Well, when someone gives you lemons… make lemonade… or something like that.
Today, a buddy and I hit a lake in the west metro area. Our plan heading out was to target some early ice walleyes. We had heard some local reports on the walleye bite… and thought we would try it out. I hand’t fished this lake since I was a little kid with my father, so I was excited to get out there.
We got out about 10:30 am and set up off a shoreline weed break to 25 feet of water. We popped a few holes… starting in about 3 feet of water out to about 10 feet of water. The weeds broke off at about 8 feet so we started there. Threw out a couple tip ups and my buddy and I started to hole hope between 8 FOW and 10 FOW. In the first 10 minutes, I had 4 good follows off of bottom. I was using a 3/16 Rattl’n Flyer Spoon tipped with the head of a small shiner. After those 4 follows, nothing. After a half hour, we decided to move on to the bottom side of the break.
Now, I should add that this is a big musky lake. Word has it that the stocked walleyes tend to keep in the weeds due to the quantity and size of muskies. But, since we weren’t having any marks after the first 10 minutes, I decided that the bottom of the break would be better.
We started popping holes every 10 feet to find the break bottom. This lake is not on my Lakemaster GPS… so we were back in the stone age of popping holes and dropping the MarCum LX5 down.
Popping holes… 14 FOW, then 16 1/2 FOW, 20 FOW, then 24 FOW… and bingo. No, no walleyes… but Away from the big crowd… we found crappies stacked 8 feet in the water column. From 4 feet off bottom to 12 feet off bottom… solid crappies.
I took a picture of the stack… and it is attached here… but with sunlight, it didn’t work out so well.
Anyway, as I tell anyone and everyone I fish with, ALWAYS have a backup plan. Be prepared for anything. And we were. We immediately pulled out our panny rods. I was using one of my St Croix Legend spring bobber rods and a 1/16 Lindy Frostee spoon already attached. Pulled out the waxies and went to work.
Rarely have I ever seen a crappie bite so aggressive in mid day in the winter. All I can say is WOW. The crappie were slamming our jigs and spoons as if they hadn’t eaten in years. The sizes weren’t fantastic (this lake is not known for great sizes, only great numbers). I normally drop my spoon to the top of the cloud… and I did this quite a bit. But for kicks, a few times I would slowely drop my spoon through the cloud, and before it could even hit bottom, it was swallowed up by a crappie.
We weeded through about 40 crappie in 20 minutes to pull our limit out. This was a meat trip. The smaller ones and larger ones were released. We kept the medium ones for an after dinner snack. We had 1 hit on the tip-up with a nice Northern kept.
After limiting out on crappies, we decided to move to another section and look for some gills. We started popping holes. Starting in 8 FOW to and through the weed line in 3 FOW. Deeper was better. 8 FOW offered consistent action on the sunnies and gills, but the sizes were extremely small.
My buddy decided to check the bottom on the 3rd hole and dropped his AquaView scout down. As he was rotating… he yelled to me to come over and look. I took a look… and WOW. On screen in 3 FOW was a musky that had to go 40+ inches. I had a tip-up about 20 feet away… and I was hoping he wouldn’t come by for a meal. It would be fun landing him, but would rather not put stress on an out-of-season game.
We hole hopped and caught quite a few gills and sunnies. As it started to get a little dark, we switched back to jigging larger spoons hoping for some walleyes before it got dark. My buddy had to take off around 5, so were weren’t expecting to hit prime time anyway. Set up in 17 FOW on the inside edge of another break… I was jigging my St Croix Premier tipped with the 3/16th Lindy Rattl’n Flyer Spoon. I had a couple more follows that were larger than panfish. On the second hole I hit, I had an immediate follow… and then a hit. A nice 11 inch crappie hit that 3/16 Rattl’n Flyer Spoon tipped with a Shiner head. WOW. how the heck these things can fit it in their mouths or even thing to go after it is beyond me. That right there just solidified even more how attractive those spoons are for just about ANY gamefish. I had a couple more crappies on that spoon… and quite a few more nibbles. About the time prime time was about to pick up, we packed up and left.
Was a good outing. For those of you that haven’t gotten out yet… all I can say is “WHAT ARE YOU WAITING FOR???”. It has not been common the past so many years where the ice has firmed up enough to get us out on early ice safely. NO ice is ever save… but the ice out there was 8-9 inches solid. We are still in early ice season with the shallows still having plenty of oxygen. NOW is the time to get out. Fish are active, Ice is good, and weather is perfect!
