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I heard there’s been a HOT bite going on up in the Bemidji area for a couple weeks now. Thought maybe if I created a forum for the area we might find someone to drop in and share some quality info with us.

Your informant is exactly right on. Lake Bemidji has been putting out an excellent class of Walleye this season. Many of the mid-lake humps are holding a lot of fish right now. Speed trolling Shad Raps or JB Lures 2 3/4” Shallow Rattling Shads has been the ticket. My last outing I found fish as shallow as 3’ on top of the humps and as deep as 12’ to the sides of them. Stay away from the crowds for better fishing.

There is also a great perch bite going on out there right now as well. These fish are feeling the water temps going down and are beginning to put on the feed bags already!! The 1/16th oz jigs tipped with a minnow or a white plastic has been the key for a lot of 10-13” Lake Bemidji Perch. These fish are being located just off the humps on the very steep drops in 19-26’ of water. Stay outside of the cabbage for your best fishing.

Access has been a real problem for anyone wanting to night fish. Larger boats are having a tough time because the deepest landing is located within a park that gets locked at 11:00 p.m. The rest of the accesses are shallow but unless you are loading a large boat you will be fine on them.

Don’t forget that Bemidji area also has a ton of smaller lakes that continue to put out some excellent pan-fish. Look for them suspended just out-side of the weed beds on most area lakes in 10-15’ of water.

This is great!!! Our own forum.

Jeff is right, but forgot to tell you that he was pulling those cranks at night. There is also a great day bite! Fish the windward side of the humps in 14 to 30ft with a Scenic Tackle “Pro Series” jig or “Angel Eye” jig in 3/8 oz and my favorite is Perch colored. Tip it with either a shiner or fat head minnow.

Verticle jig them holding your boat over the fish with your trolling motor. When jigging, make sure that you are in constant contact with the bottom. I like to jig up and set it back down so that you see the slack in your line. To do this you have to constantly let line out and reel it in. 90% of the time you won’t feel the bite. The combination of the walleyes picking it up on the drop and the amount of line out at that depth deadens the feel of the bite. If a fish has picked up, you’ll feel what I call a “wet rag” feel. Set the hook!!!!

Good luck and have fun. Some of the best fishing of the year is right around the corner.

Hows it going Chris.. Welcome to IDA

You guys do any rigging off the edge of the deeper breaks during the day with redtails?

And welcome Chris!

Welcome Jeff @ Scenic Tackle and Chris

I hope you guys keep up the chatter from up there. I have been meaning to get my up there for quite awhile now.

Again Welcome to IDA, the best place on the NET!

Shhhh James!!! That’s privileged info there Thanks guy’s. Looking forward to being around here.

Welcome aboard guys…great to see new faces!!!

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Shhhh James!!! That’s privileged info there Thanks guy’s. Looking forward to being around here.

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I’ll just have to find a way to wiggle it out of you!!

Welcome Chris! …and Jeff, long time no talk…so lets hear some more bite action! (wiggle wiggle )

I’m sure we have a ton of people interested in walleyes and pan fish…as I am. No cat’s up there I ‘spose.

opps gotta go…working today…

Wow!!! Thanks for the warm welcome guys!! Good to see some familiar faces here and be greeted by some I don’t know as well. The Bemidji area is surrounded with quality lakes and quality fishing spots.

Chris, Good to see you over here! I was keeping that night bite a secret for a few more weeks!! And it is only going to get better now. Several years ago I fished open water until the night before the lake froze over..man that was cooooooooold. But you did not notice it until you were off the lake and your hands started to hurt. Fishing was just too good to quit.

Red Tails? Gee whatever are you talking about? Wait….is that what you call these big minnows in this tank? Them one’s that keep jumping out when the lid don’t get closed?
I tried to put them in my wife’s garden pond with the fresh water stream and everything but found out that the minnows had a better chance of survival then I did once she seen them in there. So I had to put them back in the tank and won’t try that one again!!!

Seriously now…I really like using Red Tails and the largest shiners I can find late in the fall. Vertical jigging them off the tight breaks or sometimes if you hit the season just right I like to speed troll floating spinner rigs with the largest, liveliest, minnow in the bucket. When trolling rigs I will troll them behind a 1 3/4 – 2 oz bottom bouncer. There is no finesse to fishing walleyes using this method of trolling. Feel the bite, drop the rod tip and set the hook.

