Target Walleye/Ice email

Best fishing engagement ever, Ice fishing pet peeves, Gravel lizards of the week

Today’s Top 5

Best fishin’ marriage proposal ever?!

Was sent this story from a buddy and just had to share with you fish-heads. Fishing guide Matt Ruston landed his best catch yet, and did so in style. Check THIS out:

> Matt Ruston: Aug 18 started out as a typical perfect sunny day on Rainy Lake, with plans to head out fishing with my girlfriend Danielle. Little did she know I had much bigger plans.

> We arrived to our fishing spot where I began using my bow mount Minn Kota along with my HELIX 7 MEGA DI to “search for a crib” — that’s what I told her anyways. We zigged and zagged…circled along the shoreline and yet I still couldn’t find the fish.

> Danielle has asked “why are we going in circles?” She stated “there’s no fish here, let’s try another spot” just as I finished my ‘search pattern’. I asked Danielle to run the trolling motor for a moment because I had to grab a different lure. Asked her to keep the boat as straight as possible to which she said, “How? The wind is already pushing us straight!”

> “Look at the GPS it will show if you’re going straight” I explained to her.

> As she looked down at the HELIX 7 now showing a message on the screen written in the lake where we had just zigged and zagged, and circled through…

 

Not even sure I could write that in cursive on paper, let alone in a GPS track — dude’s got some serious boat control skills.

> …she turned around to see me on one knee shaking like a leaf and a Rapala X-Rap with a diamond ring around it.

 

Those size 6 VMC (split-)rings are shinier than I remember…. Lol.

> As tears welled up in her eyes she said the one word I have waited so long to hear: “YES!”

 

BIG congrats to both!!!

How NFL quarterbacks train in the off-season.

This Lake Sakakawea walleye eventually landed all the way over on Carson Wentz’s (Philadelphia Eagles QB) dinner table:

 

Case you didn’t know, Carson and his bro Zach are a couple of NDSU alumni and avid outdoorsmen. They’ve got an Instagram page called @wentzbrosoutdoors where they post a bunch of high-quality snaps and stories.

Pretty cool stuff. Hope he has a solid season…but starts out with a super average opener since he’s on the team I’m playing against in fantasy football this week lol.

Paunchy gravel lizards of the week!

1) How sick is this 33″ blue-finned [!] rock melon caught on Quebec’s east coast? Pétrice (@quebecoutdoors) said it was caught trolling a LiveTarget Rainbow Smelt 25′ down over 50-100′ where bigguns were feeding on ciscos — wowza:

 

2) No doubt David Grosulak (@dgrosulak) puts his time in on the water, and was rewarded with this dirty-30 outta Green Bay on a Moonshine Shiver Minnow. Awesome fish and a fun way to catch ’em:

 

3) SK fishing guide @emmm72 put 60 walleyes over 25″ in her boat this season, including this purtty 29.5″ gravel lizard. #Dialed

4) My man Alex “only posts pics of slaunches” Paterson has been gettin’ after the Alexandria, MN bigs! One on the left came on a [secret deep-water artificial technique he won’t let me talk about yet lol] and on the right dragging a 6″ redtail chubster:

When Alex ^ says he’s on ’em…he’s on ’em:

Gives me a couple good ideas for his next birthday…. Some screen cleaner for his Humminbird HELIX units and one of those “On ‘Em” hats I always see BASS pro Seth Feider rocking in pics with big ol’ grass pandas:

Top 30 ice-fishing pet peeves!

Ready or not, the iceman cometh! We’re gonna start sprinkling more and more ice nuggets in these here emails. Let’s go:

We polled Target Walleye/Ice fans to find out their biggest ice-fishing pet peeves and compiled ’em into one big-nasty list. How many are you doing??

 

Check the full list by clicking here, few of our favorites below:

  • Garbage left on the ice. If you bring it out, bring it back with you!
  • Losing a fish after it gets wrapped up in the transducer.
  • Snowmobiles are the jet skis of ice fishing.
  • Sunflower seeds in my hole.
  • When people set up right on top of you, even though there’s a whole lake.
  • People complaining about you being set up too close (^ lol).
  • Snake northerns. ‘Nuff said.
  • Trying to re-tie with frozen fingers.
  • People drilling holes during prime time.
  • Women hanging all over me once they find out I’m an ice fisherman….

Make sure you leave a comment on the full list here at TargetWalleye.com if you think something’s missing or people are overreacting….

Once in a lifetime catch!

Ken Marklein managed to catch this tank by its freakin’ DNR tracking tag [!] while pre-fishing for the AIM Marinette event. Madness:

Woulda picked up a lottery ticket (or 4) If I were him.

