Well, how did it go for everyone?
Three of us fished the Malmo/Fishers area Saturday and had a decent day. We rigged during the day and while the bite was not hot, it was consistent. Pretty much all day we watched boats netting fish regardless of where we were at. We did get into a good bite on some younger class fish bobber fishing a rock from around 9-11pm. We ended up boating 40 fish, with the largest being 22″.
I am looking forward to getting back up there soon!
I fished the same area as you yesterday with my dad from about 3pm-7pm. Drifted leeches on a lindy with 1/2oz weight. Had to use a drift sock with decent east wind. Stayed from 17-20 fow with all fish coming from about 18. We caught 7 walleyes and 1 decent pike. Only counted 15 boats within eyesight. Nets appeared to be dropping consistently, like you said, but not constantly by ANY means. There were only 4-5 other rigs at castaways. Granted it was Mother’s Day, but definitely expected to see more… And as far as these reports I’m seeing all over Facebook of guys catching 80-100 fish per day, what in the WORLD were all of us on the NE sand doing wrong??? In getting really annoyed by these posts because it either means everyone is lying or I am a lousy fisherman… And where is everybody else’s report who usually fishes Mille lacs? It’s been absolutely dead on here.
We pulled cranks alot during the last 3 days and caught a lot of fish. Not 80-100 a day, but very good fishing. We got walleyes from 16-27″ and also a lot of smallies, biggest being 21″. Depth was between 6-15′ of water. Lots of fish and a great time. My hands are tore up from handling fish, it’s a great problem to have. 
couple pics from the weekend
walleye.jpeg
smallie.jpg
grebe.jpg
21-smallie.jpg
27-eye.jpg
We were out right at Midnight Saturday morning and until 3:30 am we boated well over 30 walleyes with 5 over 20 between the 2 of us. We pulled cranks at 1.6 mph anywhere from 7-10 feet of water on Rock/Sand transitions. Range of fish was anywhere from 14″-26″ with majority in the 17-19 inch range. During the day we rested and we found Saturday night slower but still good on numbers with 3 big fish at 24.5″,25.5″, and a thick 27″ that rounded out the trip.
We fished only during the day saturday and sunday. Caught 8 sat and i went out solo on sunday starting at 11 am to 3 pm , sunday.caught 6 and 3 smallies and a 29 inch northern. Smallest was 23 inches with most 26 and 27 inch…Water was deep…27 foot
And 22 foot as sun was high and they wanted shiners .
Two of the better days i have had because all were big fish.
Spawned out but healthy.this was central and SW part of lake.
Hardly anyone fishing , except 3 mile had 20 boats on it.
A memoreable couple days for me.
Only saw a couple of launches…..i feel sorry for the resorters.
I ll buy my fish at Teals if i can catch big hawgs like this on 6 lbtest….the governor is in the tribes back pocket. And the dnr works for him.
We did ok on the rocks in the south. Nothing too exciting but some nice sizes. Smallest eye was the first one caught at 5am Saturday at 17″. Had three in the boat between 5am and sun-up, trolling cranks over shallow rocks, plus one smallie. That turned off as soon as the sun came up so we went in for breakfast at that point.
Largest, pictured, was a 25″ at high noon on Sunday with clear blue skies under a bobber in 10 FOW on a large inside turn. Picked up a 24″ there yesterday late morning before the thunder drove us off the lake. Didn’t want to pack up in the rain.
My neighbor made it out to the first breaks of deeper water dragging lindy’s at 6am yesterday and stuck 13 fish in a couple hours. Largest was 25″.
I’d guess by this coming weekend we will see higher percentages caught out deeper.
Walleye-Opener-2017-25-inch.jpg
Myself and my wife went out for midnight opener Friday night and did well. We went out of red door. Trolling #10 husky jerks at 1.5 mph in 6-8 fow. Barely got trolling motor on and doubled right out of the gate. We only stayed out til 2am due to having to get up with the kids in the am but ended up with 26 in 2 hrs. Most were 17-18″ Several mid 20″s. Best opener I have had in recent memory. Didn’t seem to matter the method either. Jigging drifting bobber fishing or trolling all was working as everyone we went by was doing well.
ended up with 26 in 2 hrs.
That is getting on them! I saw Will >> @MalmoMafioso posted a clicker pic on FB hitting the 100 mark with over 150 for the night on the north end.
We went out at 5am and after some searching around we found a decent bite on the SE rocks. Trolling cranks and rigging leeches put a lot of fish in the boat. Didnt keep count, but like Sticker, my hands are chewed up pretty good today!
-J.
<div class=”d4p-bbt-quote-title”>tomhopkins wrote:</div>
ended up with 26 in 2 hrs.That is getting on them! I saw Will >> @MalmoMafioso posted a clicker pic on FB hitting the 100 mark with over 150 for the night on the north end.
