Sweating it out on Mille Lacs

Welly, Kam and Ken

Well, we finally got out on Sunday with a couple of electrical engineers from work, Welly Chou and Kam Chen as well, Kam's brother Ken Chen, who is from South Dakota.  All three of these guys are super smart and we born and raised in Hong Kong.  About a month ago I took Welly and Kam out with my neighbor Lory so Kam's brother Ken was coming to Minneapolis from South Dakota and he asked if I would take them out again. Apparently he had a pretty good time during the last trip.  Never wanting to turn down an opportunity and as I stated last week, it's been kind of a fish drought, we headed up on Sunday morning and got to the lake about noon.  It was windy and hot and with a surface temperature of 76, I sensed the fishing was going to be tough and my predictions were pretty correct.  This can be a tough time of the year as the baitfish are really providing plenty for the walleyes to eat as we found out.  With the wind blowing from the south, south east I decided to try and drift a couple of the flats, a reasonable strategy this time of year.  Our first stop was 7 mile and 2 drifts from south to the north side proved slow.  I was marking a lot of fish on the graph but they were not interested in biting.  The next move was to 9 mile flat, a good choice for the end of July, again we came up with nothing.  There were a lot of fish on 9 mile, especially on the northwest corner but their jaws were sealed.  Looking back I should have simply anchored and fished the area with bobbers and leeches, it may have worked better.  Deciding that maybe the deeper inshore reefs would be good as the smallie bite was suppose to be good in these deeper areas I anchored off of the rock hump by Sherman's Point but struck out there as well.  Somewhere in this picture I was panicking as I forgot to put both my net and my tackle boxes back in the boat after I had removed them when I brought my boat back up to Frankies.  Luckily I have under the console storage and voila, both my live bait rig box and my bobber box were there and saved the day.

Because my boat move along pretty good I decided it was time to cool off so I went behind

Trophy Smallie!!!

Sherman's Point into the calmer water and punched down the throttle.  It didn't take long and we were cruising at 57 mph, these guys thought it was the greatest.  It was a nice break from fishing as well seeing's how we weren't doing to well.  My next stop was to head to the deep rock pile where we caught some the last trip, in front of Eddy's.  Getting all the rods set Welly hooked a small walleye but it got off the hook just as he got it to the boat.  That was probably good because it means it didn't swallow the hook, but it would have been nice to boat our first fish.  Oh well.  Another hour produced not even a bite so it was off to the last spot, and area always good for a nice smallmouth or rouge walleye, Indian Point.   I am still learning how to troll with my boat but am getting better at it.  Rigging up 3 lines with #5 shad raps we started by the rock pile and headed out.  Indian point is an excellent trolling location as the shallow reef is long and narrow, extending out into the lake about 1/2 a mile.  It's easy to go up one side banging the 6 foot depth then come back on the other side doing the same thing.  Right away I nailed a nice fish and trying to get one of the guys to take the pole the fish shook itself off.   10 minutes later another on hit my lure but it let loose right away, it even could have been the bottom but I doubt it.  On our 3rd pass I did finally get on in the boat, this huge smallmouth bass, must have gone 12 ounces!  Oh well, it was the only fish we got into the boat so no use complaining!  I look at this picture and I immediately think...........Does this fish make me look fat?  Of course!!   Interesting but even though it was hot I always wear my Onyx inflatable life vest as I know if I ever go overboard I doubt I could tread water for very long.  Anyway it was very hot this day and it definitely I got beat  up.  I was surprised at all the fish I marked but you can't fry up marks!

