Anyone Out On Pepin Lately?

Bearcat89 wrote:

I have never fished pepin, any maps to look at that show the wing dams.

Some map chips have them marked, and if the water low enough they are pretty easy to see.

They should be marked on any map chip for your unit. The wing damns are on the river south of pepin. They start right at the end of the lake

Onthewater wrote:

They should be marked on any map chip for your unit. The wing damns are on the river south of pepin. They start right at the end of the lake

How do you fish em ? Get in front of them and throw a jig in the scour hole off the side of it ? Drag a jig over the top of them ? Get behind em ? I always thought the wing dams were the ones up by Lock and Dam 3 but Im new to the whole Miss river fishing . Did pick up 2 walleye trolling in front the rush is 16 FOW .

WD’s should show up as a straight line extending out from shore on your map chip. Here they are starting just downstream from the Chip and Reads landing.

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Bearcat89 wrote:

I have never fished pepin, any maps to look at that show the wing dams.

Mississippi river guide and your graphs map

Love seeing this post get more attention! I’ve been out three times in recent history. Wish I had better news to report. I hit Maple Springs and Wabasha twice. I’m new to wabasha but my IDO research led me right to the three wing dams, but it wasn’t what I hoped. Pulled a couple eaters each day, the fist on cranks & ratte traps & the second on crawlers and leechs. Lots of fish were marked but they didn’t react to slow or fast presentations, willow cats could have changed that. If I get out much more I’ll be back on the big lake, found an Instagram post from a pepin guide who has been sticking pigs and numbers somewhere out there. I’m thinking Maiden Rock will be the move

ProStaffSteve wrote:

Love seeing this post get more attention! I’ve been out three times in recent history. Wish I had better news to report. I hit Maple Springs and Wabasha twice. I’m new to wabasha but my IDO research led me right to the three wing dams, but it wasn’t what I hoped. Pulled a couple eaters each day, the fist on cranks & ratte traps & the second on crawlers and leechs. Lots of fish were marked but they didn’t react to slow or fast presentations, willow cats could have changed that. If I get out much more I’ll be back on the big lake, found an Instagram post from a pepin guide who has been sticking pigs and numbers somewhere out there. I’m thinking Maiden Rock will be the move

Least your picking up a few . I was out last weekend with little to show in front the rush . Tried for pike the rest of the day and skunked ! Guide still trolling cranks or did it say ? I’ll be out Sunday hopefully. Trying to figure out where to launch solo . Can’t wait for the pleasure boaters to calm down a little ha .

isu22andy wrote:

<div class=”d4p-bbt-quote-title”>Onthewater wrote:</div>
They should be marked on any map chip for your unit. The wing damns are on the river south of pepin. They start right at the end of the lake

How do you fish em ? Get in front of them and throw a jig in the scour hole off the side of it ? Drag a jig over the top of them ? Get behind em ? I always thought the wing dams were the ones up by Lock and Dam 3 but Im new to the whole Miss river fishing . Did pick up 2 walleye trolling in front the rush is 16 FOW .

there are 3 up near lock and dam #3. 2 on the left on the dam side and one by the vermillion river. i believe the rest of them are below Pepin and there are a lot of them so be careful if you are fishing there. i am far from a wingdam expert, just not my favorite way to fish but if i had to, i would point my nose up river and spot lock just down from the wingdam and cast as light of a jig as you are able to use. i know guys throw blades and cranks too.

That explains some things better to me . Has to get a bit crowded down that way from the looks of things on my Humminbird . Anyone picking anything up lately ? Going for about anything that bites tomorrow . Maybe a smallie . Any tips ?

Get out early. The productive wing dams get boats on them all the time. The best ones are also near spots with crazy weekend boat traffic, so be prepared to get tossed around a bit if you fish them during the weekend. Don’t be discouraged if you lose some hardware to the river. These spots are notoriously snaggy.

isu22andy wrote:

That explains some things better to me . Has to get a bit crowded down that way from the looks of things on my Humminbird . Anyone picking anything up lately ? Going for about anything that bites tomorrow . Maybe a smallie . Any tips ?

