Mille lacs perch

John Rasmussen wrote:

Is there a minimum blade size to make the copter effective? Asking for a friend.

I dont know for sure. All I know is an uncle of mine would always bring his snooping ass out on his deck with binoculars whenever I would work on my garden or food plots out on my dads farm. One day after a few to many beers I was taking a leak and my buddy asked if I was playing with myself and I said no im giving uncle Bob the weiner copter. After my buddy about died laughing we noticed old uncle snoopy Bob wasnt on his deck anymore. Havent noticed him watching me since. Had to be 20+ years ago.

Pailofperch wrote:

If I’m gonna go Internet viral, I sure better be the one to make money off it!

Shrinkage!

I’ll be out of Red Door this weekend.

Any updates on the Perch Bite? Buddy of mine ran up there last week and crushed them. Me….well.. ..not so much haha. Went twice this week, out of Red Door for the mud flats. Fished just off of them in the mud with no luck. Caught a bunch huge tuilipe and 3 tiny tiny perch. Also tried out Hunter on Flamingo road, just off the bottom of gravel break and caught 50 tiny tiny perch as well. Send help, who can point me in the right direction here?

Chris Meyer wrote:

who can point me in the right direction here?

Chris, it’s a big lake, right!?

I was out a couple weeks ago, today, and I’ll be out tomorrow. Each time has been pretty similar. Haven’t exactly crushed them yet, but we’ve had decent action and caught a few toads as well. Fish off the deep edge of structure first thing in the morning and last thing before dark. And further from the structure midday. Mud or soft silty bottom is best as the perch are gorging on bugs that live there. Nearly every one pukes out a good pile. When you’re in a good spot, you’ll have schools of perch coming through every 10 minutes or so. You pick off what you can and be ready for the next school. They’re constantly on the move and in a different mood every hour. Today live minnows actually worked pretty good. The other 3 days was only jigging. 1 day minnow heads were best. 2 days it was larva.

I should mention, Tullibee and perch are generally in the same area as they eat a lot of the same stuff. But!, if you’re catching tiny perch, I’d move. Not very often you catch tiny perch and big perch together. Move further away from the flats. More basin and deeper water. 30+ feet.
Not sure how much you fish perch, and not trying to mansplain…. Just offering some tips.

The handful of days we crushed them we were not in 30 ft of water by any means. Much shallower. Seen massive crowds going deeo and we just chuckled

Pailofperch wrote:

I should say last time out, there was atleast 4-5 drones flying around. Most likely spying on people. As everytime they would pause over us for 30 seconds. Should be illegal for multiple reasons. Lowest of low in my opinion.

Sounds like it’s time to invest in a high powered net-launcher

Went out perchin’ in 1985 with a bunch of employees from Marv Koep’s Nisswa Bait Shop. We ended up on 9 Mile and how we ever found it was a mystery. It was after walleye season ended and there were no shacks around. There was no GPS and even Tutt’s map didn’t exist. We murdered some very large perch. Nobody had rods with a spinning reel yet. They were mostly using a stick with the line wrapped end-to-end. I used a Swish Rod with a pencil sinker and couldn’t get the bait down fast enough. For me, it was a once in a lifetime ice trip. Went back to 9 Mile several times using a GPS and good GPS maps and never got into the big perch again. Went out to a spot on The Midget about a dozen years ago for some nice perch and some real nice tulibee. One night, I went back to the Midget with the GPS for Tulibee. Drove out at midnight. It was 28F and a full moon with no wind. Could not keep my bait in the water. As soon as the sun cracked the horizon, fishing stopped.

How is truck travel after the last storm?

I plan on going out on the west end and moving around the deeps around the flats and searching until we find some concentrations. I’ll be doing my best to avoid the tourney areas and crowds in general. Any other tips or general ideas on areas to start the search?

We were on the north and east side over the past weekend. You can get off the roads in spots, but there are some drifts out there that are hard to see. We saw anywhere from 4-8 inches of snow off the roads. You can do it, but bring the appropriate safety gear in case you get stuck.

We saw 26 inches of ice. I gotta imagine we gained a couple more this week.

Also know there is a a big pressure ridge running north to south and crosses right over 7-mile flat. I am not positive how far the ridge run in each direction from 7-mile but looked to go a ways in each direction. With some effort you would be able to drive a truck most anywhere.

Francis K wrote:

Also know there is a a big pressure ridge running north to south and crosses right over 7-mile flat. I am not positive how far the ridge run in each direction from 7-mile but looked to go a ways in each direction. With some effort you would be able to drive a truck most anywhere.

That Ridge Runs straight to Doe Island and its impressive! It shifted pretty good last Saturday around 1:00pm. Almost knocked me off the counter I was leaning on.

Yeah, my son was fishing 30′-40′ beside it when it shifted. He may have peed a little in his bibs.

