Toxic

It sounds like this is going to be another great year.

Good read!

I also have vinyl on mine. I found a dealer on eBay.

I grew up on the water. My parents would go camping at Pymatuning Lake in Pa all summer. My Dad would drive over 60 miles everyday back and forth to work. After work and weekends we would spend every minute on the water. We had a 32' pontoon docked all summer. And many fish, mostly walleye were taken from that boat. Now I look forward to taking my little 2.5yr old man out on my boat.

Here is the article so you do not have to register....... Entrepreneur finds profits in waste rock at abandoned mine LEE BLOOMQUIST, Duluth News Tribune Worthington Daily Globe - 01/07/2008 HOYT LAKES, Minn. (AP) - When others saw piles of waste rock at the former LTV Steel Mining Co. property, Brad Gerlach saw opportunity. "My brother (Bruce) was closing the mine and said, 'Why don't you come out here and take a look around?'" said Gerlach. "On the day I went out there, it was raining and I saw all the different colors of the stone. I said, 'What are you going to be doing with all that beautiful stone?' He said, 'Do you mean that waste rock?' I said, 'No, I mean that beautiful stone.'" Five years later, Gerlach is selling thousands of tons of the colorful stone to owners of multimillion-dollar homes, contractors, landscapers, masonry companies, real estate developers, architectural firms, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers and the public. The Precambrian stone — an estimated 1.8 billion years old — is a naturally produced product that's being hand-picked in an environmentally friendly harvesting process. LTV Steel Mining Co. operated from 1951 to 2001, producing about 323 million tons of iron ore pellets. As miners blasted and dug for iron ore, the stone covering the iron ore was moved to stockpiles or used in the creation of berms. Included in the stockpiles and berms are tons of slate, diopside, jasper, banded taconite, marble, greenolite, flagstone and stromatolites. Stacked in the stockpiles and berms, the stone is hand-picked and loaded onto trucks for interior and exterior home veneers, walls, steppingstones, ponds, foundation rock, and for countertops, tables, and tiles. "We like it because it is essentially a green product," said Brady Halverson, a landscape architect at Short Elliott Hendrickson, Inc. a Minneapolis architectural planning, engineering, and natural sciences firm. "It's a byproduct of a process that's already taken place in the mining of iron ore. And it's available in a variety of forms from aggregate size into slabs. You can use small stones next to large veneer and get it to look the same." A 17-foot-long, 8-foot-wide, and 12-to-14-inch thick piece is being used as a bridge at a new Bell Museum of Natural History building proposed in St. Paul. Stone from the site was used to build the Paul Wellstone Memorial near Eveleth, at Normandale Community College, the Dr. (E.W.) Davis taconite museum at the University of Minnesota, Minneapolis Library, and in tabletops at the Guthrie Theater. Next year, Short Elliot Hendrickson will use the stone as veneer on a concrete bridge to be built over a river near downtown Tower. "It is what it is," said Gerlach, 59, a retired food industry worker. "We don't do any blasting and we don't have to cut. We're like a chef's salad that nobody's ever seen. We have the most beautiful stone in the world." In addition to the stone being reused, the site itself is being recycled. Along with natural stone production, the world's first commercial iron nugget plant is under construction. PolyMet Mining Corp. of Vancouver, B.C., plans to use portions of the former LTV concentrator to process copper, nickel and precious metals from a proposed mine to the east. "This has to be the busiest closed mine there is," Gerlach said. The entire LTV site, now called Cliffs-Erie, contains an estimated 12.9 billion tons of stone, Gerlach said. Joel Evers of Hoyt Lakes, a geologist and former LTV section manager of mining, said the stone is in huge demand by contractors and landscapers as a natural product. "A lot of the stone used in landscaping is kind of bland, but this stone has blacks and greens and reds and has a lot of different patterns, shapes, and textures," Evers said. "Its colors, textures and patterns are what make it so unique, The landscaping market has been begging for something new and is running out of natural rock. Brad just kind of hit on it at the right time." It's also heavy. Stone harvested from the site weigh about 225 pounds per cubic foot compared with about 175 pounds per cubic foot for granite, Gerlach said. "It's some of the densest stone in the world, with lots of intrusions and color combinations," Gerlach said. "When you look at a lot of fireplaces inside or outside, it's cultured rock — fake," Gerlach said. "But now, customers want the real stuff and many quarries in the country are falling behind the demand. Rocks are hot." From 2002 until recently, the company was known as Cliffs Natural Stone LLC. It was 56 percent owned by Cleveland-Cliffs Inc., 22 percent by Gerlach and 22 percent by Gerlach's partner, Steve Hedberg. Hedberg operates five Twin Cities landscaping yards. On Dec. 17, Gerlach and Hedberg closed a deal under which each now owns 50 percent of the company. The name of the company was changed to Mesabi Natural Stone LLC. Mesabi Natural Stone owns 30 acres of property at the former taconite plant and under leases with the state, Cliffs-Erie and Great Northern Iron Ore Properties. The company also has an agreement with Northshore Mining Co. for the harvesting of stone in an area of its Peter Mitchell Mine near Babbitt that's not active. The company picks rock from the middle of March until the end of November. Northshore general manager Mike Mlinar, Northshore mine manager Doug Halverson, and Gerlach's brother Bruce, who managed the Cliffs-Erie property, were instrumental in helping the stone company become operational, Gerlach said. In 2007, the company had sales of $1 million, Gerlach said. By the end of 2008, Mesabi Natural Stone officials hope with a partner to construct a year-round stone manufacturing plant operating at the site. About 35 to 40 employees would slice and polish stone, turning it into countertops, tabletops and tile. By September 2008, Mesabi Natural Stone hopes to reach annual sales of $2.5 million, Gerlach said. Sales of $4 million to $5 million are projected from 2008 to 2009. Future annual sales could reach $20 million, Gerlach said. Within five years, the dimensional stone manufacturing plant could employ 50 to 70, he said. In addition to marketing the stone on the retail market, Gerlach said the company will sell stone to anyone who gives the company a call. "So far, it's all pretty much been from word-of-mouth," Gerlach said of sales. "But we're planning to do a lot more advertising. This is going to be a real solid growing business employing more people every year."