I’ll have a report for you after labor day when i make it back out there again. dog days of summer and too many jibronies out there this time of year. september the kids are back to school and a month later, the hunters are in the woods. pretty much have the lake/river all to yourself even on weekends!

if i was to fish now either pulling spinners/crawlers or troll bandits/flicker shads in the lake. you guys can have those wingdams!

isu22andy wrote:

<div class=”d4p-bbt-quote-title”>ProStaffSteve wrote:</div>
Love seeing this post get more attention! I’ve been out three times in recent history. Wish I had better news to report. I hit Maple Springs and Wabasha twice. I’m new to wabasha but my IDO research led me right to the three wing dams, but it wasn’t what I hoped. Pulled a couple eaters each day, the fist on cranks & ratte traps & the second on crawlers and leechs. Lots of fish were marked but they didn’t react to slow or fast presentations, willow cats could have changed that. If I get out much more I’ll be back on the big lake, found an Instagram post from a pepin guide who has been sticking pigs and numbers somewhere out there. I’m thinking Maiden Rock will be the move

Least your picking up a few . I was out last weekend with little to show in front the rush . Tried for pike the rest of the day and skunked ! Guide still trolling cranks or did it say ? I’ll be out Sunday hopefully. Trying to figure out where to launch solo . Can’t wait for the pleasure boaters to calm down a little ha .

The secret on the wing dams was to switch lures every 6 casts and don’t be afraid to lose lures to rocks. The guide was pulling cranks, and that’s how I’ve been picking up the odd fish. My best bet is to pull em late in the day or better yet early in the morning on any of the shore lines. Sauger are almost a given, no sauger is too small for the box and just use em as an excuse to keep you entertained till you stumble into a pocket of hungry eyes. Honest, if you’re pressed for time just pull in front of the public landing. Most consistent walleye for me year over year. Fish everting from 4ft of water to 30ft. Color is irrelevant, just make sure your lure is smashing bottom

Was out last night . Marked a S ton of fish in 25-30 foot of water on the MN side south of maiden rock . They wouldn’t bite for nothing . Slid up to that 15 foot mark and started catching lots of shorts . They lakes a way more peaceful place in the week time . Wowza lol .

isu22andy wrote:

Was out last night . Marked a S ton of fish in 25-30 foot of water on the MN side south of maiden rock . They wouldn’t bite for nothing . Slid up to that 15 foot mark and started catching lots of shorts . They lakes a way more peaceful place in the week time . Wowza lol .

That’s a good sign in my book! I’d rather catch 10 14.75” eyes than 1 16” all day. What were you using to fish the 25-30’ water? Pepin is amazing how fast it goes from beautiful to a hot muddy puddle covered in recreational boaters.

ProStaffSteve wrote:

<div class=”d4p-bbt-quote-title”>isu22andy wrote:</div>
Was out last night . Marked a S ton of fish in 25-30 foot of water on the MN side south of maiden rock . They wouldn’t bite for nothing . Slid up to that 15 foot mark and started catching lots of shorts . They lakes a way more peaceful place in the week time . Wowza lol .

That’s a good sign in my book! I’d rather catch 10 14.75” eyes than 1 16” all day. What were you using to fish the 25-30’ water? Pepin is amazing how fast it goes from beautiful to a hot muddy puddle covered in recreational boaters.

I tried cranks first , Wind was about 10 mph out of the north for a bit which made things interesting . Was hard to tell where I was at with cranks . Was using flicker minnow 9s and 2 oz snap weights. Varied the speed from 2.5 to 3.5 but again hard to tell if I was on the bottom or 6 foot off . Then I tried crawler harnesses for a bit with a 3 oz bouncer going 1.5 . Hooked a giant sheepy though haha.

Was out trolling cranks today, 9 walleyes between 17-22″, about that many under 15″, and a handful of kicker sauger to boot. Hot color was definitely silver or chrome, with pink and chrome being the hottest. We kept it around 14-18′ for the most part, although never did give shallower or deeper a serious shake. Marked a bunch of small fish around 25′ at the start of the basin, but never got anything down there to check em out.

was out wed and friday 6 to noon. pulled spinner rigs with crawlers mostly in the 10-13 foot range. best bite was between 8-10 am for me. probably landed 25 fish on wed and went thru all the crawlers. switched to the new Berkley SR crawlers and fish didn’t care one bit. those things are LEGIT! surprisingly all eyes and sauger and not one sheepy. biggest went 24″ but lots of small saugers early on too.
friday was much slower but still got on a variety of species. i think from now on, i will go back to fishing the 4 to dusk windows. the sunsets are much more impressive than the sunrises.

You guys did better than me . Couldn’t find a pattern for cranks that kept me satisfied . My fish came from the 16 foot range .

Anyone notice all the dead fish floating ? Bass carp walleye little of everything .

isu22andy wrote:

You guys did better than me . Couldn’t find a pattern for cranks that kept me satisfied . My fish came from the 16 foot range .

Anyone notice all the dead fish floating ? Bass carp <em class=”ido-tag-em”>walleye little of everything .

