Weekend Fishing Trip

This weekend my husband Billy, my Dad (Rootski here on IDO), and I spent a chilly weekend camping and fishing in Northern MN. We started off in Northern St. Louis County. The ice had just gone off on the lakes up there and it was cold and cloudy. Water temperatures were about 45 degrees and it actually started snowing a bit while we were out! Fishing was dead. No action anywhere we tried. The overnight low was in the upper 20s and it was quite possibly the coldest night of our lives. My shivers turned to shaking and it made for a long, long night in the tent. Morning fishing yielded a few crappies. But they were small and the wind was relentless, so we decided to pack up camp and head southwest in hopes of warmer air and water temps.

We headed to our deer shack in Cass County. Water temps were a bit warmer, about 47-48 degrees and partly cloudy, and the change of location was just enough that we found some action! The usual spots on the lake were quiet, so we tried along a group of reeds and found a bunch of crappies and some sunnies in about 3-4 feet. Presentation was simple – a small jig under a bobber for me and Billy. My dad of course was fly fishing. Chartreuse, black, and white seemed to produce better than my go-to color of hot pink, so I eventually put away my pink maribou jigs and rubber skirts in lieu of a small black and yellow jig. I caught lots of fish with that one.

Saturday evening’s fishing got a little interesting. Low, dark clouds came in pretty quick, followed by a sudden burst of 40 mile an hour wind gusts! It was blowing so hard it actually pulled the richter anchor up off the bottom and pushed us down wind a bit before we cruised back near the landing to wait it out. It tried to rain, but before long the wind carried it away and we were back out fishing until dark.

Over the weekend we caught a good mess of keepers, saw an abundance of wildlife, and had a wonderful weekend. The unscheduled change of location was a great idea and I’m glad Billy and I finally had the opportunity to show my dad our deer shack!

Nice mess of fish and winter camping. Sounds like a fun weekend. So where is a photo of the deer camp?

Thanks for sharing Sharon!

No flyrod for the Rootmaster??

Nice report Sharon!

Purpledescent nail polish? Would that look good on Cat guides?

Here’s the 3 of us sitting outside the crusty deer shack! The wood-burning stoves made it feel like a PALACE after the frigid camping temps on Thurs night.

Of course my Dad was fly fishing! I don’t think he brought any other tackle besides stuff for fly fishing. I don’t know how he does it – fly casting in that wind. It seemed like the wind followed us no matter where we went!

BK asked if I was fly fishing last weekend. This year I didn’t bring anything except my trusty 6 weight Fly rod. It worked out very well. We found most of our fish in staging areas away from the shore lines. Long points and saddles between islands and shore produced a lot of fish. Typical depths were around 4 to 5 feet, and the Crappies seemed to be relating to old reeds. A slow presentation near the bottom worked well provided you could detect the bites. The cold water had them biting very light at times.

I was using a modified pheasant tail nymph. The version of this fly commonly used for trout has a thorax made of peacock herl. The version I tie for panfish has a dubbed thorax made of yarn or fur that’s in a bright color. Fluorescent Chartreuse, hot pink, bright blue, etc. The fly in the upper right hand corner of the picture is one of these flies “right out of the box”. The lower right hand corner has one of these flies after about 50 Crappies and Bluegills have had their way with it!

I was rigged a little different than usual too. The fish were biting light, and at times they really wanted it dead slow or completely stopped. I ended up using a tapered leader that came down to a 5X tippet (about 4 pound test). I added a small BB sized split hot, and a “strike indicator”. In the world of fly fishing a “strike indicator” is really a bobber. What I was doing was actually a scaled down version of a jig and bobber like most guys use in the spring for Crappies. The difference here was that I was using a very small lure (#8 hook) and a tiny little bobber so I could detect the slightest bite. The fly rod let me cast it as far as I needed to, and then I’d watch that little yellow bobber for hint of a bite. Most of the time it would sink down an inch or two and I’d set the hook into another nice Bluegill.

It was a long tough weekend with a lot of miles driven, cold temperatures endured, and just plain hard work. But in the end we found some decent panfish and had a great time.

Rootski

Thats a great looking deer shack. Can almost picture orange and deer hanging in the trees around it.

Thanks Root!

I tried using a strike indicator once and I didn’t like it, but I know sometimes it’s the difference between catching and fishing.

I had a similar weekend. I was camping in Solon Springs just outside of Superior. Boy did it get cold over night! Buried all the way down to the bottom of my sleeping bag pretty much. The fish were pretty lip locked on the lake over there too!