September 12th, 2011 St. Croix River walleye fishing is fair right now, yesterday on a half day Sunday morning trip( my last for a while now that my Sunday School teaching will commence again) we boxed 5 walleye sauger combo on a half day trip. The bite is what I consider late summer bite as we have had hot days and still fairly warm nights. The water temperature is still 74 degrees. Once the weather changes, the bite will pick up as the water temperatures drop.
Walleyes and saugers are being caught on crankbaits, minnows, blade baits, and crawlers. Best depths have been from 18 to 28 for my boat. I am having to hit many spots to find fish.
The river is always interesting as the old saw “you never know what you are going to get on the river!” seemingly always rings true. Twice in ten weeks we have had a muskie eat the fish being reeled in, both times an innocent smallmouth bass minding his business and then “WHAM, game over smallie!” The first encounter was with a ski that sat there and ate, not drop the bass when it saw the boat. I thought it was trying to spit it out, but then the smallie just started slowly disappearing into that big maw of the muskie! Then the line was cut.
Cats, yes they are hitting now. Buffalo are also taking blade baits in the mouth. I have also seen carp do this. A very nice battle indeed on the two mentioned species.
River level is normal at 675.7 in Stillwater, MN.
Summer is slowly going away, and what a send off, just fantastic weather.
