The cooler weather seems to have started to put the bass on Minnetonka into somne of their fall patterns. In both a tournament last weekend and another this past Friday, I was not able to get on the schools of bass holding in the deep milfoil. Instead we had to resort to fishing docks to catch the majority of our fish. This first picture was my big fish Sunday and weighed 4lb 9oz. It was the 2nd big bass of the day behind a 4lb 13oz fish caught by Erik Jacobs out of the back of my boat. I still can’t believe I let that one slip by. Congrats to Erik though on that fish as well as a 2nd place in the tourny. The best baits on the docks for us were either Outkast stickworms or ring fries.
The smallies have also shown up with the cool temps. Both tournaments had fish in the 3-4lb range come in like the one here Jeff is holding. Some guys said they found them on deeper rocks, but the ones I found were shallow around docks that had rocks.
The pike and muskies have also started going real well. It seemes like once that water temp starts dropping, it is the trigger for them toothy critters to feed up. We didn’t hook any muskies, but had numerous follows, and know of 2 46" + fish boated.
Nice job Mike!
Mike,
Kind of early for a shift to fall patterns. September is definitely a time of change on Minnetonka. Unfortunately, the milfoil bite diminishes.
What is the water temperature?
Low to mid 60’s, with the temp under the miloil low 60’s. There are still fish in the foil, but for me it was one here, one there. Last week the docks went crazy with numbers of 3lb fish with a few bigger. Also saw fish coming on buzzbaits and spinnerbaits. Definatly a start to fall patterns.