Fishing & Boating in the Northwoods

Charging Your Boat Batteries

Boat Batteries

Charging boat batteries is much different from charging car batteries. This is especially true today. Importantly, marine batteries, no matter the type (flooded wet cell, gel, AGM, or even the newer Lithium-ion variety, respond to charging in different ways. Using the right battery charger in the proper way will help preserve the life of your […]

Freshwater Lake Algae – The Good & Bad

Free stock photo of beach, environment, lake

Not long ago, I read an article about algae that was adapted from a book called Lake Watch: A Guide to the Care of the Yahara Lakes, written by several distinguished authors from the University of Wisconsin. I thought I would share with you some of the information gleaned from that article. What is / […]

Rice Lake Ice Fishing

rice lake ice shanty

Many years ago, it became increasingly obvious that the traffic heading north out of Eau Claire was far too great to be handled by a two-lane highway; a four-lane version had to be built. And as is the case in many similar situations, small towns along “old” US 53 – soon almost forgotten – were […]

Equipment for Ice Fishing

clam ice shelter

Necessary Gear for Ice Fishing As I prepare for my ultimate and full entry into the world of ice fishing, I have decided that — although I’m sure many get by with less; obviously more is always possible. There are definitely several items of equipment that I consider to be essential. At the very least, […]

Lake Delavan Ice Fishing

lake delavan ice fishing

As I stated in my very first article on the topic: “Winter sports are surely not for the faint of heart. But if the hustle-bustle rat race and other stresses have got you feeling that you want to scream, my suggestion would be to head north for a little getaway.” Seems like it was time […]

Winter Fun on Lake Kabetogama

Ice fishing on Kabetogama

Winter is in retreat and the sun is starting to race to the north. We’ve passed perihelion – the earth’s closest approach to the sun – and the days are getting longer a few minutes at a time. Sounds like Spring is just around the corner… Well, it’s a little further away than that, but […]

Walleye Meuniere Recipe

Walleye Meuniere

It has always been amazing to me that the most excellent tasting dishes are often the simplest to prepare. The recipe here for walleye done meuniere style is one I learned a long time ago. If you’re not familiar with what Meuniere sauce is, it is a simple preparation of clarified butter and lemon and […]

Fillet Northern Pike & Remove the Y-Bones

R. Karl with huge northern pike

Perhaps you may have heard someone say: “I really do like northern pike, but it’s so full of bones!” I can relate… and I am not alone. I know many a fisherman who loves to fish for pike but throws them back, because he never learned how to remove those nasty y-bones. Warning: This article […]

Filleting Smallmouth Bass

Heidi and smallmouth bass

Whether you call them “smallies”, “bronze backs” or some other name, fresh-water small mouth bass are incredibly fun to catch; they are amazing fighters! (The smallmouth bass featured in the photo was caught on Lake Kabetogama with a crawdad colored Rapala Shad Rap fishing lure.) Warning: This article contains graphic images of fish filleting that […]

How to Fillet Bluegills & Other Panfish

R. Karl with large bluegill

I’m not really sure where the name pan-fish came from. My sense is that they were just small fish that were scaled, gutted and gilled and tossed into the fry pan. They go by myriad names – like bream, sunfish, blue bream, sun perch, blue sunfish, sunfish, sunperch, coppernose, copperbelly or bluegills – and are […]