I finally got the opportunity to get back on the water! The summer sure gets busy with the kids and last weekend I was running between baseball games and dance recitals.
Joining me yesterday was a long time friend of mine (Rick) and his son (Sam). As many of you already know, my true passion is chasing monster bucks over in Buffalo County, WI. Rick has a 200 acre dairy farm and over the years he has let me hunt his property. I’ve harvested a Thanksgiving morning buck on his farm back in 2002 and several turkeys (including a mature tom this year).
When I’m over there, I always lend a hand when it comes to doing chores around the farm. Now granted, he still calls me a “city slicker” 
but I know he appreciates any help he can get. In return, he let’s me stay with him when I’m hunting on my other lease and we’ve had many good nights sharing stories at the local bars in Durand and Arkansaw. 
I’ve been talking about catching big walleyes on Mille Lacs for years and extended him many invitations. However, it’s very difficult for him to get away and find someone else responsible for milking the cows.
Well… we finally made it happen! 
Rick found a friend that could help him out for one day! The plan was to finish milking the cows Monday night, drive to my house in Maple Grove afterwards, stay the night and head up to Mille Lacs in the morning. The plan was going smoothely until one of their cows calved at 7pm. 
When running a dairy farm, you just can’t plan these things. They arrived a little late but they made it around 11pm. It was pretty funny to hear Rick complain about “rush hour traffic” (yes – at 11pm!). 
If he only knew…
The next morning we hit the water about 9am and right away we hooked our first fish – a 26 incher and Sam is on the board! 
(caught on a #9 with a snap weight and planer board). He is smiling like I’ve never seen before! I asked him if that was his biggest walleye to date and he looked at me and said “Biggest??? I’ve never even caught a legal walleye in WI before!” (15 inches)
The bite was very consistent for us in the morning and we boated 10 walleyes in the first couple of hours. All the fish were between 25 – 27 inches with the exception of one 23 incher. All three rods were catching fish. Deep tail dancers via leadcore was my other set up that was working well.
And then it happened…. 
The slight breeze died down and the lake became dead calm. The temp started to rise and we started to cook! 
It was HOT and the flies and bugs were sticking to our sweaty bodies.
The bite also slowed down. I always think it’s interesting when it gets dead calm on the water how everything kind of disappears from your sonar. The amount of bugs and balls of baitfish just kind of go away along with the arcs. However, we kept at it and managed to boat a few more fish. Due to the heat and the bite slowing down, we finally ended the day early around 4pm because they wanted to stop at Cabelas (for the first time) and still had to drive home to WI last night.
When we left the lake I only saw two other boats fishing and there were only 4 other trailers at the Casino boat ramp. It was hard to believe that only a short month ago, the same place was full of trucks and trailers.
All in all, it was a pretty good day of fishing and even a better day enjoying it with friends. 
And the best thing about it…………. was seeing that huge smile from Sam 
when he boated his first big fish of the day!
on those big girls. Congrats! 
Awesome report as always! I’ve noticed too once the water turns to glass the fish shut off.