News

1. Tommy Skarlis gets Hall of Fame induction.

> Tommy will officially be inducted at the Northern IL Sports Show on Jan 18 at the Lake County Fairgrounds in Grayslake, IL.

Congrats brotha! So well-deserved!!

2. WI: Records shattered at Green Bay AIM event.

Walleye nuts Jake Becker and Chris Rice absolutely walloped the Green Bay BIGS using Moonshine Shiver Minnows in shallow water. Their 2-day total (10 fish) went a thiiiick 112.73 lbs…that’s an 11.273-lb average!

Full scoop on how they caught ’em here — congrats fellas!

3. ‘Marathon Man’ sets new world record…

…for most fish caught in 24 hours = 2,172 fish! That’s an average of more than 1.5 fish per minute:

Whole thing went down live on his Facebook, including the moment he broke the previous record and got ice-bathed lol:

4. Yo high school ice-heads!

The crew at Otter Outdoors just launched their new Varsity Pro Staff program for high school students:

> “…incredible opportunity to learn inside information about the ice fishing industry via a social media platform where you can connect with other Varsity Pro Staff as well as be mentored by our very own Professional Pro Staff Team.”

Gotta submit your application by Oct 1.

5. ND: NWT championship at Devils Lake Sep 11-13.

Some cool insight in this write-up talking with NWT veteran Gary Parsons and rookie Dylan Nussbaum. Makes me wanna get back over to Devils nowwwww.

Can catch ’em so many different ways — looking forward to seeing how the champ gets crowned. Guys will be doing their best Michael Jackson impressions at the landing during prefish:

6. Clam buys All-Terrain Tackle.

#makingmoves

7. Joel Nelson’s Lund is for sale.Crazy decked-out 2019 Lund 1975 Pro-V w/ Merc 225 V6. Waaaay too many features and add-ons to list, so can check ’em all in his original post — bunch of pics there too.

I’ve had the chance to fish in it and beside it — dude keeps it spotless. Heck, even NFT’s Sam Larsen can catch ’em in it (lol):

Of course it’s not cheap — thing’s top of the line! — but Joel has it listed for about $15K LESS than what it would otherwise cost ya.

8. New 4.5 Salmo Rattlin’ Hornet colors.

Just dropped 4 new clear patterns on their website:

9. Brunswick groups all tin brands together.

Callin’ it the Aluminum Boat Group. Feel free to click the link above, but it’s pretty much just corporate lingo.

10. Strike King has walleye jigs coming.

Tommy “gunnnnzz” Kemos walks you through each in this vid — including a football-head jig which is way more common in the bassin’ world:

11. China trade war hitting the fishing biz?

Jeff Moore of WC Bradley, the folks who own Zebco Holdings said:

> “We believe the imposition of tariffs puts recreational fishing at risk of being taxed into a sport for only the wealthy.”

That’s Jeff talking at a hearing on the Trump Administration’s China tariff deal. Heard the tariffs on fishing stuff will be 10%? Any guess who will be paying for that….

Tip of the Day

Use noisier bottom-bouncers to call fish in.

Ever considered the sound your bottom-bouncer makes? For sure an overlooked characteristic that could help you catch a few more/bigger ‘eyes than your fishin’ buddy…which of course is most important lol! Brad Hawthorne says they can help call aggressive fish in from a distance:

That Northland Slick-Stick is the deal when it can be bumped off structure and fish are on the chew. Watched B-Rad put on a clinic using it paired with a Butterfly Blade Harness when we were fishing outta the NW Angle on Lake of the Woods. #ClickClickBOOM

Meme of the Day

Take advantage of that time on the water this weekend:

Today’s ‘Eye Candy

Christopher Meitzner of Tight-Lines Guide Service had a rough start to his morning (vehicle probs, etc) but made the best of it. Dude always seems to think/act/talk positive no matter the circumstances. Tough to do for anyone so thank YOU man:

Sign up another fish-head!

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Who is Target Walleye
Target Walleye — walleye during open water and all species during hardwater — is brought to you by Al and Ron Lindner, Jim Kalkofen, Brett McComas and other diehard fish-nuts like you! #fishheads
Brett McComas is the main man for Target Walleye He was discovered in Brainerd, MN after years of wondering how in the heck people break into the fishing biz. He’s in it now, but still can’t answer that question…. Brett is one of those guys who majored in marketing, only because there was no such thing as a “fishing degree” at the time…. Get him at brett@targetwalleye.com
To send us walleye pics, ice shots or whatever, just respond to this email or click here to email us. Or post it on the Target Walleye Facebook page.

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