Dead Eyes on Mille lacs

Trolled a few hours Sunday – tough bite for us, as we only scratched 4 fish. All were nice from 24 to 27″.

The one thing we noticed that was disturbing was the incredible number of dead eyes floating around the abyss . This was similar, if not worse, than the number of fish that were dead and floating during the great bite a few years back when the 14-16″ slot made keepers very rare. Every pass, no matter where we were, we would see several floaters – all nice fish from 23″ and up. I guess pulling those big fish from 30′ deep through all that warm water while the boat keeps moving is too much for many of them to take. I wonder what the mortality rate for those trolled fish is? Seems like a waste.

Tim

noticed the same thing 2 weeks ago. kinda sad.

I saw a couple dead eyes, but that was about it. Most of the other dead fish were tullibee. (Whitefish) Pretty common for them to die off this time of year.

When we were up there a couple weeks ago we saw two dead walleyes in 4 days. In all the time I’ve spent on mille lacs I’ve never seen the big numbers of dead floating walleyes people occassionally talk about. Upon inspection most are usually suckers or tullibees.

Last friday we spotted a few but nothing out of the ordinary for mid summer.

Not to worry. I have seen about 10 this year, the fish we have released trolling this year (well into triple digits) have been released healthy.

HS

We saw a dead pout that would have gone 10-12 pounds.

I seen one dead eye, probably about 25″ on the long 4th weekend. I think they do pretty well.

big g

On Saturday, in about 5 hours, we saw 15-20 eyes floating. Also, there were a handful of tulibees and pout. I would aim the boat at them and troll close just to see – and the vast majority of what we saw were eyes. 3-7lb fish. I think a good portion of the healthy releases that “just swim away” end up not making it. That is just one of the costs of fishing – nobody is at fault – it’s just reality.

Tim

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I think a good portion of the healthy releases that “just swim away” end up not making it.

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The DNR study done on catch and release mortality on Mille Lacs Lake, last season if I remember correctly, showed this to be untrue. The vast majority of fish lived.

I am with you though, when I see a big girl floating it makes me a little sad to see such a specimen end up as seagull food.

James – interesting point. If I remember correctly, they took a bunch of hooked fish – put them in a pen, and monitored?

Was that study done with fish caught earlier in the cooler/shallow water season, or late season warm water/deep fish? Huge difference between the two.

Tim

They had release pens set up all over the lake, even the flats.

We saw one on Saturday on the north end. A fat 24 incher.

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James – interesting point. If I remember correctly, they took a bunch of hooked fish – put them in a pen, and monitored?

Was that study done with fish caught earlier in the cooler/shallow water season, or late season warm water/deep fish? Huge difference between the two.

Tim

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If my memory serves it was not done early in the year. I think it was late june – early july. I’ll try and verify but I think it took place right about this time of year.

We’ll see how good my memory is… lol

It was indeed late june as Jon Jordan posted a link to early results on the 29th of June back in 2005. That link no longer works as the page it was linking to has been pulled but that post date would support my contention that the study was done late june – early july.

DNR Mortality Study

No if we can only find that actual study we’ll have something…

I am out there a lot and I havnt seen to many floaters.One of the biggest reasons fish dont survive is being pulled up too fast from deeper water.The good thing this year is the fish are very strong and are coming up slow otherwise you would see a lot more.

The study was done throughout the summer and the DNR found that they had overestimated the hooking mortality percentage that they used for harvest purposes.

I was out Saturday and saw one eye, one sucker and a tulibee in six plus hours of fishing. Also, the DNR still had release pens on some of the north end flats two weeks ago. Does anyone know if they are still doing a mortality study?

for as many people that are out there fishing, i don’t think that there has been to many. i have been fishing all over the lake the past few days and i have seen more perch and tulibee’s than walleyes. the walleyes that i have seen have been on the large side though. the walleyes are in good shape, not to worry…..tom fellegy

Thanks for all of the replies! I guess with the limited success we had – all those fish seemed like it must be a high mortality rate!

Looking forward to get out again, unless I can line another salmon trip to Lake Mich instead…….MUCH better fights!

Tim

I was out trolling on Saturday and took notice of a few walleyes thrown in on a high number of dead bait fish. I netted one to take a look at because it was huge. It had to be in the 28-30″ range I was going to take a picture and a few measurements, but the smell made me place it back in the water and get upwind

we brought a long a counter while out trolling and here is what we saw. Saturday we counted 53 tulibee and 3 walleyes floating on Sunday we counted 68 tulibee and no walleyes.