Open Water Trolling, Mille Lacs Lake-June 2, 2012

It felt good to be back on my favorite body of water – Mille Lacs Lake. With early ice out and the warm temps this spring, I was chompin at the bit to get out there to find out if the walleyes have already started to move into their open basin feeding patterns. This is my 12th year of open water trolling and it’s an amazing feeling each year the first time out. I’m like a little kid on Christmas morning just waiting to open up those presents or in this case, see those magical arcs out in the open basin.

Joining me was my wife – Tina and two of our good friends – fellow IDO members Tim Ellis (TEllis) and Kevin Hines (KHines). Both of these guys have fished with me before and are open water nuts like me. Tim owns a 621 and has a lot of open water trolling experience. He’s fished this method on bodies of water such as Lake Erie, Green Bay, Leech Lake and Mille Lacs Lake. He’s a type of guy that does all the little things right that leads to success and he’ll stick with it until he figures it out. We’ve spent hours and hours sharing open water trolling information with one another and it never gets old.

Kevin reached out to me last year after reading one of my open water trolling reports and I could tell right away, that he had the same passion as me when it comes to walleye fishing. We soon found out that we were neighbors and lived only 3 miles apart. Once again the power of IDO has created another friendship! Kevin’s very methodical and asks the right type of questions that lead to success. Questions that make me think of the why I do it this way or that way. We ended up fishing together twice last year and both days were very memorable. Kevin spends a lot of time on Mille Lacs and Lake of the Woods and he recently picked up a beautiful 621 himself. I’m guessing that boat will have a lot of slime in it from a bunch of open water walleyes real soon!

We hit the water about 10:30 and it was beautiful out. Bright sunny skies, calm winds and air temps hitting the low 70’s. As we motored out to our first scouting run, I had a big smile on my face and I could feel it was going to be a special day simply because of the favorable fishing conditions. The first, second and third scouting run didn’t reveal the sign that we had hoped to see. No big deal – they’re out here somewhere. We made our way over to another scouting run that has produced well for me over the years in early summer and we finally marked a few baitfish mixed in with an occasional arc. It wasn’t the greatest sign but just enough for us to give it a try and put out our lines.

About a mile later we ended up boating 4 walleyes and had two other hits. We worked this area over good, made a few adjustments along the way and really got into them. Early in the day they wanted Rapala Deep Tail Dancers DDT#11 – Bleeding Tiger on boards – about 150 feet back on braid. We made the most of the bite and we ended up running 3 planer boards along with one long line out the back. Before we knew it we had boated over 25 walleyes in about 4 hours. During one stretch we caught 3 walleyes within 15 minutes, a 28 incher, a 26.5 incher and a 28.5 incher and it was 1:30 in the afternoon! Now that’s what open water trolling is all about!

As the day warmed up with sunny skies and the water temps increased to 63 degrees, we started to mark more baitfish near the bottom along with an occasional arc. We positioned our leadcore lines out the back accordingly and were rewarded for it. Storm Deep Thunderstick Madflash – Chrome Yellow Perch and Pink UV Fire were the hot colors on leadcore. Bleeding Tiger was no longer the ticket and we adapted to what the fish wanted. Long story short – we ended up catching over 40 walleyes out in the open basin on two different trolling runs that were about 2 miles apart from each other. Most walleyes were between 21 – 26 inches long and we also ended up keeping 8 box fish ranging from 14.5 to 16 7/8 inches. What a great day especially being it was our first time out this year!

This week’s tip I will answer the question – where does one start to look for suspended fish on a 130,000 acre lake???

When I first started fishing Mille Lacs – I was really intimidated by its size. I thought to myself, how am I ever going to find some suspended fish out here? I would spend hours and hours motoring all over the lake going from one spot to another spot sometimes covering 3, 4, or 5 miles at time without stopping. I realized that I was just guessing at where they would be versus having the mindset of eliminating water. To summarize – I was closing my eyes throwing a dart at it. I found out very quickly that I needed a game plan before I hit the water because my fuel expenses were going through the roof!

