Fish Survey at Fountain Lake

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DNR Fish Survey

Great article jason, Its good to see the lakes in our area holding strong for the game fish. Its just too bad we dont have more lakes with walleyes.
Wallster ><((((>

Thanks Jason. Very interesting to see it acturally being done.
Thanks, Bill

Cool stuff!! Thanks for sharing.

Anybody fish Fountain or Albert Lea lake this week. Any advice on baits for Early (7-noon) morning Walleyes.

For numbers of fish, you can’t beat the channel just below the fountain lake dam. But plan on having lots of company as there is usually at least 10-20 anglers there 24-7. Lots of good walleyes between 14-17 inches being caught on minnows and twister tail grubs.

For walleyes in the 20-30 inch range, I would try trolling shad raps along the rocks on fountain lake. The deeper hole near Hatch Bridge is usually the best and troll as close to the bank as possible.

Hope that helps! Give us a recap of your trip and take pictures!

Jason
Thanks for the help with Fountain. I will appologize in advance for the lengthy tale but it was just too much for a couple sentences.
We pulled into Albert Lea with our 14 ft jon boat about 7:30 am. We headed to the dam for some directions and just to check the action.
We headed to the bait shop and got the boat in at Brookside ramp shortly after 8.
We were alone at the landing and hurried to launch so some hot fishing action would help us forget the cilly 26 degrees and the steady NW wind.
The 9.9 Johnson had little trouble shattering the 1/4 inch ice in the channel and we entered the main lake with Shad Raps in tow. Not sure where to find the Hatch bridge, we headed I belive WNW as we headed into the wind. The Johnson wasn’t running too well. It killed several times at troll speed and I soon warmed up on the pull rope.
We made it over to a bridge, all the while crossing about 6-7 feet of water.
Just past the bridge, everything changed. The motor killed. Two pulls and the rope broke. It was too short to pull directly on the flywheel so it was dead. Not to be detered, I plopped the trolling moter in and hit the switch. We got about twelve feet out of it and it slowed to about 2 rpms and quit. I had charged the battery all night, but it chose now to expire.
Well, I haven’t rowed in a long time but we turned the boat around, back under the bridge and because we were in the nw corner, knew the wind would give us a good drift all the way across the pond. We threw on a crawler (the bait store was temporarily closed to move so we had nothing but Kwik Trip crawlers) and let the gales of October take over.
About 2/3 across, Buffy’s (Jason, you may remember her from the 2001 LP state softball runnerup season in 2001. She was the catcher.)pole bent in half! Fish on! She adjusted her drag as the fish stripped line. She had it about 30 yards from the boat and suddenly her reel gears stripped. I messed with it while she procedded to pull it in by hand. Her first and a nice size Catfish. See pic. Now we’re fishin.
We had drifted nearly to the other shore so we had to start rowing toward the landing.
She threw out her crawler again and I row/trolled with a Shad Rap. We were making headway againt the wind when suddenly my rod tried to exit the boat from my bent leg grip on it. I recovered and set the hook. Fish on!
My reel had no trouble hauling in the Carp. See pic. Although they do fight pretty good when you snag’em by the tail. It made me dream of Salmon snaggin’ at Manitowoc almost.
Buffy volunteered to row. Her first time. She did great, even getting us back thru the 1/4″ ice in the channel. See pic.
We loaded the boat and by then had used up our morning. We headed back to town a little disappointed by the equipment malady but happy about the catch.
I wonder if she will go with me in my boat again? She would probably want to ride in your boat next time.
Thanks for your help Jason, “A bad day fishing is better than a good day of work anytime”.

Randge & Buffy

Buffy’s Cat

Randges Carp

Sorry can’t get the 3rd pix to go

Glad you had a good time despite the equipment troubles!
It has been a cold one out there this past week! Water temps dropped from 60 down to 44 in a matter of a few days. I didn’t realize you could still catch those catfish this late in the season. There are plenty of nice channel cats in Fountain Lake. The DNR has done a nice job stocking them over the last several years.

I do recognize Buffy from the state softball team. Looks like she’s pretty good at catching fish, just like she was with softballs!

I was out on Fountain last Tuesday for a bass fishing story. Caught over a dozen bass, but no giants. The story aired this morning on Channel 6 and will run again tonight at 6pm. Also went out yesterday (Sunday) afternoon and caught a few, including a 3 pounder. Like I said, water temps have plummetted and the fish are much more tentative to bite the bass lures.

I’ll post a link to the story once its put on our website!

Here’s that link!!!

Howland’s Headin’ Outdoors