Mille Lacs Jumbos

Had a short window to hit mille lacs this past weekend. I was sure glad I did. I was able to finally put together a decent perch bite, something I have been waiting for a long time. I think the last good ice bite for jumbos was about 4 or 5 years ago. After a bit of searching finally stumbled onto the mother load school. In typical jumbo perch fashion a simple 1/8oz spoon (gold) and minnow head, had perch screaming off the bottom or sometimes picking the spoon off the bottom. Overall a very good day with 1 over walleye 23″, one mysterious fish that peel drag for about 2 minutes ( pike or ski), and one 14″ male walleye for the table.

Focused on shallow water yet, less than 15′. Had good ice depth, but not great clear ice. A lot of ice moving below the main sheet causing some holes unfishable after the ice moved periodically throughout the day.

Cannot wait to get back up after this school of perch, hopefully they stay shallow for a while, sure is fun…

Thats great fishing Calvin!!

Awesome Cal

Those look great Calvin.

A few questions…….when will this school start sliding out to the deeps?

What is holding these fish shallow, weeds, food etc.?

When they do go deeper, do they usually head to adjacent deep water so you can target them or do they pull stakes and vanish to god knows where?

Be interesting to see if you can stay on em

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Those look great Calvin.

A few questions…….when will this school start sliding out to the deeps?

What is holding these fish shallow, weeds, food etc.?

When they do go deeper, do they usually head to adjacent deep water so you can target them or do they pull stakes and vanish to god knows where?

Be interesting to see if you can stay on em

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When will these fish start to slide out? I would imagine these fish are going to stay put as long as their food source does. This is a rock/sand area that is still putting out some bugs, I also did notice a few YOY (young of the year) perch in the belly of the bigger fish. So the new hatch is still around. I have heard these fish can stay shallow all winter.

When the go deeper they will transition to food, gotta stay on bugs or YOY bait. The perch relate to contours just the same as walleye, however just not as moody as a walleye. Studying the Lakemaster chip early in the season will give classic perch locations. Shallow rock area’s (less than 8′) that they were feeding on in the fall, then slowly transition to the deeper (20+ fow) softer bottoms that will give up bugs for them to eat as well.

The challenge is to locate the bigger fish within the school, sometimes its luck and sometimes homework in the fall/early winter pays off, for me its luck.

Thanks Cal

Awesome info thank you!

Nice mess of perch Cal!

Thanks a lot Cal. Great info to go with a great mess of perch.

Nice job Cal