the story closely.
Tight Lines -- Woody and Bruce