I like to break it down into manageable pieces. Right off the bat, I eliminate two thirds of the lake. Choose a third of the lake that you’ll be fishing – sand on the north end, mud in the middle or gravel in the south. I believe there are suspended fish in each of these 3 areas of the lake on any given day and none is really better than the other unless there is a distinct but hatch going on. Once you choose the third of the lake you are going to fish, now get out a map.

The next thing I would do is eliminate any water that is under 30 feet deep. Why? Tullibees – the favorite fish that open water walleyes love to target, typically love cooler water and will seek the deepest part of the lake especially as the water temps increase. I’m certainly not saying that you can’t catch walleyes in the shallows during the summer. You can! In fact, I believe there are walleyes that live in the shallows all year long. They primarily feed on baitfish consisting of spottail shiners, mimic shiners and bluntnose minnows and the corkers out there know how to catch them! I also feel there are walleyes that live in the open basin during the entire summer. Their prey consists of tullibees and yellow perch. It’s important you understand why those suspended walleyes are out there and if you find the tullibees, you will eventually find the walleyes.

Now you should have about 1/6 left of the lake to scout – still a daunting task but you can make it even smaller. Determine how you are going to scout that area of the lake. Look at the forecast and in particular the direction of the predicted wind the day you are going to fish. You want your scouting runs to go in the same direction of the wind because it will be easier to navigate and you also want to troll with the wind once you find the suspended walleyes (boat control and planer board control).

Now find a flat for reference point and move out anywhere from ½ to 1 mile away from that flat and mark down a 3 mile scouting run. I typically do not troll within a half mile of any flat. To be honest, I don’t like flats because of the fear of bottoming out my crankbaits. Now move over another mile and mark down another parallel scouting run. Do the same thing again and pencil in your 3rd scouting run. You now you have 3 scouting runs running parallel to each other, each are 3 miles long and you are covering a 6 square mile area. Now mark another 3 mile grid somewhere else on the lake and that should do it. You have 12 square miles of water to scout. If you do that, odds are you will find some suspended fish.

Now you’re on the water and you finally reach the beginning of your first scouting run. Here’s where having a good sonar is a must and equally important, knowing how to use it (even better if your sonar has side imaging capability). Motor 4-5 mph for about a hundred yards and look for suspended baitfish with a few arcs mixed in. You’ll be scouting in depths typically ranging from 30-35 feet of water. The baitfish and arcs will typically be located 15 feet down to 5 feet off the bottom. There may be walleyes even higher in the water column but you probably won’t graph those because of your boat motor noise. You want to find about 6-8 arcs for every 100 yards. If you don’t see anything promising, motor up as fast as you want to go and move down your scouting run about a half of a mile. Motor down again and cover another 100 yards. Repeat until you are at the end of your first scouting run. Now move over one mile to the start of your second trolling run and work your way back the opposite direction. You get the idea… Be precise and methodical. It really doesn’t take that long to eliminate a lot of water. That is your goal – eliminate as much water as you can until you find the right sign. When in doubt – scout!

It was truly a memorable day on the water. We worked together as a team and everyone knew exactly what to do. We were in unison and the energy and excitement was feeding from one person to another. There was no down time and if we didn’t have a fish in the net, there were 4 lines out. Catching suspended walleyes, grilling venison brats, having a few cold beverages, listening to Siruis radio and being able to do all that with good friends was awesome – it just doesn’t get much better than that.

On a side note… Kevin is part owner of a company called Arise Orthotics and Prosthetics which is a complete patient care facility available to meet the needs of patients requiring either custom or off-the-shelf orthotic and prosthetic devices. Our son Nick who has cerebral palsy recently had reconstructive leg surgeries and Kevin graciously came to our home and evaluated Nick’s old leg braces. He right away noticed some things and suggested some improvements. Because of Kevin’s experience and connections in the industry, Nick is now the proud owner of some really cool custom leg braces that will enable him to be much more comfortable when walking and hopefully someday help him reach his goal to run. Who would have ever thought the passion of walleye fishing would bring two people together and the result of that would improve the quality of life for a little boy whose dream is to someday run. All because of a fish called a walleye.

Please don’t hesitate to reach out to me via PM or email if you have any open water trolling questions. I’m more than happy to help! I’m also going to be doing some more open water/on the water trolling clinics this summer so let me know if you’re interested and I’ll add you to the list.

Until next time – keep trollin!