With the early full moon of September I decided early that I would wait until October to make the first trip up. But I couldn’t start my next job for a few days and obviously that means I had to go fishing. With water temps at 68 I figured the bite would be tough and it was but not as bad as I thought. Night one belonged to the smallmouth. A purple and chrome Storm Thunderstick absolutely was the ticket. We managed 23 smallies pulling on a sand flat at 2.5 mph. The key was to start on the deep side of the flat angle up into the shallows around 2 feet and turn the kicker as sharp as you could really hit the throttle and once back into the deep water put the kicker in neutral and 75% of the fish hit as the boat was completely at rest. I’m not a genius, by pure accident I had made the turn and put the boat in neutral to grab a candy bar, whack. I duplicated it on the next pass caught a fish and that was our pattern for the rest of the night.
Night two we decided to go out of Garrison which I have never done and found fish out on a reef. While the eyes didn’t cooperate very well, the smallmouth and rock bass were on fire. I had never caught a Mille Lacs rock bass before and was shocked when the first one made it into the boat. I had no idea they got that big. We had a blast fighting those fish but I was worried about finding some eyes.
The last night I was determined to find some eyes. I hit a spot that produced last year in September the only problem was I didn’t have the wind I needed. I learned last year that shallow running raps were a good producer when the temps are still warm so I started out with them and never tried anything else. I only run #9 SSR’s when I am on Mille Lacs and that night one color caught 85% of the fish-Purpledescent. My spot was a rocky shoreline with a gradual taper to deep water extending to a point with a very steep break, I know there are very few of those in Mille Lacs. Most of the fish came going along the steep break into the shallower water at 2-2.2mph. We didn’t catch many big fish but their fight made up for their lack of size. I’ve had some good fights in October but that warmer water really puts a jolt into them. I got one fish to boatside and didn’t get him in the net for a good 5 minutes, at one point it actually took 30 feet of drag on 1 run. Below are a few of the fish and another rock bass that ate a #9 SSR right before sunrise. Can’t wait till the temps drop and the big fish are on the chew in October.
September 5, 2009 at 1:31 am
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