Appreciate the honesty, some days it just don’t work out the way you planned it. Humble makes you appreciate the good days! I did not notice much floating on Wed but Friday there was all sorts of fish Maiden rock side. you could smell it well before seeing it that is for sure. i bet if you cast that rip rap along the sconi side, you would do well on crappies. i marked a bunch on SI but i already made my bed at that point. This month should be REALLY good.

isu22andy wrote:

You guys did better than me . Couldn’t find a pattern for cranks that kept me satisfied . My fish came from the 16 foot range .

Anyone notice all the dead fish floating ? Bass carp <em class=”ido-tag-em”>walleye little of everything .

I was on a different pool, but saw a odd number of dead fish as well. Any idea what caused the die off?

Crank bite was on for me. JSR 7’s worked fast and erratically put a pile of fish in the 16-22″ range in the boat Saturday. I lost a couple other bigger fish as well. All the better fish came from less then 6′ of water. If I went deeper or slowed down all I got was shorts and sheeps.

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Was thinking about hitting pepin this weekend. Could anyone tell me where abouts maiden rock is, never been on it and plan is to troll some cranks or drag some crawlers. Is there a launch anywhere near where I should start, or better spots to try? Please help a rookie to this. PM me if wanted. Thanks

John, if you launch at Roschen Park, stand at the water’s edge at the landing and look 45 degrees up stream and you’ll be fairly close. Maiden Rock is upstream from Stockholm a few miles.

Jimmy Jones wrote:

John, if you launch at Roschen Park, stand at the water’s edge at the landing and look 45 degrees up stream and you’ll be fairly close. Maiden Rock is upstream from Stockholm a few miles.

Thanks! If anyone else has any suggestions please feel free. Would love any help the respected experts have

Anyone out fishing on Lake Pepin Sunday with all the wind? How did you do? All I got was a sheeps head from a full day of trolling.

So I did not get out last weekend due to stuff around the house getting in the way. Plan is to hit it this weekend. Any launch better than the other want to launch on the MN side. I have a deep v on bunk trailer if that matters

We launched out of Hok-Si-La Boat launch. It’s a pretty nice launch. I also have a deep v boat and it wasn’t bad getting out or back in. We mostly trolled with some raps and bottom bouncers. We will be back maybe with different game plan but we didn’t really see anyone boating fish while we were out there.

Jacob Strand wrote:

Anyone out fishing on Lake Pepin Sunday with all the wind? How did you do? All I got was a sheeps head from a full day of trolling.

Most river rats will say you need to speed up if you are only catching sheep.

Jacob Strand wrote:

Anyone out fishing on Lake Pepin Sunday with all the wind? How did you do? All I got was a sheeps head from a full day of trolling.

. We trolled cranks and struggled. We were spoiled the last few weeks with good numbers. Sunday we put 4 shorts 1 18 and 3 pike in the boat. Still catching fish in less than 10 ft. Tried deeper and pulled some lead off the break to but nothing to show for it. Fished from 10 am to 4. Thought about fishing the evening bite but called it early. Was nice to put the boat away in the day light.

Jacob Strand wrote:

We launched out of Hok-Si-La Boat launch. It’s a pretty nice launch. I also have a deep v boat and it wasn’t bad getting out or back in. We mostly trolled with some raps and bottom bouncers. We will be back maybe with different game plan but we didn’t really see anyone boating fish while we were out there.

Thanks I was thinking of using that one. I don’t have any lead core set ups. How heavy of a bottom bouncer were you using? Anyone use snap weights on the river or just drag a deep diver against current. Sorry new to all this.

John Rasmussen wrote:

<div class=”d4p-bbt-quote-title”>Jacob Strand wrote:</div>
We launched out of Hok-Si-La Boat launch. It’s a pretty nice launch. I also have a deep v boat and it wasn’t bad getting out or back in. We mostly trolled with some raps and bottom bouncers. We will be back maybe with different game plan but we didn’t really see anyone boating fish while we were out there.

Thanks I was thinking of using that one. I don’t have any lead core set ups. How heavy of a bottom bouncer were you using? Anyone use snap weights on the river or just drag a deep diver against current. Sorry new to all this.

Not much current off the main channel a bit . Ive used snap weights before with success. Otherwise deep diving cranks like Bandit Deeps or Rapala Tail Dancer Deep 9 will get ya 20 foot . Both of those cranks Ive had limited success in .

I still think lead core with a smaller cranks like a JR7 will get you more fish but Im very limited in using it. Just a smaller profile bait is my thoughts . Im sure someone will chime in ,