Chris did a great job describing the use of jigs and minnows. I would just like to add that often times when I am vertical jigging I will switch over to a 6 ½ – 7’ extremely fast tipped rod. By using a rod this long I can jig vertically, pause, move the rod tip over a few inches causing the minnow to swim in a horizontal direction, pause, jig and repeat. With a longer rod you can cover a lot of area around the front or back of your boat. Thus perhaps showing this presentation to more fish as well as working both a vertical as well as a horizontal strike zone. As Chris indicated you often times do not feel the bite but rather just a different feel on the rod.

The Bemidji area is also loaded with panfish lakes. A person just has to put in the time to learn them as it seems they all fish a bit different. There are crystal clear lakes as well as stained water lakes in this area. It seems that each one of them has a different feeding pattern. I will try to share a tip or two about this area’s panfish as the ice begins to form.

Cats??? Sure there are. I seen a bobcat here just a few days ago and there has been a few bigger cats spotted too!! Actually there are some catfish spots just west of here in the Crookston area though. About 2 hours west of Bemidji. Maybe we can find a kitty fisherman to give us a report for the Crookston area.

Rumor has it that there are some pretty elusive cat areas over by that there village of Crookston, not to mention some dandy Smallie holes in that area also. Legend says that some fella over there has caught Walleyes up to 13#, and 33 inches out of that Red Lake River. Conditions below the dam are pretty grim this year of the drought but above the dam all the way over to TRF is pretty good sailing.

Am I the only one or does my avitar look just like Beckwith??

Hey now!!!!!

I’m sorry man but my belly still hurts and I almost peed in my pants giggling so hard. Some one had to know you to make that toon right? It just can not be a luck of the draw me finding that avitar, can it?

SO any how, I just went out on the Red Lake River near TRF today and caught a bass on almost every cast. The rock bass were just unstopable this evening. Landed close to 60 fish in just an hour. Now that was pretty fun.

I need to find a way to put a techo-colored watch on that little guy. Every time I’ve ever seen Jeff he’s got a watch with 39 different colors of over spray on it.

I bet you did Rusty!!

James, that watch is one of a kind and it changes by the day depending on what we are working on. Right now it has about 50 coats on it. Heck of a conversation item!

Any reports for Muskies on lake Bemidji as of late? With the low water over here the fishing has been pretty tough accept for the Bass over by RLF. the cats over here are very tough to come by until we get some water again.

Check this out.. Heck you can catch catfish over here and Smallies, rockbass, pike, Muskies, Walleyes, saugers, Crappies, and tons of rough fish….. but I bet you never imagined all this stuff… Anciant Bison skulls and horns. My research has found them to be from 200 to 5000 years old covered by water or mud for all them years.

That is way cool. How much time do you spend searching them out? I would assume a BUNCH.

On a similar note, a local angler snagged a pair of ancient elk antlers from the mississippi river a few years back.

There’s lots of secrets buried it the mud banks of these big river.

Well, it started as a total chance finding. Then it turned to looking every now and again and now I can head out and I pertty much know where to look. I spent an entire day to find all those in the pic. We went about 20 miles up river searching every sand bar and then all the way back.. It is crazy what you can find that has been burried for many of years. We even found a old Arctic cat mini bike. The drift wood is unreal. I wish I knew a taxidermist that was looking for some mounting wood.. I found some awesome stuff.

Nice catch there Wiskersman but no wonder you have so many problems catching real fish!!!

The pink on the watch really brings out the color in your eyes!!

Hey now! I’m fishing with that guy this weekend and it will be in the dark and I’ll be all alone.

Should I be afraid? Should I be VERY afraid?!?!

Hey Ethan, Good to see you here! You been out? Chris and I was out last night for a bit and can say this much brrrrrrrrrrrrr. It was a fall night for sure once it started to rain. What a view to check out the fall colors!!!

No fear James…your safe!!

not been out lately – I’m on an eight day stretch now at work
But as soon as thats over – I’m on the lake. Should be going really good here soon. Really want to chase some pannies too. We should try to hit the water again before freeze up. Hard to believe another season is winding down already!

This summer has just flown by. I am also hoping to get out a few more times before freeze up. I want to do some more fishing and then spend a few hours just marking winter structure on the GPS as well.

The flats should be really turning on here pretty soon.

You dont have time to fish, you got painting and pouring to do.

Jeff

Too bad you couldn’t make it tonight… first fish went 29″ and was as fat as a football. We hit nearly non-stop action for the first two hours with a bunch of fish in the 23 – 27 inch range coming to the boat.