dinged up prop

The day ended on a sour note as I hit the bottom of the lake on the way in at the landing,  I am fully aware of the danger however the lake is up about 6 inches in the last few weeks because of the rain and I usually am very careful on the way in but it didn't make any difference, and my prop mades some tracks in the gravel.  There must have been some larger rocks because it really dinged up the edge of my prop.  I suppose it probably would be fine to run it this way but the motor is too expensive to chance on running something out of balance.  We stopped at Bill's on the way back and he has a guy that stops there on Tuesday, picks up damaged props then returns them on Friday. Unfortunately the Super Dooper Nylon prop wrench didn't work so good and I had to wait till I got home to take it off.  So much for that so I decided to get a standard deep well socket and breaker bar to do the job as my big fear in Canada is ruining my prop, so I carry a spare.  A lot of good that would have done with a wrench that didn't work. Well, I am going to be more prepared next time but at I found out before it was too late!  My wife, brother Steve and I picked 40# of blueberries on Saturday when we went back to Eleva to see my mom.  She is doing OK but still needs a lot of help.  This weekend is my friend Bruce's 60 birthday party and my plan is to get my jon boat going as the water levels on the Mississippi River have come down almost 4 feet so the fishing should be pretty good.  I like fishing the River, it's right in the back of my house and it's pretty easy to go out for a few hours at a time and enjoy myself.

The Feed Bag is On!!!

Despite last weeks sad turn of events, getting out on the boat can help wash all ones sorrow away.  Having a few sorrows to wash, the hot Mille Lacs bite has been nothing more than phenomenal and I have been taking advantage of everything she offers.   My first real trip was actually on Sunday, May 27th.  Although my friend Tom Emmons would more than likely disagree, he did take priority over what turned out to be a pretty good fishing trip.  This trip included Lory Brasel bringing his 18 foot Lund to fish with Tom McAtee, and I showing the newbie to walleye fishing, Welly Chou, the finer points of the Mille Lacs post spawn bite.  After stopping for bait at Lundeen's, Lory got the jump on heading to the landing on the west side by 10 minutes.  The wind was brisk from the east and my concerns about the rough water were confirmed as the lake came into view, 3 foot rollers hitting the shore.  As we passed the Conoco/Subway we spied Lory's truck parked, probably loading up for lunch.  A quick call confirmed my suspicions, it would be a lot easier and comfortable if we turned around and launched on the east side.  Although about 20 more miles, it was a smart move for sure.  Launching at the new Liberty Beach Landing, the ramp was full as we had to park the truck on the main highway.  There were 3 tournaments being held in the coming week (more on that) and with the bite strong, every landing was overflowing.  Finally getting on the water we headed to the first structure 2 miles out.  The east side of Mille Lacs has a ton of unnamed humps that come up from 35 feet to 20 - 24 feet, some are rather large and some are very small.  After drifting over a few times we fired up the Suzuki and headed a mile south to a small unoccupied structure topping at 22 feet.  We drifted across and the Lowrance lit up with fish hanging a foot or two off the bottom.  Usually this means the fish are active and it prompted me to try out the anchor function on my Minn Kota Terrova I-pilot.  Wow, what a fantastic feature for bobber fishing walleyes!  The anchor in the boat just became 99% obsolete.  With the bow into the wind the trolling motor kept us exactly in position above the fish with little sway.   Rigging up Welly line and casting it out he watched as this was a new experience for him.  As the bobber hit the stop on the line, set at 20 feet, it just kept on going.  I was wondering where his bobber went when we realized it was down.  Now bobber fishing has a technique all it's own as you really need to tighten the line before you set the hook.  With the fish moving and you stationary, this can be difficult to teach the right touch.  With that, Welly missed the first bite, the second bite, and the third bite before asking me to set the hook on the fourth hit.  Refusing, he finally got a nice 16 inch keeper.  While the Terrova held us in place a large thick mark appeared on the screen of my HDS 10.  Quickly reeling in my rig and letting it back down right next to the boat, the leech and sinker came into view as the fish swam up to meet it at 18 feet.  Back down it went and as the bobber hit the water it just kept on going.  A quick flick of the wrist and the above picture is what ended up in the net, a really nice 27.25 inch walleye.  Not bad.  The 4 of us ended up with 8 keeper walleyes, enough for each to enjoy a nice fish fry.

