2019 Mille Lacs Reports

Figured I would start a new thread since we are past the opener. This is a repeat from that topic but just wanted to get this start.

Fished today (May 16th) 7a-2p with 2 of us in the boat. Spent the whole time up north between red door and barnacles. Pitched jigs (whistler jigs) w/ plastics for the first 3.5 hours and put 12 in the boat. Spent the rest of the time pulling lindy’s (1 w/ a leech and 1 w/ a spot tail) and put another 15 in the boat. Everything was 19-20.5″. The joke was that it was the same fish following us around.
All in all a fun day fishing. Was really hoping to bring 1 or 2 home but it wasn’t in the cards today.
Tight lines and stay safe!

What did you have for water temps? Were the fish moved out or still real shallow?

52-54 throughout the day. Fish were all over between 8-18 throughout the entire time. Caught them in all those depths from start to finish.

I would like to be up there this weekend. But I have a list of problems to deal with before I can make it back up. Will be looking forward to a long weekend of fishing over Memorial. Good luck to those fishing.

Made it up this weekend, and the weather was brutal. The swells had waves and the waves had waves on top of that lol. Drove around 3/4ths of the lake before finding a place suitable to launch (Red Door) and fish nearby. Fishing was very limited in the places we could go and fish effectively. But we found a couple right away, had a big lull mid-day and finished with a double. Caught 25 eyes mostly on jig and a shiner and trolling in the evening. Biggest was 25″ and almost all of the rest were 17-21″es.

Drove up Sunday in that snow storm. Much nicer today!

Holy cow, did the lake freeze over last night? The low was in the 20’s!

Jon Jordan wrote:

Drove up Sunday in that snow storm. Much nicer today!

I bet! We stayed up with intentions to fish Sunday, but it was even nastier plus a changing combo of snow/rain/sleet.

Kind of OK that I had to stay home given how the weather turned out. And I’m guessing today isn’t great fishing, with high pressure moved in after that huge low. Who knows though. Looking forward to this coming weekend.

We made it out on Friday. Gorgeous day! Fish seem to come in waves. Also, found the fish deeper than I expected..17-21’. Hit up areas between red door and myr mar. Couldn’t find shinners anywhere. Leeches seemed to work ok. Most were between 17-19”. Only 1 over 20…kind of miss the days of every fish being 24-26”. I didn’t even bother going out Saturday or Sunday.

Coming up this weekend and staying the entire week up there. Plan to give Garrison Reef a run for it’s money. Maybe venture up the shoreline to Myr Mar Reef and check that out. Anyone fished either of those lately? Anything working better than others. What’s been the depth? Gunning for Walleye and Bass.

Friday afternoon I spent a few hours on the north sand but it was slow. I moved near Pike’s Point over rocks for the evening and picked up eight, biggest being 27.5, in about an hour snap jigging spottails on standup jigs in 14-18 FOW. Fish wouldn’t take it if I worked the jig slow. Started snap jigging and it was consistent until I left.

Looking to get a fishing report for this weekend. I am coming up to fish on Saturday with my 10 yr old son. I am looking to put him on fish (walleye) and curious where I should start my day at. Was thinking about starting on the west near garrison and work the north end. Or have the fish started moving off the shallows/sand transitions?

Best Bait: Leeches or Shiners?
Approaches: Lindy, Jig, slip-bobber, cranks, etc.

My folks have been catching them on the sand on the north side of the lake, mostly using a lindy rig and leech. Hope ya got a big boat though, because it gets really rough up there when the wind starts blowing from the south.

Jason Young wrote:

Looking to get a fishing report for this weekend.

Johnsons Portside puts up reports (and commentary) on Facebook and has just started a YouTube Channel. Here is the first report out from “Tackle Jack”.

-J.

The winds are supposed to be coming out of the NW Saturday so we should be good on that part.

New report from Tony Roach.

Fishing was a little tough on us this weekend, however that’s after putting 122 fish in the boat on Opener, so it’s all relative I guess! We tried jigs and lindys with shiners and leeches for the most part, starting with the sand around Malmo. Caught a few, but not many, so we headed south to the reefs on the east side, didn’t do much there either. We fished everything from 10-25′ in those areas. Found them out on deep mud/rock transitions, of all places. Caught a couple dozen each day out there, with a jig and shiner being by far the most popular option. We caught the majority on the deeper mud around the shallower harder bottom areas. Didn’t see many people catching much, although there were a decent amount of boats on the water.

What did you have for water temps?

57-58 out on mud today, we picked up a few pulling blades and crawlers

Somewhat of a slower weekend for us too. Didn’t get much time to fish as it turned out, but when we were out it was slow.

Saturday afternoon we threw out bobbers and fatheads off the dock for an hour with the kids. Right away we had one on my 3 yr old daughters rod. Came off trying to teach her to reel. Got another one right after that and ended up being a 22.5 “ walleye. Shortly after that a 25” walleye. I was shocked they were in the harbor midday like that!

Only got a few Sat night and didn’t see many other fish boated. Went out for smallies on Sun morning for 1.5 hours and didn’t catch any. And that was all the water time I got.

Hoping to log more time in the next couple weeks here….

Great pic!

Had a very good weekend of fishing well over 60 fish a day shiners rigging and jigging was best. Shallow gravel at dawn and when it was rough deep gravel mid day. Fished sat, sun, and Monday. Sunday was the slowest mid day with sun and little wind. Morning was still great but midday was much slower.

Few more pics.

I assume by most of these photos that the SMB are still pre-spawn and the walleyes are post-spawn. The walleyes all look pretty friggin’ skinny and the SMB are all brown tanks.

gim wrote:

I assume by most of these photos that the SMB are still pre-spawn and the walleyes are post-spawn. The <strong class=”ido-tag-strong”>walleyes all look pretty friggin’ skinny and the SMB are all brown tanks.

The eyes are skinny like that all year. We got into some bigger 28″ fish last fall when they should have been putting the weight on and they were 5 to 6 lbs. Maybe the browns are eating all the bait?

gim wrote:

#1859190
I assume by most of these photos that the SMB are still pre-spawn and the walleyes are post-spawn.

Correct. The walleye just spawned.

Sunday was one of the most special days I’ve ever had on the water. I took both my dad and 4 year-old fishing, and we were able to catch a bunch of nice smallmouth. My son’s first ever fish was a 20.5″ bass, and as I held the rod, he was also able to reel in another 6 or 7.

I’ve had days with more or bigger fish, but never any better.

Nate wrote:

I’ve had days with more or bigger fish, but never any better.

Nice! I know what you mean…. doesn’t get any better than that!!

Great pictures Nate! I assume the bass were on shallow rocks?