Mississippi River St. Paul, Mn Pool 2 Fish Report

After a run up to Mille Lacs for opener, I found my self back on for a Pool 2 Monday morning work efforts! Joining my boat today was Doug Goaley of South St. Paul. Doug had expressed one thing in mind today and that was to spend the day running and gunning from riprap to wingdams to backwater sand cuts, etc…. With a little twist of my arm, we eagerly got on the water at 6:00am and started our day. With forecasted ending sporadic thundershowers for the day and calm winds, we set out targets south of the 494 ramp.

The first part of the morning we spent hitting some wingdams that had been active on the previous trips. In our first spot and within a couple casts, both Doug and I hook up almost immediately pitching Bomber 6A cranks baits to the tops of the wingdams. Fish of all sizes have been showing themselves on the wingdams as of late. 18”-29” fish and everything in between have been most cooperative. What’s been working you ask? Pitching cranks to the wingdams coupled with a simple no thrills straight retrieve that makes its way deep enough to contact the rocks within the dam. Once bottom contact is made, a slower retrieve may be applied to walk the crank through the rocks to put the lure in the strike zone for a slightly longer period of time. Some walleyes have actually followed the crank through the rocks and been drawn out away from the wingdam to take a inviting swing at your lure. These fish at times have been consistently above average sized fish, so when your lure start pulling away from the wingdam, keep a nice steady retrieve and hold on!

After a successful morning of wingdam pitching, we headed way south to explore some backwater and rip rap shallow water trolling. Fish were cooperative within minutes of getting rolling here as well. After about 20 minutes of trolling and 3 smaller walleyes, we decided to shift gears and go pitch the wingdams with JimmyD’s hair jigs and a ¼ oz jig and chartreuse/pepper K-grub. Setting the boat just on the up current side of the dam, we proceeded to pitch these setups back on to the tops of these structures and slowly walk them through these snag infested areas. After a few minutes, we tangled with a couple nice 26” walleyes. There are good aspects to jig pitchin this time of year but there are also some drawbacks, the good characteristics are that you can effectively cover the entire area very thoroughly and cover the top, middle and bottom area of the dam. The drawback to this approach is the inability to cover water quickly. This time of year is made for running and gunning. The fish are showing themselves with in the first handful of casts and then followed up by a couple more active fish shortly after. After 15 minutes on the windam, you have pretty much covered the area and could respectively move on to the next spot to do it all over again. Sure an angler can sit on one spot and catch a few more fish if you are willing to put in your time. These fish are really spread out and we typically do not see the massive congregations on the structures like we do during the cold-water periods. So stay moving for fastest results!

This active bite will last well through the summer and all of the above techniques and presentations will work at some point and time. So now is a perfect time to get out and catch some fish and gain some confidence in as many techniques as you want to become more skilled at. This is a great opportunity to gain more valuable experience and confidence. Some days confidence will out fish any technique you may read in a magazine. Look for one more report by the end of the week as I wrap up my guiding on Pool 2 for the spring season…..unless someone express interest in another trip!! JK

Good luck to all that get out and enjoy the season!