Welcome to the site. Isn't the internet great. Wow, all the way from Russia. I also attach my line with a coast lock swivel and I use the same split ring like the others stated.

I shot two does in WV. And 2 does on two different controlled hunts in Ohio. I only seen 1 small buck and I let my buddies boy take a crack at it. He hit it, but we lost the blood trail after an hour. I was really hoping we could find it for him. I just don't he had all that great of a hit on it.

www.gloutdoorstore.com. That is a nice site with decent prices.

I was almost scared to open this up when I saw the title. That is some great video. Thanks for sharing.

Man you guys are lucky to have such nice areas to hunt at. I hunt a 200 acre farm in West Virginia. The deer are real thick there as well. And there isn't a lot of pressure on the deer. I shot two does, my buddy and his 10yr old shot a doe a piece and their cousin shot a nice 8pt in two days of hunting. The landowner encourages doe harvesting and who am I to say no to meat in the freezer. Us Ohioans are so lucky on deer this year. We had such bad weather for the first day. It rained so hard I saw Noah's Ark floating down the river. The rest of the week was windy with 20-30+mph winds. The numbers are down as much as 50% from last years opener. A lot of guys that I've talked to are just not seeing the deer this year. Southern Ohio had a bad case of EHD and it killed a lot of deer. We still have a 2 day second phase deer season 15/16 Dec. and muzzleloader. Good luck to all.

Sure did! I put it on the night before and had it locked in on the base. As I was going out on the water and heard a thump. I turned around just in time to see it fall off the boat. I'm guessing that someone tried to steal it and could not get it off and gave up. Or the swivel base mount lock malfunctioned. Bad thing was I had it sold. Arrgh!

I have been hunting since I was 4yrs old. I mostly hunt deer now. I used to hunt waterfowl, until I lost a good buddy and a good lab who I used to hunt with. Good dogs and friend are both hard to replace.

This my 1997 Trophy. She is equipped with a 150hp 2 stroke Yamaha and a 4 stroke 9.9hp kicker. I can hit the water running at 40+mph. I have a Lowrance 332C GPS/FF. I'm down to 1 cannon downrigger (lost one). I just installed a planer board mast and can't wait to try it out next year.