Last weekend was tournament time as Mark Applen and I fished the Minnesota Tournament Trail event on Mille Lacs, Sunday June 2nd.  We have fished this tournament for the last 2 years with the highlight being our rookie year where we took 3rd place, winning $1046 for the ENA Charity Fund.   Last year we gambled and may have placed 6th, in the money but our strategy pushed us to 16th place.  This year we ended up a respectable 69th out of 83 teams.....not very good!  Although the fish were biting like crazy we decided to stay close to our east side hot spots and caught a bunch of 21 - 25 inch fish yet no slot fish under 17 inches and no lunkers over 28 inches.  The primary issue was the early spring have moved the fish into deeper water, into their summer peak locations.  Our traditional hot spot of 2 years running was basically void of fish.  I was pretty confident that one needed at least a 28 inch fish to play the game and the winning team brought in 2 plus 4 slot fish (you can weigh 6 fish per team) for a total of over 18 pounds.  This along with a number of teams who did bring in a 28 incher made placing in the money very difficult.  Never the less after working our spots we headed out to the flats to try and salvage the day.  We were in the first flight of 50 boats to start at 7:00AM and as you can see the majority of the boats headed north to the mud flat areas.  We headed to the gravel bars and humps off the east side and really never got a slot fish or a 28+ until we moved to the Midget Flat.  Immediately we started marking fish and soon employed our trusty I-Pilot to hold us in place while we through out the bobbers.  Almost immediately they went down and within a 20 minutes we had 2 slot fish under 17 in the live well.  We continued to work the flat and caught about 19 fish total with the majority being again in the 21 - 25  inch range.  With a few hours left we decided to go back where we received a good tip that there were some slots being caught, as well be closer to the weigh in.  We managed to catch our third slot fish then had to head in to be counted as arriving before 3:00 to avoid disqualification.  Hindsight is 20/20 and the chances of getting a 28+ are as good where we fished as anywhere yet thinking about it, the area's were hit hard by the launches and they probably took most of those fish under 17 leaving little for us.  Oh well, it was still a blast to fish with my friend Mark, a great prelude to our big event on June 15 to raise money for the ENA fund to help the families of children with cancer.  This year is our Tenth Annual and we should surpass the $250,000 raise for a great cause.  If you feel like helping click on this link ENA Fund and hit the donate button on the bottom of the page to give through your Pay Pal account.  It's really a worthwhile cause and I will report on our success after the Golf Tournament we hold as our major fund raiser.  The last picture is a 25 inch fish that we got early Sunday morning of the tournament.  As I said, we really caught a lot of nice walleyes however Mark refused to take any more pictures unless it was of a 28 inch fish.  As a result this is the only picture I have for a reather successful day of catching the wrong sized walleyes!

Sunday I am taking my neighbor Blair and his friend from Chicago to Mille Lacs hoping to repeat the success of the last 2 weeks.  Blair asked if I would be interesting in hiring out but since he moved my shed (another story), it's the least I can do.  I hope the bite is still on, which it should be and I look forward to an exciting report next week.

Pig Roast and Lead Lining, a Great Combination

This weekend proved to be a full court press.  My neighbor Tim Kuntz hosted his annual September Pig Roast at the "Men's Crisis Center" (his detached 2nd garage).  Tim is one of those guys that never does anything without doing it big and last Saturday was no exception.  When he first moved into the neighborhood you could tell he had some substantial talent but it was wasted at his job, working in IT for a local hardware/software company.  Tim and I hit it off right from the start as we both hail from small town America and share the same values.  One of the things I got Tim interested is smoking meats.  After making some venison sausage with my smoker he built his own smokehouse that rivals most BBQ pits.  Needing a pig roaster, he welded up one using an old large tank, mounting it on a trailer, most of the bugs have been worked out.  Out neighbor down the street was holding a fund raiser on Friday night for his school and asked Tim to cook a hundred pounds of pull pork butts.  He obliged and we went over to check out the party.  Plenty of beer and great pulled pork, the party had a cowboy theme, with all the guys dressed up in hats and boots.   Sticking with my own kind I remarked to Tim if he knew the difference between a real cowboy and a fake one.  Nope.........so I told him, real cowboys have the crap on the outside of their boots.  I think there were plenty of guys there that weren't real cowboys!  Because our plan was to start the pig at 1:30 Saturday morning, we decided to hang around the party till the end.  The pig went on as we finished around 2:00.  The next morning I brought my propane deep fryer and my Karaoke setup for the entertainment.  It was a busy Saturday as we helped with the final preparations.  That afternoon I pressed 3 gallons of fresh apple cider which we put in a large coffee server for anyone needing to warm up.  Serving at 5:00, there were over 120 neighbors and friends that showed up.  The highlight of the night was Welly Chou, the guy I work with and who I took fishing last week.  Welly is a championship Karaoke singer and was the hit of the party.  Singing like a pro, everyone stuck around till after midnight.  We finished the second keg of beer before closing it up at 2:00 for the second night in a row.  No rest for the wicked!
 