We went out at 5am and after some searching around we found a decent bite on the SE rocks. Trolling cranks and rigging leeches put a lot of fish in the boat. Didnt keep count, but like Sticker, my hands are chewed up pretty good today!
-J.
On our way to the lake on just before midnight on Friday I (mostly jokingly) said that our goal was going to be 100 fish by sun-up… Surprisingly we hit our “goal” before 4 AM and ended at 6:30 AM with 149 walleyes after 30 minutes of not being able to get one last fish shallow trolling once the sun came up. I’m pretty sure that’s a 6 hour stretch of walleye fishing I’ll never top.
Saturday we modified our approach a little looking for bigger fish and ended up with ONLY 41 walleyes between 8 PM and 1 AM but we did find the bigger fish with 16 of the 41 coming in between 24-28.5″.
A couple things that we may have done differently than others was we were able to quickly key in on UV Pink/Green Husky Jerks as the hot bait. I almost never run the same lures on every line but the UV HJ’s were out-fishing every other lure 2-1. Also, each time that we had a strike I would quickly pause the Terrova allowing our bait so slow down and start slowly rising (Think exactly like the Rapala Shadow rap commercials) and we almost never caught just one fish at a time.
Will
Ditto on the UV Pink. After being down to my partner 4-0 I made the switch and it never came off.
Thanks goodness our DNR has us releasing these fish due to the LOW WALLEYE POPULATION IN THE LAKE! A shame that they are screwing things up so badly on what is obviously a healthy system…
We boated 44 walleyes between 7:00-11:30 Saturday night between Knox point and Myr Mar, Largest was 26″ We were trolling Rapala DT 10s off the first break until after sunset.We moved shallow after dark and caught fewer fish on stick baits than we did on SS #5’s. Unfortunately my fishing buddies were under dressed for the cool nights or I think we probably could have boated quite a few more.
We got off the water just as the moon rose over the lake,it was quite a picturesque scene with the moonlight shining on the boats looking to the east.
Hated leaving at that time.
<div class=”d4p-bbt-quote-title”>Jon Jordan wrote:</div>
<div class=”d4p-bbt-quote-title”>tomhopkins wrote:
</div>
ended up with 26 in 2 hrs.That is getting on them! I saw Will >> @MalmoMafioso posted a clicker pic on FB hitting the 100 mark with over 150 for the night on the north end.
We went out at 5am and after some searching around we found a decent bite on the SE rocks. Trolling cranks and rigging leeches put a lot of fish in the boat. Didnt keep count, but like Sticker, my hands are chewed up pretty good today!
-J.
On our way to the lake on just before midnight on Friday I (mostly jokingly) said that our goal was going to be 100 fish by sun-up… Surprisingly we hit our “goal” before 4 AM and ended at 6:30 AM with 149 walleyes after 30 minutes of not being able to get one last fish shallow trolling once the sun came up. I’m pretty sure that’s a 6 hour stretch of <strong class=”ido-tag-strong”>walleye fishing I’ll never top.
Saturday we modified our approach a little looking for bigger fish and ended up with ONLY 41 walleyes between 8 PM and 1 AM but we did find the bigger fish with 16 of the 41 coming in between 24-28.5″.
A couple things that we may have done differently than others was we were able to quickly key in on UV Pink/Green Husky Jerks as the hot bait. I almost never run the same lures on every line but the UV HJ’s were out-fishing every other lure 2-1. Also, each time that we had a strike I would quickly pause the Terrova allowing our bait so slow down and start slowly rising (Think exactly like the Rapala Shadow rap commercials) and we almost never caught just one fish at a time.
Will
There was a period where my wife hooked one and we paused the terrova while we got the hooks out of her walleye. my lure was still out and before I hit the go button I picked up my rod and bam fish on. After I landed it I cast out and was just gonna hit button again and bam. Another one. Haha. My wife made me give her my lure or she was gonna throw me out of the boat as I was up 14 to 4 at that point. I was using blue glass #10 husky jerk. She was using pink but it was broke off earlier at the boat on a nicer eye. We then switched her to perch color hj but they would not touch it. I ended up using a purple shadow rap to finish out the night and that worked ok but the blue glass hj was the ticket for us.
Biggest fish was 27 1/2″. And I just happened to get it on my very first cast at 12:08am. Glad to see the major numbers of fish everyone was catching. Looks to me like this fishery is coming back and then some. I have no problem with the catch and release regulations, but I know I can’t speak for others
DFD06F4B-01EA-45DA-9D78-A27717448598.jpg
I’m a little late with this report, but better late than never. I was doing my usual shore fishing from Eddy’s at midnight Saturday morning. I basically caught 11 eyes in two hours either on a perch 1/2oz Rippin’ Rap or KVD300 Jerkbait in Sexy Ghost Minnow. When the clouds came in I couldn’t figure out what they wanted for the last hour I fished. The fish were from 16.5 to 23.5″.
One of the more productive Openers I’ve ever had there.
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