Mille Lacs Lake fishing report 7-19-04

After spending the entire weekend on the water here trolling crankbaits on Mille Lacs lake, I thought I would have a few more walleyes to the boat than what I have shown here, but honestly the trolling bite has put the brakes on something fierce in the past 4-5 days. Double digit number of fish per outing was the norm up until middle of last week when things started to slow down dramatically to only seeing 3-5 fish per outing. This past weekend was even slower, and actually the slowest couple of days I have had on the water in years.

The pattern for my boat over the past several weeks was to cover the deep basin with deep divers and in line planer boards. Some fish have been coming higher in the water column on one day and the others have come from the deeper haunts and everything in between. But after a couple hours on the water each day, you had a pretty good idea on where the best depth, color, action and speed for that period and time for the highest percentage of getting bit. But with the amount of bug hatches and forage available, the walleyes are a little pickier at what they decide to eat the last couple of days. In these conditions, I always resort to higher troll speed as a trigger for these sluggish fish. My best advice right now is stick closer to the deep gravel areas in your search for those suspended fish and cover water! Playing the odds game is the best suggestion I can give currently. Find a large school of fish and stay on them, eventually you will get a couple fish to cooperate.

I spoke with the DNR both days upon coming off the water and 14 fish were caught during the day hours out of 130+ boats for Saturday and Sunday. That is not 14 keepers, that is 14 fish physically caught. Ouch! From what I have heard, the morning and evening bite on the rocks has still been the best thing going for putting fish in the boat. Slip bobber and rigs seem to be the best presentation going right now for that bite. My prediction is the trolling bite will stabilize here shortly over the next week and more and more fish will start to show up once again. I will report back by the end of the week to give an update on what’s going on in the trolling scene!

As for right now if you still want to pursue the trolling bite for those above average sized fish, I would suggest that you cover fishy looking water the best you can and keep changing depths, colors, actions, and speeds until you get bit and try to duplicate it like always. A thing to keep inthe back of your mind is that not all the walleyes are doing the same thing at the same time…meaning someboady has got to eat! Another alternative I may suggest is taking this opportunity to go after the bronze backs as that bite has been taking shape nicely over the past several weeks. With the heat we have early this week, I would predict a very good smallie and musky bite as these days tend to promote a consistent and aggressive behavior from these critters! I will only have one or two more walleye reports from Mille Lacs in the next couple weeks as I am making my seasonal shift to the smallies both right here on the lake as well as back home on the Mississippi River. Talk to you at the end of the week!