Minnetonka open water

Gray’s bay is totally clear. ST Albans was 75% and Excelsior is starting to break up. All the channels are clear and the main lake has open areas. Won’t be long..

West side is all clear

I was thinking of heading there Monday if it looks to be 50* Is it too early? We use to fish there as kids, off shore, in an area that people never fished. I want to take the boat Monday. May have a couple seats open.

Ron

I fished a small cove on mon and did not get anything. I would bet that by mon the fish will be moving up to the shallows though, if not they should be sitting on the first drop next to the spawning areas.

On the news last night, they said Minnetonka officially iced out yesterday. Now.. if it doesnt refreeze with skim ice in the bays on these 18 degree nights

I’ll be fishing it next week.

Was out on Tonka on Monday and the Crappies were already going strong…about 4 feet of water, smaller bay..

I’ll be making a point to get out there next week!

I’ll be there Monday!! Unless its raining..Now, to look for a small bay…..

e-mail is available….

Dave, are you going Monday? You can hop in my boat if you want. I just need to make sure it starts and clean it up Saturday. 17.5’Smokercraft. Or we can split up and call each other on the phones.

Im heading to pool 2 for white bass and walleyes unless the plan changes.

If something changes, I’ll let you know!

When will the buoys and markers be placed in the lake?

Picked up my mini mites today. They weren’t on sale 6.99 for 6 pack!! I did buy a pair of Rocky boots for 25.00!!!!They have a clearence sale 1/2 off the clearence price
Now I’m eating King Crab legs(8.99 a # on sale) and Ribeye steak on the grill. Putting new line on a couple reels and watching the masters. Man it don’t get much better then this.
Washing it all down with a Michelob.

I’m not sure about the other places on Tonka but, we went out there today and caught many crappie in shallow water. We constantly moved with the trolling motor and casted the mini mites under a bobber. It was hit or miss and nothing congregated. Plenty of action. A hint is we started in Maxwell bay.
Next hint, we caught nothing in Maxwell bay but other bays connected.

PS: I haven’t fished Tonka for about 15 years, so if I can find them, you can too.

I’ll be out tonight hitting my crappie spots so expect a full report tomorrow.

Fished Tonka from shore on Sat and boat on Sun, as you would expect not as many from shore but did catch quite a few. Best spots were by the access at Maxwell and the Lagoons in Wayz, nothing at seton, nothing at fletchers. Sun in the boat was nuts, between 2 guys probably got about 75 in 3 hrs along with about 40 sunnies. 15 crappie topped the 12″ mark and probably another 15 over 10″. Fished small shallow bay connected to main lake about 3′ deep tried a couple of spots like this and some had fish and some didn’t. I think the key to fishing them this time of the year is that the fish are either there or they are not so if you aint catching them keep on moving till you find them.

They didnt seem to want minnows or waxworms but a white plastic jig under a bobber was the ticket.

Now is the time to get the boat out and get after them. If you do go don’t keep the big ones there are plenty of 9 inchers.