End of August Open Water Trolling on Mille Lacs!

End of August usually means that the walleye fishing slows down. There is no such thing when you are utilizing the open water trolling method. Joining me for a day of open water trolling were 3 friends of mine – Joe Cavanaugh, Craig Daugherty and Kevin Hines. Not only are these guys all experienced walleye anglers, they also have the same passion as me for open water trolling. I was truly looking forward to this day because I knew we would work well together as a team and maximize our time on the water.

As I mentioned in my last report, I’ve begun to move more towards perch colored crankbaits (Rapala Deep Tail Dancers and Storm Deep Thundersticks) due to what I suspect is a growing perch class that is now becoming the preferred target of these open basin walleyes. In doing so, I’ve placed these crankbaits deeper in the water column trolling only 4-8 feet off the bottom. By fishing this deep, I’m starting to catch a lot more fish that are under the 20 inch slot. In fact, 9 walleyes that we caught on this day were brought home for the knife and they ranged from 14 to 19 inches.

Our day was a little quirky and what I mean by that is I had a hard time putting together a consistent pattern. I threw a lot of colors at them hoping that I could increase my catching ratio. Little did I know that what I started out with was still the most productive pattern (perch colors) and we ended the day strong by catching 25 walleyes including some big fish (25-27 inches).

The next day I brought out Roy Larson, Tom Franz and Wayne Schertler who I met through a mutual friend. All three of these guys were new to open water trolling and had never tried leadcore line or planer boards. It’s always fun taking out people for the first time and let them experience the thrill of catching these suspended walleyes. The wind had changed from the previous day and that made things a little more challenging in the fact that we would not be able to troll the same direction with the waves.

Our day started out pretty good; we marked a lot of fish and ended up catching 4 walleyes on our first troll run. The second run was not so good and even though we went through the same exact area as our first run, we only caught one more walleye. Whenever this happens, I will slide over a couple hundred yards and make a parallel troll run trying to locate that school again. Our third run which was a parallel line a bit north of our other ones was unproductive and we never landed a fish. So our 4th run I decided to make another parallel run a couple hundred yards south of our first troll run and it paid off as we landed a nice double – a 26 and a 24 incher and we also added a couple more box fish. Our spirits were lifted and I thought we were really going to get into them. During our 5th run the leadcore line took off screaming and we all thought it was a big fish. Tom was up and he was really battling this fish and we thought we had the big one on. However, we soon realized that the walleye was foul hooked and coming in sideways. It wasn’t the big one after all and ended up being a 23 incher. Our 5th run was coming to an end, our lines were silent and we only had a half hour more to fish. Do we continue on or try a short 6th run. The decision was unanimous, pull up our lines and go through that same area one more time where we caught the double.

I joked around and said “OK guys – now it’s all about catching just one more fish!” With about 10 minutes to go before we had to leave, the leadore line attached to the planer board took off screaming. Wayne was up and the battle began. This fish stayed down and we all knew this could be the one we’ve been waiting for. Finally it surfaced behind the boat and our hopes were confirmed – it was the big one we were looking for. Soon the big girl landed in the net and Wayne had caught his personal best – a 28 incher! Congratulations Wayne! That’s fish number 14 this year for my boat measuring over 28 inches! What a great way to end the day with a bunch of great guys and mission accomplished. Even though our day was cut short and we had to leave the lake at 3:30 – Roy, Tom and Wayne had all caught their personal best walleye! We ended the day catching a dozen walleyes and kept 3 for the table.

Scouting for these suspended walleyes sometimes can feel like a daunting task. Where does one start to look for these fish when there’s 120,000 acres of open water and you only have a few hours to fish? It’s important to keep it in perspective and dedicate a percentage of your day towards scouting. If you think you can just motor out a few miles, drop your crankbaits and start fishing without doing any scouting, odds are you will have a pretty boring day. It takes some time and patience and you will not catch fish if you’re not consistently marking them on your graph. Having a good sonar is essential.

In late summer, one of the things that I really focus on when it comes to scouting is water temps. A subtle change even if it’s only a couple of degrees cooler is enough for me to scan that area for tullibees. These fish don’t like the heat and they need cold oxygenated rich water to survive. I also like to scout areas that are a little bit deeper for the same reason. I put on a lot of miles looking for the right sign. Experience has taught me that there out there somewhere and it’s only a matter of time until I locate them.

Once you find some good sign, determining the correct depth to place your crankbaits is extremely important. Yeah it’s easy to place your crankbaits two feet above the arcs on your sonar, but what if the fish are scattered all over the water column. Where do you start then? In late summer, I typically focus on the lower one half of the water column. That doesn’t mean that you can’t catch fish up high, but I get more consistent results fishing the lower half. Why? That’s where the baitfish is congregated. On Mille Lacs, the majority of the open basin is anywhere from 30-35 feet. If I’m able to fish 4 lines, I typically stager the crankbaits in the lower half of the water column and I place one line at 15 feet down, one at 20 feet down, one at 25 feet down and one at 30 feet down. Again this is just a starting point and once I catch a couple of fish, I adjust the other lines that are not producing to the same depth where I’m catching fish. The key is to get all four lines firing and hooking fish. If one of my rods is not producing, I will work and work on that crankbait until I get it to go. Is it tuned properly? Are the rattles inside the crankbait working? I will even swap it out for the same exact crankbait with the same color to see if that makes a difference.

I can’t tell you how many hours of trolling I’ve wasted using a crankbait when the rattles were not working properly. I’m consistently shaking them to ensure they sound right. What happens sometimes is a walleye will actually puncture a small hole in your crankbait and it ends up filling in with water. I firmly believe that the vibration that your crankbait draws in more walleyes than the color of your lure.

The open water trolling bite will be good for a couple more weeks as long as the water temps stay warm. So make your plans now before the tullibees start to move into the shallows in order to spawn. I plan on making the most of it and I’ll be back at it this Labor Day weekend. As always, feel free to send me a PM or an email if you have any questions.

Until next time, keep trollin’!