Ray, nice seeing you again. We did lousy that morning. It was smooth sailing until that stinking wind blew us away. I took my buddy Eric out who just got back from Iraq about two months ago. I had to cancel our first trip due to weather and I didn't really want to cancel Sunday as well. But the waves got to him and he chummed a few times. I started to get nauseated watching him get sick. We ended up with only 3 eyes and the combo of him getting sick and the waves, I headed in around noon. In-spite of the circumstances, he caught his first ever Lake Erie walleye @ 27.5". And he said he had a good time and was willing to give it another go. The Dramamine will be on me LOL.

Here's mine. This is my first buck I ever shot twenty some years ago. He's not huge but I'm proud of it. He was taken with a 12g and the doe was taken with a Knight 50. muzzleloader a few years back.

Yes sir Ray, them whitebass are something else! I am not sure if I can hit it this weekend or not. The Wife wants to go to the fair Sat. And Sunday my Stepson has a football game. I like being there to support him. If the weather holds out next weekend I'll be out for sure. I'm assuming that was you I was talking to on your boat Sunday while I was passing by on the river?

We got a late start Sunday around 11am She was a little ruff heading out, so we started at the 02 line and marked lots of fish. Got 2 eyes from the downrigger right off with a perch thunderstick. Then all we caught was white bass and white perch on the dipsys. We moved to the 07 line and started to pick up some more eyes. We had all 4 rods hit at once. Unfortunately for us we should have moved a lot earlier in the game. The lake laid down to almost nothing around 5 and the sun was a shining. We picked up a total of 10 nice eater eyes, lost two at the boat, one steelie and a steelie lost back 300+' behind the boat after showing us a great dance show. My buddy's little guy starts school on the 27th, so we had to leave at 7. We ran our dipsys anywhere from the 3 setting at 150-220 and our 2 setting at 150-168. We just kept adjusting or depth and speed but we could not keep them trash of the hooks. Overall we must have caught over 50 white bass/perch, and sheepheads. We let the little guy get a lot of reel time so I am sure his arms are feeling it today.

I've seen your boat many times. Hope you get in back on the water. I've been watching the weather and I cancelled my trip for tomorrow morning so I'll be up Sat. I'm leaving my boat at home and hitching a ride on a buddy'd boat. Good luck!

That sucks! Did you get'er fixed? I'll look for you next time up. Is that your boat name as well?

I was out in Ashtabula on that day. It was ruff as you know what! You guys did alright. Great job!

Awesome! I hope to do as well tomorrow morning. We'll be heading back to Ashtabula for some fine fishing. I'll post the results tomorrow night.

We went out 9-13 miles Friday and Saturday and had two fine days at Lake Erie. In two days we caught 28 walleye and 7 steelhead. One walleye was a Fish Ohio fish at 29.25 inches and over 9lbs. Also we had a several between 6-7lbs and were 26-27 inches. Monkeypuke, sorry I never got a chance to call you back. My cell phone has been acting up. It's tie for a new one.

First off let me say thank you to all who responded back to me. My day started out pretty lousy for me. Got on the water at 7am. We were about 4 miles out and I heard a noise coming form the back of my boat. As I turned around I saw my Downrigger hanging onto my kicker motor. I have no clue how this this thing came off its swivel base. Long story short, it is now museum materiel in Davey's Jones locker. We made it out to 70 FOW and was marking fish like crazy. I ran 2 dipsys #3 setting @200-220, 1 dipsy #0 @175, 1 #2.5 @180, and my last remaining downrigger at 66' with meat on a harness. I picked up only 1 eye on meat, the rest was trash fish. I ran stingers off the dipsy trolling @ 2.5mph. The hot color was anything with purple. We ended up I thought with 15 (someone hit the clicker twice) but actually had 13. Just short of a 3 man limit, one of the guys got deathly ill on the boat and we had to head in around 1pm. If anyone snags a downrigger let me know

Thanks guys!

Thanks. I know I'm glad she's back. I guess I forgot that part. Yes I will be launching out of Ashtabula.