Minneapolis Lakes Bite

Minnapolis lakes are finally getting in shape for ice fishing. Lake Harriet now has about 7″ of ice where boats were fishing 3 weeks ago.

The reports have been mixed. Some people are getting nothing but small walleyes, other people are getting decent numbers of good walleyes. Harriet and Calhoun have been producing fish in the 20′-24′ range and fatheads seem to be the key. Similar reports have been coming from Nokomis in 15′ and less. Lots of people are reporting muskies being caught.

Small panfish are biting everywhere on top of the deep weeds. Nothing much of size, but a good bite in 10′-14′ just about everywhere.

Good Luck out there.

Thanks for the update Dave!

Dave,
Here is a local tournament on Calhoun. I’m going to see if my bro mplspug wants to fish it.
http://www.bobbyandstevesautoworld.com/news.html

Ron

I just learned of that tournament yesterday.

I might be fishing calhoun somewhere this weekend.. but not going to pay $25 a hole to do so!

No electronics, no shelters allowed. I havent been hearing about it from anyone, I dont know how the turnout is going to be.

Its going to be very cold and windy.. I can picture the lines at the porta-potty’s already That is, along as they provide some!

It all depends on the prizes. I can’t find anything so instead I am going to the local lions tournament on Saturday the 17th at Peltier lake.

Dave! When did you become staff? I musta missed it. Well congratulations sir!

I did a vey last minute short trip to L of the I’s and tried a different spot in deeper water. Same story. Lot’s of lookers and no takers.

dd

Quote:

---

Dave! When did you become staff? I musta missed it. Well congratulations sir!

---

Thanks! There was no formal announcement. I think it was yesterday it was official?

I made it over to Calhoun this afternoon. I had lots of looking, and only one 15″ walleye that would take it and stay hooked. Lots of heavy marks down there in 18′ off the weeds. I suspect there will be a fishing report up within a few days, they can only have lock-jaw so long. It was too cold out to do much(any) hole hopping!

L.o.I is a strange lake.. most of your action is going to happen in 12′ and less, the deep water rarely produces anything.

I will be out there(Calhoun) pretty regularly this week in the afternoons, if anyone would like to join me, send me a pm.

Are most people tip-up fishing for the eyes or running jigging spoons?

Gary,

Most of the action has been coming on fatheads on a plain hook. I have been pulling some fish on jigging spoons tipped with a fathead. We have bee seeing more lookers than takers as of late, last night was an exception, but I lost about every fish personally Bob Moore stuck a nice pig walleye on a spoon, had another break me off on a plain hook and fathead(see new Calhoun report)

You know your going to have one of those days when it starts like this setting the depth on your slip bobber. No minnow is safe from the perch in the daylight hours! This is one of about a billion that came after my depth guage just trying to set my depth.

Is it a good ice fishing “practice” for these metro lakes, that if you find smaller perch during the day, you will find your better walleyes come dusk?

You’d think but not often at least on Minnetonka. I’ve fished spots where the little perch just covered the bottom and never had a walleye show up. On the flip side my best walleye spots don’t seem to hold a lot of perch. Then again Tonka walleyes don’t seem to follow the walleye textbook anyway.

Quote:

---

Is it a good ice fishing “practice” for these metro lakes, that if you find smaller perch during the day, you will find your better walleyes come dusk?

---

Thats almost a loaded question

Thinking about it for a couple minutes, it does seem like where the heaviest concentrations of perch are always seems to be in key structure, or transition areas on the inner city lakes. This might be the inside turn of a weed line, gravel/sand transition, a small *feeding shelf* directly related ample cover(usually weeds), and very close to deep water. These same structures can also be shoreline breaks that drop quickly from 1′-7′, and have deep water near by.

I suppose it makes sense, the perch and small panfish use these exact same *ambush points* to capitolize on their prey as the walleyes(preditors in general) use to ambush their forage(perch).

The answer is yes, but that doesnt mean that where-ever there are perch, their are going to be walleyes. What is does mean, where-ever you have a high concentration of forage, and an excellent ambush opportunity close to deeper water, you have found a good place to fish.

If you have an area with lots of these ambush points, and perch are abundant everywhere, often the fishing is better if you can find the *fish highway* when the fish are coming in from the deeper water… which is often the outside edge of the weeds, or on a deeper shelf close to the weedline. It may be a very narrow corridoor.

If the fish are getting easy meals, they will be there consistantly to take advantage of a good situation spending minimal amounts of energy to get their fill.

Too True David. Also one thing to keep in mind is that Perch and Walleye are part of the same family. So habbits and feeding ground are going to be pretty similar… difference being their placement on the food chain .

If the lake has a decent walleye population… my expereince has been where there are perch, there will be walleye. But you still have to take into consideration the time of day/night, structure, etc (everything Dave mentions above).