Red Lake 01-09-10

Went up to Red for the day on Saturday. Hit the ice about 11:00 and went out of Rogers on the South end. Never been on the South end before, but renting a sleeper down there with some buddies in February so I wanted to check it out. Fished mostly 14-15 feet of water, moved around a few times, pretty cold to move too much. Caught about 12 walleyes, 2 16’s and the rest small 10-12’s and one perch. Bite was real light, missed as many as I caught. On the dead stick they would pull the bobber down all the way under the ice, set the hook and you could feel the fish pull the minnow off, (very frustrating). Also pretty skiddish, at times would mark on the Vexilar and when I would jig the spoon, they would disappear. All in all OK, just hoping for a more aggressive bite in February.

Thanks for posting. I’m headed up with 11 guys Thursday to Sunday. Staying out of Westwind, we will be blessed with high 20s and maybe even a 30 degree day!! We may not even need the heat during the day in our portables. I’m pretty pumped to get up there.

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Went up to Red for the day on Saturday. Hit the ice about 11:00 and went out of Rogers on the South end. Never been on the South end before, but renting a sleeper down there with some buddies in February so I wanted to check it out. Fished mostly 14-15 feet of water, moved around a few times, pretty cold to move too much. Caught about 12 walleyes, 2 16’s and the rest small 10-12’s and one perch. Bite was real light, missed as many as I caught. On the dead stick they would pull the bobber down all the way under the ice, set the hook and you could feel the fish pull the minnow off, (very frustrating). Also pretty skiddish, at times would mark on the Vexilar and when I would jig the spoon, they would disappear. All in all OK, just hoping for a more aggressive bite in February.

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If you want to go out of the South end try Mort’s. It just upsets me to no end anytime I see or hear of someone going out of Rogers. They are the worst people to deal with. Very rude people. I’ve spent a fair amount of time on Red being very happy with everyone on the lake up there EXCEPT Rogers. I take every opportunity to tell people how poor Rogers is and how the people at Mort’s bent over backwards to accommodate us last minute when Rogers screwed us over.

Midnight, sounds like a decent trip. A couple eaters and some action. When I lived up in GR we used to hit Red a lot year round.

I have accessed all over on URL and we have settled on Rogers as being our favorite place. I can say I have never had an upleasant dealing with them. I have had a couple of bad experiences with some others on the lake, but it is my finding that Roger’s has always been top notch for us.

Tim

I was up there from last thursday through yesterday fishing out of Johnny P’s houses. It was pretty hit and miss the whole time, until saturday night when things started heating up a little after that front moved through. Got a hodge podge of fish, no limits on the walleyes but did get a handful out of our house, biggest was just over 21″. Also a perch, a 14″ crappie, and a small muskie of all things.

Did you get a pic of the Muskie if so could you post it?

I do have one, will have to get it off my cell phone. He was just a baby, maybe 14″. If you still want to see one that small I will try to post it and see if someone can tell me if it was a tiger or not.

Hey huck you could send it to me via txt MSG @ (612)801-6822 I bet it’s a baby pike.

Could very well be a baby pike too, I’m not really sure. Heres the pic.

100% sure, thats a pike

Juvenile pike. We see a lot of these in the area you where fishing. They really do look like mini musky when they first appear but after rolling them over and counting the pores under the jaw line it will deem them pike. Six or more pores it’s a musky, five or less it’s a pike. Not saying a few musky are not present in Upper Red Lake but I would put good money on yet another young pike with the classic young fish bar markings. What throws people is the colors look like a adult musky and the fins tend to have a sharp appearance to them along with the classic Upper Red Lake red/brown pike color phase we have. I even had one a few years ago I would have been willing to contest it was a young musky until the pore count and closer look at the scales on the cheek, the pike will have scales under and behind the eye as the musky will only have them behind the eye.

I have sent several pictures of these young fellers to the fisheries boys and always get the same response, juvenile pike.

But for the record I do believe we have a few Musky cruising around the lake, it would inevitable to say a few would not get in via connecting waterways, in with minnow buckets or even with the walleye stock. It does happen.

We have also had Largemouth Bass and Bluegill caught in the test nets per the DNR and a few caught hook and line so anything is possible.

anyone catch a small sturgen yet? im sure i read reports of them put in also a few years back?

Cool, thanks for the info. Dont think I ever caught a pike that small before and wasnt sure if there were even muskie up there. Threw it back pretty quick, didnt take much time to look at it.