Mille Lacs 1/28 – 1/29

Well my first trip to a Mille Lacs sleeper was disappointing. We had a house rented out of Red Door from 10 am Sat – 10 am Sunday. They had the house out on the flats past the first drop off. 6 guys, 8 holes, 5 vexs, 2 cameras and 1 fish. 23″ Walleye came on a rattle reel at 7:20 pm. I even went out with the portable and drilled 20 or so holes in search mode, but could not find any change in bottom and no marks. We wanted to go explore more, but with some unsafe ice not too far away we were warmed not to venture too far out. Wondered how the other hundreds of house fishing that same break line were doing. We tried every spoon, jig, bait we could come up with. Only spotted 5 fish total that swam by the cameras. Of course my rattle reel went off like crazy at 5:22 am and by the time someone got out of the bunk and made a try for it, nothing there. Wish we would have found some fish as we had some “virgin” ice fishermen we were trying to get excited about this sport. Lets just say we did not have many votes for doing this again. Personally, I would rather pull some sleds with 4 wheelers and move to find them, but I knew most in the group wanted to try the sleeper, and it was a fun time with family, but no fish

I have a house on the East side of the lake and it was pretty slow for us this weekend too. Friday night we had 2 keepers, broke the line on 2, a few small ones, and atleast a dozen where the fish let the minnow go. Saturday afternoon and evening was really slow with just one keeper, 2 too small, and a few bites that were dropped. This time of year always gets tougher and the weather didn’t help. For those on the move it sounds like the weekend still went pretty well though.

I fished out of the Red Door yesterday afternoon from 230-530, I was fishing our in deeper water like 26-28 feet, I caught a tulipee, and 2 perch. One perch was 12.75″ which was a nice bonus. I did see a bunch of fish on the MarCum, but not a lot of interest in those fish. I think most were tulipee’s as they would come in high and spook very easy when I jigged the spoon. High sunny skies didn’t help much either. So you were not alone in a tough bite on Mille Lacs this weekend. Most guys I talked to said the same thing.

Welllllll….. Its too bad that all the great reports have been going on and it was basically a swing and a miss. ML is not an easy nut to crack and considering you were only on it for 24 hours it is not really surprising… I wish I could tell you more…

We got a guide (Bobber, Bob Carlson and he did a fine job) for a 1/2 day the first day of our summer week in July, one of the toughest months for the lake. There was a full perch bloom that year, making the fishing even tougher. Thanks to the SMB, we still had a fish catching trip and our second one was better. Realistically that is where we are in the winter period right now as well, the toughest part.

Personally, I wouldn’t give up on her yet, but know my guys wanted muskies and ‘eyes, again not the two easiest in July. We made the move, but I would still go back at an optimum time, not the tough ones. Just my observations from our 14 days there.

Mark

Yea. It aint no Canadian fly-in lake. For sure not a guarantee. Been there.

We got eight perch (five in one fast flurry) and a 26.5″ walleye from Saturday at noon till Sunday night. We are out of Hunters. My dad is up there now and cant find them anywhere!
Dream’n

Unfortunatly I think you may have fallen victim to bad timing and good ole mother nature… The cold weather/accompanying barametric pressure shift really seemed to put the fish in a passive mood. I know quite a few people who have been on fish all year and 95% of what I heard was that Sat/Sunday was the slowest we’ve seen all year

Even though we did manage to put together a decent weekend because of previous time I’ve spent out there already this year it was a real tough bite out for all of us… I hope the unfortunate timing hasn’t left you with a bad impression of Mille Lacs and Red Door

There was also a TON of traffic out there from Thursday thru the weekend. Lots of houses getting pulled… plowing… and folks getting out on the ice. Not exactly helping either.

Pull the camera up. You wont see them under the ice but you will have a much better chance of seeing them up close on the end of your line.

Thanks for all the encouragement guys. I think I had my hopes up pretty high. Seeing the video posted here on Friday with those crazy IDO guys sure didn’t help Like I said, I think my style is more run and gun than sitting in the house.

The weather definately had them in an off mood, the fish I marked were interested at first then casually swam away. I didn’t care though as it was the first time i had been out in 2 weeks after breaking my leg out there! Had a friend help me get the house set up and fished a few hours sunday from 1-6. Had my 4 year old with for the last few hours and got him 2 perch and I got a keeper eye. Also the fishing feeding time calendar had sat sun pegged as poor and this coming weekend as best, we will see