Big Pond slugfest

I had the privilege of spending 3 nights on Mille Lacs over the weekend and tapped into the same amazing success that many other IDAers enjoyed during the full moon. Heck, the fishing was so outstanding that even a couple of guys from Wisconsin were able to cash in!

Saturday night I was joined by IDA pro staffer Don Hanson who made the long drive to join us in our quest for big green fish from the big pond. It took us a while to get our program together but by the end of the night, we had 3 fish over 20″ and a few eaters and slimers to boot. We fished a well-known community spot on the west side, mostly in the shallow weeds and rocks. As we slowly trolled up and down the shore, my father-in-law Tim noted that the bay looked “like Hong Kong harbor”…he was right. Most of our action came within a narrow window, 11:30 to 1:00 or so. The hot bait….Don said that if we posted it, we’d be called liars! The first pic here is Don with a healthy 25” fish that came to the net around 12:30 am. Thanks for putting up with a couple of rookies Don, we had a great time!

Sunday night found Tim and I patrolling another well-known spot on the west side. This evening the shallows were again thick with Lunds, Crestliners and Alumacrafts, so we opted for a different approach, namely digging baits into deeper sand outside of the weeds. We targetted depths of 14-16 feet and had consistent action between dusk and 11 pm. Tim stuck a healthy 27″ fish that was his biggest to date (pictured above), and we had 3 others at or above 25″ in addition to eaters and slimers. After a lull of an hour or so, we went shallow and were back on fish including another 25″. Things looked great until we were chased off the water by Sunday night’s rain and hail storm.

Whoops forgot the pic. Here’s Tim’s 27.

This is one of my 25s from Sunday

Here’s another 25 from Sunday

Monday night found us as guests of James Holst. I had the opportunity to catch more pigs during one night with James than I had ever imagined possible. James posted many of the details and pictures from that night in his recent report, but I thought I’d add one more of the two gators from that evening, 28.5 and 29.25. Thanks James for all the tips and for the fantastic night on the pond!