Because Welly stayed with Lory Saturday night and the lead line bite was still on, three of us left on Sunday noon for Mille Lacs.  We were in surprisingly good shape by the time we left and got to Bill's by 1:15 with 2 main goals, to drop off apples and to get Welly a duplicate fishing license.  Someone had broke into his car on Friday night taking his laptop and wallet.  The strategy was to repeat the same drill we did 2 weeks ago, lead line till just before sunset then head to the reef and troll the shallow 5 - 8 feet of water.  The prior trip was very successful on the line line side of the strategy but the reef trolling didn't go so good.  It's still worth a try (in my mind)!  My first stop was at 3 Mile Reef to check the water clarity.  When we arrived a couple of weeks ago I could not see the bottom rocks in 4 feet of water.  Although that can be a good thing, I wanted to recheck it during the a period when the sun was higher in the sky.  A quick run over the reef and I never saw the rocks, something that should be pretty easy as in past years.  After discussing it with Bill we speculated that the reef, which is known to be covered with Zebra Mussels is no longer as visible for the mussel shells are quite dark and may just be enough to make it look like the clarity is less.  From there we headed to the deep gravel.  With 3 in the boat and 2 lead line rigs we had to set up a side planer board with a #11 Rapala Tail Dancer in a Rainbow Trout color.  We trolled for over an hour before the first fish hit, on the Tail Dancer.  It was a nice 18 inch walleye, perfect for the live well.  We had #5 shads on the lead line as Lory got a nice walleye and I nailed a small one.  Another 100 yards and the flag went down on the planer board and you could tell it was a nice one.  Giving the rod to Welly he reeled in his largest walleye ever, a gargantuan 26 inch fish, as fat as I have seen them.  In the meantime I switched to a blue/chrome Rattlin' Rouge as the larger Tail Dancer seemed to suggest the fish were looking for a larger bait.  A few minutes later that lead line pole doubled over as Lory reeled in a nice 23 inch walleye.  The lead line total was 4 walleyes in the box ranging from 16 inches to 19.875 inches, some good eating for later, and at least 4 more released.  At 7:00 we reeled them up and headed to the reef.   Connecting Welly and Lory with the #5 shads, I did a shallow running Rouge.  Our casting strategy didn't pay off again but the trolling strategy put another 18 inch walleye in the box as those 2 caught and released a total of 6 fish.  I changed to the Shad Rap but alas, it was too late.  With 5 walleyes in the box, a nice perch, some great fish released, it was a very successful outing.  Cleaning the fish I noticed how much fat was in their bellies.  It must have been a great July and August for feeding on the young of the year tullibees.  Splitting them up we all got a nice meal as I cooked mine up on Monday night.

This week I have a wedding in Eleva, however I do want to get out again on Sunday.  With everything going on it might be my last one or two trips for the year.  Looking back I am wondering if I am running out of time or simply running out of energy! 