Alex Fox wrote:

We were on the north and east side over the past weekend. You can get off the roads in spots, but there are some drifts out there that are hard to see. We saw anywhere from 4-8 inches of snow off the roads. You can do it, but bring the appropriate safety gear in case you get stuck.

We saw 26 inches of ice. I gotta imagine we gained a couple more this week.

How was the fishing?

Thanks for the travel report gentlemen.

Next question, do I need an extension? Just messin.

If you see a black tundra with a topper and three stooges trying to find some perch stop over for a beer and say hi.

FinnyDinDin wrote:

Next question, do I need an extension? Just messin.

I think that question is actually pretty valid!
If you’re drilling inside a house, I’m pretty confident you might need one. Otherwise direct on ice it’s getting close.

I was out last Thursday and helped two different guys that couldn’t get through inside their wheelhouses. And it’s been nothing but cold since then.

Yea I have one. My buddy is going up for the perch party with a wheel house and he has called all over and everyone is sold out. Extensions don’t hardly sell until they are needed then they gone quick. I’m gonna steer clear of the perch party. I told him to bring his chisel to finish his holes off.

If you are out making holes for hoping around you should get buy without an extension however I use one simply for saving my back from bending over repeatedly. This alone is worth the price of $20-$25.

I do remember seeing them at Reeds a few weeks ago.

Made it out to Mille Lacs this past weekend. Two guys fished a total of about 12 hours. Came home with 31 jumbos. Definitely not fast and furious but well worth it. We were totally off the beaten path (got stuck a couple times) and nobody fished around us. No fancy live scope or anything. Everything came off of spoons with either waxies or red spikes. Had to sort thru a ton of dinks to get our fish. Not sure if that means we were not quite in the right spot or if that is the norm. Sure was a great couple of days to be out fishing.

Gerty wrote:

Made it out to Mille Lacs this past weekend. Two guys fished a total of about 12 hours. Came home with 31 jumbos. Definitely not fast and furious but well worth it. We were totally off the beaten path (got stuck a couple times) and nobody fished around us. No fancy live scope or anything. Everything came off of spoons with either waxies or red spikes. Had to sort thru a ton of dinks to get our fish. Not sure if that means we were not quite in the right spot or if that is the norm. Sure was a great couple of days to be out fishing.

Sounds better than my last trip out. I do not fish Mille Lacs as much as I did in the past. I tell my wife that I need to get out fishing more to sharpen my skills.

I am planning on heading up tomorrow. Wanted to avoid the crowds from this weekend.

We did pretty good on Saturday. Not huge numbers but we got some true jumbo piggies. First two spots were duds and found them on the third. My old man and his buddy both caught their biggest perch. Sunday we searched high and low, deep to shallow scoping and fishing and never did find the big ones. Must have checked at least a dozen spots. I hope to head back sometime in March.

FinnyDinDin wrote:

We did pretty good on Saturday. Not huge numbers but we got some true jumbo piggies. First two spots were duds and found them on the third. My old man and his buddy both caught their biggest perch. Sunday we searched high and low, deep to shallow scoping and fishing and never did find the big ones. Must have checked at least a dozen spots. I hope to head back sometime in March.

This march should be a excellent time to get up and target those fish. That’s our plans as well.

It is official. I have no horseshoe up my…. Finding these hog perch should be easier. The bright spot was the very pleasant weather today. I think that I need to fish for some crappies to boost my confidence in my fishing skills.

Used my new Ion Alpha Plus for the first time. It worked great for running around drilling a lot of holes through thick ice. I would say that the blades might be a little too aggressive. It felt like I needed to lift up on it as it drilled.

Anyone try and pickle tullibee? After cutting away the wide lateral line crap the balance looked pretty good for pickling. Going to give it a try.

I see that Garrison Sports is pulling their bridge tomorrow (Thursday) already. Pretty much shuts down their road as that heave is pretty close to shore. Seems crazy as much ice and as cold as it was that they are calling it a season. Plenty other access points, just seems quick.

Quite a few people out fishing for perch yesterday. I would think that with the added perch interest this year that road access fees are still a viable business plan until mother nature maybe throws in a snowstorm, heaves, cracks and/or shoreline erosion problems.

The off road travel with my 4 x 4 truck yesterday went just fine. I did pull out a 4 x 4 truck that drove in a thicker patch of snow yesterday but his tires were crap. Twin pines road did not go out very far when I last visited but if they are still open then you are not that far from the Garrison Sports roads. You should be able to travel off road from Twin Pines to access the Garrison Sports road system.

In prior years when there was a good perch population did the fish move in shallow as you get later into the season or do they normally stay out deep in the mud basins? Do they look for shallow weeds, rock or sand?

Gerty wrote:

I see that Garrison Sports is pulling their bridge tomorrow (Thursday) already. Pretty much shuts down their road as that heave is pretty close to shore. Seems crazy as much ice and as cold as it was that they are calling it a season. Plenty other access points, just seems quick.

I know he likes to take some time off to do other things as he has a young family. Going 7 days a week would be a grind.