I grew up n Faribault… not too far from Waterville. Anywhere you can fish from shore on the Canon River should be good for bullies.
As for size…
The biggest bullhead I’ve ever seen went just shy of 2#, and that just plain freaked me out. I’ve seen 2 that size in my life and I got me both the same night off the same dock usurping dead suckers under a lighted bobber.
A 3# bullhead? The state record for blacks and yellows is ~3# 10 oz. to be fair, the record for a brown bullhead is 7# 1 oz… but I’ve never seen anything even approaching that size. My pair of 1# 13 oz were mutant huge in my experience. They were both browns.
For blacks and yellows, you’re looking for 12-14 inch fish that come in around 15-18 oz. That’s fairly typical of those species and are good eaters. 2-3 lb fish are of the “trophy” class… nobody would be too bummed if you kept them, but they are trophy-class fish for their species.
Crawlers on a bobber are the typical bait. If you want this Faribault, Rey the King Mill Dam, either below or above the dam. The bullheads tend to congregate below the dam, but those tend toward smaller sizes. You might find bigger ones above it.
Nearly all the lakes in that part of the state (from Faribault west to Mankato) are chock full of bullheads. And in the Waterville area it’s bonus because they stock the area with channels.
Feel free to keep your limit (100 per fishing license – so 200 if you’re both fishing)… people in the area hate them, but I was always fond of a mess of bullies. There are just so many of them treat you could keep 10,000 of them and not make any kind of dent.
Hope that helps… you’ve always been helpful to me, so here, have a little payback. PM me if you have any specific questions…
