Chisago/South Lindstrom Bass fishing

I spent the morning on these lakes with good friend Bill. We got out about 5AM and found a few biters right away in the channel. These fish were hitting spinnerbaits run just under the surface. After that it got tougher. The water is pretty muddy looking with limited visibility. This has affected weed growth. We never did find cabbage. The only heavy growth was coontail in 4-7 FOW. If you found a stump in one of these areas then so much the better. Worms and spinnerbaits produced, while jigs and crankbaits didn’t. I think smaller jigs might have worked as a slowly dropping presentation was key. I was using a skinny 6 inch purple colored worm with a 1/16th ounce weight Texas rigged. This would fall fairly slow. The majority of my hits came on the initial drop. The best fish we came up with was a shade under 18 inches and there were several in the 16 inch class. It also seemed that there were groups of fish roaming through these weedbeds. If you found one fish it was worth hanging around as there were usually several more. After that spot would cool off you might cover 1/4 mile of shoreline before you found another group. It was tough on the trolling motor battery but you had to keep moving. A fun day that ended all too soon!

Rootski

How do you tie your spinner baits on to your line and do you use a snap or a sweivel? Thanks

Mbarron,

My thinking is to keep everything as simple as possible. Anything you add is one more thing that can fail. That was a hard lesson learned from Musky fishing.

I tie directly to the spinner bait using a palomar knot. I was using 12 lb mono, and have had very good luck with that knot. It’s fast and easy to tie.

Rootksi

A quick search provided the following:

http://www.fish4fun.com/palomarknot.htm

Hope that helps.

Rootski

Thanks for the report. When they implemented catch and release on the bass in those lakes it did wonders to increase the size of the fish. I use fish it early and late in the season. I don’t know if I remember ever seeing cabbage, but that coontail, especially in the fall, will hold some big fish.

You mention a slow fall. I had the same bite last fall and did well with a 1/4 oz swim jig on a lift drop retreive.

THANKS FOR THE INFO — that seems to be the majority of fisher people using that knot