Leech lake 5/23/13 - Leech Lake - Leech Lake

After a few rainy/windy days and not getting out I was able to get out today. We had very good north/east winds right away. The fish were snapping shallow and we had a two man limit in just over an hour. Was a blast. No slot fish but the keepers were unquestionable with a few over 17. We opted not to beat on these fish and went searching for larger fish in a few spots I haven’t fished yet. This is where my day went sour. Fished for more 3 hours with nothing to show for it. But that’s fishing. I have no dough that had we stayed in the first spot we would have had a banner day, but fish were taken home and fun was had. I am on the water the next 7 days and am looking forward to it………1/8 jigs and minnows, minnow type did not matter. These fish were taken out of 5 to 8ft on a wind blown shoreline.

Sounds like our day almost to a T. We fished 5′ – 8’… windblown shoreline. Most fish were in the 15″ – 18″ range with the largest coming in around 24″. We ran into some great perch as well which made a nice addition to the fish fry. All fish were caught on 1/8 oz jigs and a PB&J Moxie. The fish were cracking the plastics!

And like you, when we left our shallow fish to go hunt down new fish in deeper water… we got the goose egg. As soon as we went back to the shallow fish in Portage Bay… GAME ON! The key seemed to be finding last year’s pencil reeds in deeper water that were not visible above water but provided some great cover for the fish. These beds of old reeds would push out to 6′ or so and were filthy with fish… ‘eyes, perch, one FAT largemouth and a handful of pike.