I spent the entire weekend guiding on Red Lake and Lake of the woods again. The weather was a little cooler this weekend but the bite was pretty hot. We only spent one day fishing Lake of the Woods and it was a good one. Sunday we worked several areas 18-21 miles out and found fish in several locations. One gravel bar was holding a huge number of fish, plenty to keep everyone busy and the size was much nicer than last weekend. This picture is me with a couple that came in just under the slot.
We Fished from 7 AM unit 1 PM and that was plenty of time for everyone to catch their limit of walleye. As I said earlier the size was much better this weekend with most of the keeper fish going 16-19 inches. We didn’t catch many sauger or perch but we had a few of each. Just nothing huge like last weekend. We used Scenic Tackle Jigging spoons and chased around the active fish which made for some fast action at times.
The majority of the weekend was spent on Upper Red Lake. We spent one day chasing pike which ended up being very slow for the couple hours that we fished. The walleye were certainly willing to bite and we caught plenty but the pike did not cooperate. We did however catch quite a few pike while crappie fishing. This picture is Joel with a nice 32 incher. For our group I believe we caught 9 pike on the weekend with a few more broken lines.
The crappie fishing seemed to be good all day this weekend. If you were on a school a limit could be caught in less than 10 minutes. However, you had to stay after them. We worked hard staying after the bite but were lucky having the fish hold to one certain area all 3 days. In all, I believe we caught in excess of 170 Red Lake crappies this weekend. Small Scenic Tackle jigging spoons in Red Glow and Phelps Tick jigs worked well again. I also want to thank all my guide clients this weekend, it was a VERY busy weekend on the lake. We had some techincal difficulty with the camera on Red Lake so I am waiting for those pictures. I will get them up as soon as I get them. I am using this short week to recover but I will be back at it again this weekend!
Nice report. Did you need the services of a MORON on either lake?
Thanks for the info, you said you went out of LOW 18-21 miles. Were you fishing in Canada? Where can you drive out that far and still be in minnesota?
When you leave from the River you can easily go 21 miles. We could have went a lot farther yet. We were just South of Garden Island.
Gem–LOL, you remember that! No, we didn’t need a MORON on Red or LOW. As long as you are not drilling thru a hard house you are fine. There was one area on LOW where I drilled into a big drift of snow that I could not get through but other then that, I had 4 or 5 inches left.
But, I always bring my Moron with
Scott, I’ve never ice fished either of those lakes so I need to ask why you have to drive so far out to get fish?
Herb, I chose to drive out that far because basically the lake is a bowl until you get out that far. That is where the good structure starts, on the US side. Yes, there are some small reefs, and shallow reefs and gravel humps in closer but the good structure starts out farther if you are going out from the South end. There are several really good reefs around the twin islands, out off Long Point and Arenesons, but I usually go out of the South end.
I also chose to go that far because my clients are paying me good money to put them on fish and when I go out there, I don’t have to look at another person beside my clients. This weekend there was not another fisherman within 3 miles of us. Oh, and the bite was really bad close in.
On Red Lake we are only fishing out 4-5 miles.
Good info Scott. Pretty hard for this southern Iowa dude to imagine driving out that far on ice.
thanks
Thats a nice pike, escpecially to pull up in an ice shack.
Some Slab pictures, this is Tom with the Big fish of the weekend.
Some eaters
A couple more nice ones
Great fishing Scott, I went up for a day and a half and did not get into them. will make a short post prob tonight and put a picture on here I took of a nice young man holding a pair of 14’s. keep those pics coming. thanks Jack..
Hey Scott,
Looks like you guys had a great outing. I’m heading up to Red next Mon-Wed for the first time. For bait do you guys use wax worms or crappie minnows or a little of both? Also is it possible to shoot through the ice with a Marcum to mark fish before drilling? We’ll have 5 guys and 3 augers so if drilling is necessary that’s what we’ll do but if shooting through the ice works I would think it would save some time and manual labor. Also have you tried jigging spoons with 5-6″ droppers hanging off them? Are they something we should try? Thanks for the info.
Clark
Shooting through the ice will not work any more. It will take you as much work getting through the crust as it will to drill a hole.
Keep it simple. If you are on them, it does not matter what you are using. If you are not on them, the ones that come through will be finicky. Remember, when you are set up waiting for the bite, someone is already on their way off the lake with their limit. They are always biting somewhere on the lake, that is how I look at it.
Remember that?
HE77, I’ll never be able to forget it.
It has become a common euphemism in the ice fishing vocabulary for me and several of my buddies.
Although I may be the only one that knows who coined the phrase.
Gem, you can throw that out as Internet Trivia sometime
Pikester with some nice slabs
Couple more nice slabs
Everyone got in on the action
I know he caught more then the one in the picture
Nice report Scott. Sounds like we’ve been targeting the same general area. Looks like we’ll be heading up the 11&12 if my wife can get the 11th off.
Sounds like more people were doing well this past week. It had been a tough bite for a lot of folks this past month.
Catch you later.
Borch