Road Trip to Mendota?

Ps I just read your post a bit closer…it’s Lake >>Monona<< in Madison >>CALIFORNIA<<

Shoot whiskerkev a pm, he’s a fountain of info for this area.

Wow I feel silly, not sure what lake I was thinking! I edited it out as to avoid confusion. Ill shoot kev a message

Lake Mendota is 10K acre jewel of the Madison chain. Its average depth is 70 feet. It has a very good perch, big blue gills, pike, and my favorite monster channel cats. The way I go about it is a little different than most but I averaged 30 inches per fish pushing 15lbs last summer. I didn’t catch a single fish last year under 4lbs. Here are a few examples

I don’t know if I’ve ever seen a walleye guy look this happy.

My girlfriend and I would like to come down and fish with you guys if your still going to fish. We have never caught catfish thru the ice, it sounds like fun.

Our arrival time isn’t totally firmed up as of yet, but by 11 am for certain.

But that’s not stopping anyone from fishing earlier.

I’m working on having a internet celebrity ride along with me and that might change our arrival to earlier in the morning.

All those pictures but I don’t see any of them in winter

Anyone want to suggest a rod length and action? Let me rephrase that. Anyone want to suggest a FISHING rod length and action?

Whoops, wrong thread.

Here’s a little video of me catching a 12 lb. channel cat on Lake Mendota two years ago. I really underestimated the weight of the fish in the video but I took it home and weighed it. http://youtu.be/J2m4gUc7iK8

Someone want give me a couple bits of info on the regs in Wisconsin? How many lines? Can I use a tip up? I want info along those lines…so to speak.

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Someone want give me a couple bits of info on the regs in Wisconsin? How many lines? Can I use a tip up? I want info along those lines…so to speak.

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Three lines. Any combination of jigging rods or tip ups. Minnesota anglers have to flap their arms like a bird and yell “Yatze” every time they catch a fish. It’s all on page 14 of this year’s regulation book.

Ask for a daily license unless you think you’ll be back b/f the end of March. A non-resident yearly is around 50 buck. Too bad it didn’t work out for last weekend-it was a “free fishing” weekend.

Hope to see ya out there.

A good observation by Jesse. I’ve never even tried for them through the ice. All of those fish are still swimming and they all stack up where the yahara dumps in.

Here’s a youtube video of Eric Haataja doing a shoot for catfish thru the ice on Lake Mendota.

Catfishing thru the ice on Lake Mendota

You will have to scroll to the 2nd half of the video to see the cat fishing portion of it.

Now you can never say I’ve never done anything for the cat fishing crew here on IDO.

Good luck out there this weekend. Even I will be curious to see how it goes.

I just talked to Gene at DS Bait. 2 days ago, there was still isolated pockets of open water off of Gov’ Island. He’ll have a report on ice conditions at the end of the day tomorrow. I was hoping to chase some perch out there

On that end, I have a buddy who works over in CALS (university campus building).
He has a clear view of all of Lake Mendota. According to him, as of yesterday, (Tuesday, Jan 22nd) there was still a fairly large pocket of open water out near the middle somewhere. Probably the same pocket that Gene at D & S is referring to.

I bagged this excursion due to ice conditions. I can see where we would fish and it is ice covered but it also has plenty of current. I’m going to try again in a couple weeks. We could have used pug to test the ice but I don’t want people to drive 4 hours for a dunking.

No wonder Kev said we should go out there and he would show up a bit later.

Imagine my consternation when Joel Ballweg shows interest in catfishing. I’ve only asked him a dozen times if he wanted to come along for some boat fishing but it just doesn’t compute for him that catfishing out here isn’t your normal river fishing for kids. I’ll shut up now as I want to keep my spot for salmon fishing.

Careful Kev,

I took RRR out cat fishing once and the next thing I knew he started guiding for them.

I can see it in Joel’s eyes…pull up on your fav cat hole and they’ll be a walleye boat there hooting and hollering with enjoyment!

(I can say that…I don’t have a salmon spot. )

First off RRR and Joel are two very different sorts. Joel has put me and my family on so many good bites, I should be delivering him his daily fishing report. Nothing against Randy but if he suggested to me a catfishing trip I would laugh out loud. The great thing about the lake is even if some lucky stiff guesses right and is in the right kind of spot, they won’t know how to present the bait and do proper positioning and they will have a long night. Meanwhile, I might go a couple hundred yards and do just fine anywhere really.

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Careful Kev,

I took RRR out cat fishing once and the next thing I knew he started guiding for them

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….BK you always you owned the NIGHT. I just guide in the DAYLIGHT. Besides its always fun to guide for the E Z fish. …rrr

The reality of cat fishing for me is pretty simple. There’s only so many hours in a week. If I’m going to chase salmon and trout on Lake Michigan and walleyes & crappies the rest of the open water season, that just doesn’t leave much time for catfish. Ya gotta sleep sooner or later!

When I was a young pup, I actually fished for catfish many, many times on the Wisconsin river before I was struck with the walleye bug.

I caught the Big Fish 365 show on cat fishing through the ice on Lake Mendota when it first aired and I gotta admit, that does look like it would be quite a bit of fun. And it occurs during a time of the year when I actually would have time to go do it.

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When I was a young pup, I actually fished for catfish many, many times on the Wisconsin river before I was struck with the walleye bug.

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When I was a young pup, I actually fished for walleyes many, many times before I was struck with the cat fishing bug.

Sounds like a failure to launch problem.. The absolute best time to fish Mendota for cats is August thru Suctember.

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Sounds like a failure to launch problem.. The absolute best time to fish Mendota for cats is August thru Suctember.

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Suctember doesn’t really sound so good when you put it that way.

Sucktember for walleyes is feedbag time for kitties. There are no pleasure boaters, and no bugs. It is like bluegill fishing only the bluegills will break your gear and not apologize.