Walleyes with Welly

It's been an interesting week as we are on a collision course with autumn.  I am writing this from the San Diego Convention Center exhibiting at a medical show.  The weather here is beautiful and consistent, 70 degrees during the day and 65 at night.  Intellicast is saying tonight will be 30 degrees at home.  Usually that number is associated with the temperature at the airport so unless they are wrong we could have a hard freeze.  The garden is in a low spot, so much for my watermelons!  The great news is the mosquito's day's are limited.  I am flying back on Thursday and will assess the damage then.  Sunday was the full moon, the opportune time to fish walleyes on Mille Lacs.  During past September mid month fishing trips to Mille Lacs, I have been extremely successful casting Shad Raps and Rouges on the shallow mid-lake reefs.  An hour before sunset to an hour after, the reef would become the popular destination for walleyes looking for an easy meal.  Admittedly that bite and pattern hasn't been so good lately.  There were evenings where we would handily catch 12 - 15 nice walleyes.  My goal last Sunday was to see if that bite will ever materialize again.  Stopping at Lundeen's, Bill knew my plan and sarcastically ask if I was fishing for memories tonight!  Based on my success of the last 4 years that was a pretty honest assessment.  Even so if you don't try you'll never know so I had to try.   A new fisherman joined me, Welly Chou, an engineer that I work with.  Welly was born in Hong Kong, has developed into an excellent engineer as well an excellent Karaoke singer.  Having won a number of amateur contests, he even opened up for Keith Urban a few years back.  Not much of a fisherman, he expressed interest in accompanying me on one of my trips to the pond.   One thing I really enjoy is introducing fishing to someone who has little experience.  Sometimes I can be somewhat overwhelming with the electronics, methods, and strategies, Welly is curious enough to put up with that for a day.  After buying a fishing license we headed to the east side of the lake the plan was to lead line the nearby deep gravel bars for a few hours then head to the reef and cast shads through dark.   Connecting a #5 purple shad rap to Welly's line and the same in hot steel pattern to mine we let out 5 colors of line and started trolling.  We would go through pockets of fish but didn't seem to strike a pattern to make them hit.  Bill had called to see what we were doing and decided maybe the #5 shad raps were too small and the fish were looking for something different and larger, maybe a husky jerk or a rouge.  After hanging up on him we would switch after we went around the one hump however within about a minute the port rod bent over.  Giving Welly the rod he reeled in our first keeper walleye I had gotten in over 2 months, a nice 16 incher.  Resetting the lines back at 5 colors we went another 100 yards when we nailed another one.  Between the keeper walleyes would often be a single pull on the rod then it would return back to normal.  Reeling in to check the line there was a 9 inch walleye at the end of the lure.  Enough to move the rod but once hooked they would simply be dragged behind the lure.  Because you really want to keep a clean lure going you had to watch the rod all the time.

Within 45 minutes we had 4 keepers in the livewell and by the time 2 hours had passed we had 6 keepers, a nice 12 inch perch, and released a 27 1/2" as well as a 23 inch walleye.  In addition Welly caught a nice 28 inch northern pike, an unusual catch in 30 feet of water.   We ended up with 13 walleyes caught, 1 northern, and 5 perch.  Not bad for 3 1/2 hours of trolling.  As the moon began to rise over the horizon we decide to pull in the trolling lines and head to the reef to cast for walleyes.  As Bill gave me a hard time about "fishing memories" I noticed the buoy marking the northwest corner of the reef had been moved.  It is good that I have the latest Lakemaster chip which overlays the bottom contours (1 foot increments) on my front HDS5.  There were still GPS tracks from last October's trip so following the reef would be easy.  With a southwest wind we stayed on that side of the reef casting with the wind into the 3 - 5 feet of water.  It took about a half hour to cover the entire reef and as Bill probably predicted, not even a follow.  Having to fly to California in the morning, I decided that one pass was enough.  If the fish were there they would have hit.  Not the case.  Maybe Bill is correct as this would be the 5th or 6th time I have tried my hot pattern of 6 years ago with little or nothing to show for it.  I am not sure what has changed but it certainly doesn't look good.  I will try again in a week or so and maybe we just need a little cooler weather (it's coming!).   With surface temperatures in the mid 70's this could be the key, we'll see.

My good friend Adam Mayerich is getting married this Saturday.  I gave his him and his dad a lesson on trolling walleyes on Leech Lake last opener and I am looking forward to seeing him and his family.  Sunday will probably find me back in Eau Claire as my brother Jon has been in Intensive Care since last Friday with a severe case of pneumonia.  I am worried about him as he has had enough medical problems in his life.  I am not anxious to see the frost damage tomorrow but unfortunately it is what it is.  Maybe we'll be ice fishing soon!!!