Was fortunate to have some time off this week and spent it ALL on the water. Great way “get away” without traveling more than 45 minutes from home. It’s a good reminder of how lucky we are to live in this place. There were multiple moments every day on the water where I had to just stop and take it in. The middle of the week is a great time to find solitude on bodies of water that aren’t exactly known for that.
Monday 6/22, Lake Minnetonka. Primarily down in the SW Bays — Smithtown, Phelps, etc. It was a gorgeous and calm day to be on the big lake with that beautiful water. I was the only trailer in the lot at the 3 Rivers district launch near the Arboretum. Could not locate any walleye or pike, but worked around the islands and got on a nice panfish bite. Took home a mixed bag of about 10, all caught on crawlers under slip bobbers. Just a basic split-shot rig. At the end of the day I landed a little fighter smallmouth and then it turned off mid-afternoon. I took a nap in the bow and called it a good, if slow, day 1.
Wednesday, 6/24, Bald Eagle Lake. I worked the northern bay past the line of marked rock hazards first and marked a lot of fish but hardly had a bite. No interest in the fatheads or any of the crank baits I threw. Caught a couple skinny perch, maybe 6 inches or so, on a perch colored jigging rap. Had more luck working the points off the lake’s long, narrow island and was catching some small and mid-size crappies on that same jigging rap. It was my first time with that lure so I’m definitely intrigued. Then I pulled the other new bait out of my bag, a fire tiger Shad Dancer and started fan casting the area and ended up with my personal best crappie — not sure if this qualifies as a slab, it was about 10.5″ on the tape. Good enough for me!
Thursday 6/25, Chisago & South Lindstrom Lake. Got my old man to take a day off work and join me. We met up at Frankie’s and spent too much money like always. Their fishing advice was very vague. They wouldn’t recommend one lake over the other (we asked about Green and Center Lakes as well). They basically said pick a lake and work the weed lines, the fish are starting to come out of hiding. We headed to the launch on the channel between Chisago and South Lindstrom since we’ve had luck on Chisago before.
Started by working the transitions between sand bar and weeds on the north/northwest area of South Lindstrom. Trolled Fickr shads, jigged live bait, worked jigging raps, nothing. Headed in shallow and casted some new Storm 360GT swim baits. They felt great to retrieve but we struck out on South Lindstrom. Around 10:30am we gave in and headed over to Chisago. We drifted all over the main basin and worked the eastern and south eastern shore areas where the main area feeds into the southern bays. We stayed busy with fish from about 11:15am until 1:30pm — mostly healthy sized bass around 13-14 inches with one fat 16 incher that my dad caught on a floating jighead tipped with a fathead, split shot about 18 inches up the line. That was the best fish of the day and it rewarded us with a nice jump out of the water on her way to the boat! That floating jighead also produced a nice crappie for my dad, just smaller than my fish from the day before. We also caught bass on the Shad Dancer again, and we had a sunfish hit a #7 firetiger flickr shad that we were trolling at about 15ft. That was kind of a surprise!
After being intrigued the day before we spent almost $30 on jigging raps at Frankie’s and then completely struck out on that bait. We worked a #9 in gold and #7 in clear blue tiger and clown. Dad had one nice hit where he lost his tipped minnow head but nothing else. I switched to a 1/4 oz jig/fathead combo and finally caught my first walleye of the season. Only 12″ or so, but a confidence booster since jigging success has not come easily to me!
