Chetek Chain

While there remains good ice on the chain , anywhere from 16-20 inch’s fishing for the most part has slowed somewhat.The bite right now is slow lots of fish marked on the sonars and seen on the camera but just not alot of takers no matter what you put down there.Only really active bite is very early morning and late afternoon. If we get the higher temps and rain the ice will go fast. For now the landings aren’t to bad but it can be seen that it won’t take much to make them useless. Please be careful out there and use your best judgement. I will post reports a couple times a week.

Sorry for the lack of action on the thread . I will be on regularly with reports and will help anyway I can information wise.
Rgiht now panfish action is very good on gills and crappies, gills are in shallow and in some cases you can actually target them by eye. Crappies seem to be moving back out into the deeper water somewhat from their shallow haunts of the past month or so. Walleye action is slow or in some cases non exsistant. Trolling up Prairie with fire tiger crank baits in 8-12 fow should produce but don’t expect constant action.
Bass are moving shallow and are fairly active with the channel between Pokegama and Mud being a very good spot right now.

will post some pics of the perch and walleyes I have been getting over the past 2-3 weeks and they are still biting.Just to let you know the date on my camera is of by one day and I can’t figure out how to change it.

more

another day

I am going on a trip to chetek june 4 – 10 and I was wondering how the spawn is for the panfish and also about the walleyes. This is my first trip to chetek. Was wondering if any one has any suggestions. I would like to fish walleyes, But I can handle a panfish also. How are the muskies on Potato lake? Just wondering what bait to concentrate on for the listed species.

Silverstreak; The crappies are starting to move out ot their deep water areas but are still fairly shallow. gills are shallow and making beds with the clear water you can target them by sight. For walleyes it has been extremely slow. the fish I posted came out of Big Chetac by Birchwood which is about a 45 minute drive from Chetek.

Nice eyes vman!

Jason ; took some friends there tonight and out of the 4 of us we caught 7 eyes 16.5 – 21. Working the large sand/mud flat north of the islands dead center in the lake. Also caught about 15 jumbo perch.

As i said before there is a good bite going on right now on both the Chetek Chain for panfish mainly but I have heard that northern action is picking up in the southern end of the chain.
Big Chetac right now is very good for walleyes, jumbo perch, crappies and gills.

thanks for the info vman59. Maybe I will see you up there.
I will be in a 1850 fishhawk tan\green with a 135 optimax.
Hopefully I can show you my catch and offer a refreshment

as vman said the south end of the chain is lighting up. crappies appear to be done spawning and heading to deeper water. gills up next. silver birch area hot yesterday for crappies to 11 inches. most in deeper water right on the bottom.

Welcome onboard King !

King please be patient while we wait for that Elderly statesmen from the north end of Prairie to log on.

Yeah, well, the “Elderly Statesman” has made the trip….FINALLY!!!!! Can we say that on here or will it get pulled like that other psuedo site that went to the dogs?????????

ANYWAY, HERE I IS….Let the FUN begin!!!!

‘Cane

ya can say anything as long as you keep it clean.

NO problem there…what are the weekend plans

thinking about hitting BC very early tomorrow morning but Monday for sure. Want to get on th lake before the idiot boaters get on it.
Have the sons graduation party this afernoon.Your more than welcome to stop over.

Monday morning will work, too…message me if you are going tomorrow, though…..

Or call……………

this morning catch on Big Chetac.They sure tore up the weedbeds this weekend weeds floating everywhere.

(by his SON)

lots of nice gills working the shoreline on the northeast side of the long brdge that seperates Prarie and Chetek.

Vman is definitely right…… The gills are in the shallows big time. My shoreline is very active with “boils” every night just before dark and again in the morning before the wind kicks up. It is “popper time” on the chain.

vman59
what is the best approach to the walleyes on the chetek chain. and do you usuallly fish deep or shallow? How is the water clarity on the lakes, I normally fish the mississippi, where clarity is very important to determine the color of lures, Any advise would be very helpful. thanks.

its a good thing i got my fly rod loaded up in the boat already! cant beat gils on a flyrod. cant wait to get up there.
-Aaron

Hey guys….just wanted to let you know that the Boss has set up a dedicated Chetek forum for threads related to fishing the chain. Look for it towards the top of the WI menu. Have fun!

Aaron~ can’t help you on the bass other than to tell you that EVERY tournament they have on the chain, it seems all boats head straight for Frankenburg Slough. This is the bay on the north end of Prairie, just south of Veteran’s Park (check the map)The tourney guys beat the water to a froth up here. I know, I live on it.

As far as the flyrod…..DEFINITELY don’t forget that, as was said before the gills are going nuts…the water around my pier is just simply alive and boiling every night when the wind goes down. So, if you can’t get bass, there are always nice gills. They are a better size class this year than I have seen in many, many years, as proved by what Vman and I caught this winter. You should have fun, either specie.

As far as walleye…..that is another story. The days of going out and catching a quick meal of them are over. We have a definite over population of small LM bass and they have taken over all of my “historic” walleye holes…Trolling seem to be the only way, of late, as there have been some beauties taken with this method….the down side of that is there are some real idiot pontoon owners who have absolutely no respect for fisherman and probably will cut your line, so, if you chose this method, be sure to watch for them. The sad part of this is most of these dorks LIVE on the chain and SHOULD know better….

Bottom line…you WILL have fun. Hope this helps!!!!

‘cane

eye were hot last night but unfortunately all were 11 to 13 inches. 7 total in the boat in 1/2 hr with leeches and slip floats down 7 to 9 ft.just before dark. several big gills cpr’d.

watch out cane as the new boat will get to your area quickly if the guide will let me use full power. Have to get there to check out gills. My guests have been doing well on gills with fly rod off my docks and along the ten mile shore.

I hear ya……..they are literally stacked along my shoreline….Too bad it’s so FAR down there and the War dept has all kinds of plans for me…

thats it I am going to go off Cane’s pier !!!!